How to Enter Meditative Concentration Quickly

When sitting in meditation, if one contemplates the meaning of the Dharma, one enters meditative concentration (samādhi) faster than by silently reciting the Heart Sutra and mantras, and the concentration is deeper; it is faster than entering concentration by regulating the breath, and faster than entering concentration by any other method. This is true for those of keen faculties (indriya) with light afflictions and few wandering thoughts, because such people already have a foundation in cultivating concentration, so the preparatory expedient methods can be omitted. But for beginners in concentration who are heavily prone to grasping at objects and whose minds are full of thoughts, the more they contemplate, the more scattered their minds become; without meditative concentration, contemplation is just scattered thinking—a scattered mind full of random thoughts—so they should wait until they have a foundation in meditative concentration before contemplating. When I take my seat and cross my legs, I use no preparatory method at all; I go directly into deep contemplation. There is no thinking by the mind consciousness—it is all deliberation (manasikāra) by the manas. After crossing my legs, I first focus on the Dharma that needs to be contemplated, and then I settle on that Dharma without moving, without a single wandering thought. This is the state of the manas investigating Chan (canchan).

The deliberation of the manas is deep and slow, but thorough; the thinking of the mind consciousness is fast and shallow, not thorough or penetrating. Thinking by the mind consciousness is a preparatory expedient, whose purpose is to arouse the contemplation of the manas; at the very beginning, this is a process that must be gone through. In the deliberation and investigation by the manas, there is almost no knowledge to be gained, and one's store of knowledge does not increase, yet it is very interesting—there is a deep flavor of exploration, a delight of vaguely sensing that something is about to be discovered. What is developed is the wisdom within one's own field of mind; this wisdom is not obtained from outside—what is obtained from outside is only knowledge. At this level, one no longer feels tired; I can sit for a whole morning, or even a whole day. It is only when there are concerns weighing on my mind that I have to come down from the seat.