How to Sit
How to Sit
A beginner's guide to zazen, step by step
The best way to learn is in person, and we will offer a short orientation before each sitting for anyone who is new. Still, it helps to know what you are walking into. Read this once, and let the rest be learned on the cushion.
See it for yourself
This short film walks through the posture and breath of zazen. It is a clear, gentle place to start before you read the steps below.
- 01
Your seat
You may sit on a cushion on the floor or in a chair, and neither is more advanced than the other. On the floor, most people sit cross-legged on a firm round cushion, or kneel astride a cushion in the posture called seiza. In a chair, sit toward the front edge with both feet flat on the floor. What matters is a base that is stable and comfortable enough to hold for a while.
- 02
Your spine
Let your back be upright and self-supporting, lengthening gently from the base of your spine through the crown of your head, the way a mountain rests on the earth. Settle your shoulders, soften your belly, and draw your chin very slightly in. The posture is alert and dignified, awake rather than rigid.
- 03
Your hands
Rest your right hand in your lap, palm up, and lay your left hand in its palm, also facing up. Let the tips of your thumbs meet lightly above, forming a soft oval. This shape is called the cosmic mudra, and it becomes a small, sensitive mirror of your state: when you grow drowsy the thumbs fall apart, and when you tense they press together, so the hands themselves teach you to stay balanced.
- 04
Your eyes
In our tradition the eyes stay open, lowered to rest softly on the floor a few feet in front of you, the gaze unfocused. Keeping the eyes open keeps you here, in the room and in your life, rather than drifting into a private dream. Many of us sit facing a blank wall, following Dogen and the teachers before him, so that there is nothing to look at and nothing to look away from.
- 05
Your breath
Let your breathing be natural, through the nose, settling low in the belly. There is no special way to breathe. Simply let the attention ride on the breath, following each exhale as it goes out and dissolves. If it helps you settle at first, you can silently count your breaths, one through ten, beginning again at one whenever you lose the thread, which you will, often, and that is fine.
- 06
Your mind
Here is the part everyone worries about. You are not trying to empty your mind or to stop your thoughts, which cannot be done and is not the point. Thoughts will come, plans and memories and the whole busy parade of them. The practice is simply to notice, the moment you realize you have been carried off, and to return without scolding yourself to your posture and your breath. You will do this a thousand times in a single sitting. Each return is not a failure; each return is the practice itself, and there is no way to do it wrong.
How long, and what comes next
We sit for periods that run between twenty-five and forty-five minutes, depending on the morning, with slow walking meditation, called kinhin, in between. If you are new and that feels long, sit for as much of it as you can and rest when you need to. No one is watching or judging your stillness. Over time the body learns to settle, the periods come to feel shorter, and the quiet begins to feel less like effort and more like home.
When you come to sit with us, arrive a little early and we will walk you through all of this gently, in person, before we begin.