A very important part of our meditation practice is doing the right thing as much as possible (this is the 8-fold path). And one of the most critical components is making sure we have the right view and right thought. Do we know how to recognise good/fruitful from bad/unfruitful? Do we have the right concepts and ideas shaping our practice that will lead to the outcome we desire? This may seem like a foundational discussion to some advanced and very grounded practitioners, but I think it aims right at the heart of what meditation is and isn’t. Specifically: how the questions we ask lead to the answers we seek. Knowing the difference between how and why, in my opinion, is what separates a good practice from poor practice. Or at the very least, it helps clarify our purpose in meditation versus other more speculative-based modalities out there.

Why?

It is very often that I see people in various advanced/serious meditation forums asking lots of questions such as:

• “Why am I thinking about X so often?”
• “Why do I find X so appealing?”
• “Why does X hurt so much?”
• “Why do I feel so bad?”

These are all valid types of questions, however, they are not the types of questions we can answer in meditation. They’re the sort of questions that’ll lead you in a circle to nowhere when meditating. They are best left to your philosophical, psychological, self-help, and therapeutic contexts. Why (heh)? Because, in short, there is no meaning to your dukkha. Dukkha has no teleological purpose at all. It is meaningless. In the linguistic and/or semantic sense, the question of why is all about finding the meaning of things, purpose, grand narratives, etc… In our meditation, we will never find the meaning of things because, for the purposes of our practice, we need to know there is no meaning to it.

We can understand this practically by looking at dependent origination. If we assume there is a meaning to our suffering, we understand that there is some sort of inherent essence to the suffering. That is, we believe that suffering occupies some aspect of selfhood. In other words, there is something that can be clung to, craved, etc… Because if we find the meaning, the suffering is no longer in vain. If we find the reason why we suffer, we can be content suffering because now it’s good. It’s a bit like a conman telling you how putting gravel in your shoes will cure your bad posture, it’s a lie. And, we can also see that in believing the suffering is now good, we are setting ourselves up for future suffering — if we discover that the suffering didn’t serve a purpose to begin with. So, by asking why in the context of meditation, we are holding ourselves back and impeding real progress and actually increasing our dukkha by presuming something to be clung to in meaning for suffering; this in turn causes further craving for even more meaning. So, we must do away with this notion ASAP.

How?

So what are we actually doing in our meditation? We are finding out how.

• “How am I thinking about X so often?”
• “How do I find X so appealing?”
• “How does X hurt so much?”
• “How do I feel so bad?”

Instead of seeking meaning, we are looking at the process. The process is what we are all about in meditation. Process process process. The way things are fabricated to appear as they are to our ignorant minds. The question of how aims at finding out this exact thing for us.

How we suffer is a process, with discrete elements that can be uncovered, investigated, and eventually unmade to never come back. The next time we find a theme in our lives that bother us, we mustn’t jump to our ignorant first question of asking why. Instead, “how does this theme occur to my mind? How does it seem prominent?” Only then can you start breaking down how stimuli appear, get interpreted, and weaved into a story about “me”. And only the question of how does a self get extricated from the process of the investigation itself. The question of why always presupposes there is some centrality to the experience of suffering at hand with no reflection on how that presumption is itself a critical part of the problem. By taking the “me” out and assuming a process is occurring, we’re immediately starting in the right frame of mind for good investigation that’ll lead to the fruits of the path.

In short: if you ask shitty questions, you will get shitty answers. Input influences output. This is itself a (meta-)lesson about process vs meaning. Meditation practice is far closer to woodworking than philosophy — despite appearances. If you ask a woodworker why they make chairs you’ll get some tautological or vague answer. If you ask a woodworker how they make chairs, they will reveal to you their skill.

One of the most important teachings one can receive from contemplation is that of radical pragmatism. We aren’t here to philosophise about metaphysics, play linguistic games about definitions, or justify this or that position like in a court of law. No, we are just here to know how things are, how they are made, and how they can be unmade. If we ask ignorant questions we will get ignorant answers.

May this be of use to someone reading. Be well.