3 Key Moments for Shinzen Young

So, in your probably early experiences with meditation can you recall any key moments when you realized experientially that wo?

This is this is shifting the nature of my experience in a way I hadn't expected.

Probably the first T moment.

Came a few months into the practice.

When I started to notice that at the end of our set.

The Voice that had always been screaming in my head.

Although it was still present it was like, at a distance. It wasn't screaming anymore.

I didn't have to listen to it.

Instantly I never experienced anything like that was like the internal talk by the end of a set the internal talk hadn't gone away. But he was like, at a distance who was muffled.

That wasn't you know.

Whole New World for me.

So I went to my teacher and I said, my sitting scotting getting interesting and he said. Oh, in what way and I described this phenomenon.

And he said Oh that's good, you're starting to go into Samadi.

Into a state of high concentration.

So.

Then he said now you have anything that you experience on the cushion.

You must eventually be able to experience in daily life.

And I thought This is crazy. I could barely get a little heut of that quieting of internal talk.

Um.

After an hour of focusing on my breath? How can I possibly maintain this in daily life and he said. Well, you can just do it that was a pivotal experience that was really new and something that who would have ever thought. That was possible for someone like me to experience even a few moments of quiet of internal self talk.

I would say the second dramatic thing that ever happened to me came.

At the end of my first week long. Zen retreat in Japan, which was this ***** Riffic killer ordeal. It was in the summer very first night they like broke 3 sticks over People think the mosquitoes like an inch long that could bite you through your clothes.

And it was like you know, Japan is very moist, so In summary you're just like sweating right.

And you're not allowed to move at all. No matter what and by the way this is a good example of what I mean by horrifically bills that I would like People, not to have to go through by working smart with precise vocabulary. But.

Because if we talk about this People say, Hey, you know who would ever put themselves in that they don't see themselves in that scenario.

So you don't have to do this kind of thing, but the first time I did do. That kind of thing I buy the and I nearly had lost my marbles. I was starting to have insane ideations, literally insane thoughts.

Like a torture victim basically and my whole body was shaking with pain and I thought I was going to cry. I was, I was sure I was just going to start bawling.

And it was the last.

Set of the last day.

And I was just holding on and in my whole body was shaking and I was just holding on for dear life.

And I realized I was about to cry, but not just crime, I mean ball breakdown.

And I started to scream in my talk space. You're not a baby. Don't Cry. You're not a baby? Don't cry like that over and over again.

And.

Suddenly.

For no reason.

I dropped into equanimity.

Big time.

It wasn't just the quiet OK that I've described before my entire being dropped into a spontaneous equanimity.

The way you know that's happened is the pain level is.

Exactly the same but the suffering level.

Dramatically.

Reduces or perhaps even goes away.

And in this particular instance.

The suffering completely went away, so I went from.

Near fainting level of pain.

To my body totally relaxed.

Yes, the internal talk turned off.

And the pain turned to do a kind of flowing enerji that was just massage in my being.

And it was like I could have stayed there forever. The physical body was literally breaking up into a flow of spirit.

And.

Then the Bell Rang.

That ended that set.

I was never the same because.

You know you can hear somebody say this but.

If you haven't experienced it. Why should you believe it and I would have never believed that that could be the case.

So that was extremely dramatic a few years later, one day at the end of day, I sat down. I haven't meditated that day, I was doing self inquiry at that time.

Asking, who am I.

And at the end of the day, I sat down and I said, who am I. I looked at my boundaries.

And they vanished.

And they never came back.

And I was tired, the same ever I didn't said I just got up.

I got up I just started to walk around and communicate with the walls.

And they were.

Me.

And so is the whole world.

And next morning, you want to went to bed that night. I thought well that's going to go away, you know it's like.

Woke up the next morning.

It was there an it never went away ever my whole life, I was, I've been privileged.

That was after I'd meditated for about.

For years, so it's been 40 years now, so I like 3536 years ago.

And it has nothing to do with Out concentrated your heart is just is.

That was obviously huge watershed there that's what gives me the confidence to teach.