In Reflective Meditation, I sometimes say we are the “describe your experience” school of Buddhism. After you meditate, we invite you to describe your experience—first to yourself, and then, if you choose, to others. This simple act of recalling and articulating what happened becomes part of the practice. It’s how we learn from the bodymind we actually have, not the one we think we should have.
In our descriptions we may find ourselves using one-word labels. Labeling our experience is an ordinary habit, and Buddhist traditions have long used it—from early instructions in the Foundations of Mindfulness on knowing the body, feelings or mind-states, to later insight practices that instruct meditators to lightly name or note what’s happening right after it occurs in meditation.
We take this in a softer, more personal direction because we often see that the label holds deeper meaning for us, that we collect ourselves around them. “Tired,” “hopeful,” “scattered,” “curious”—these aren’t just categories; they’re small doors into a wider landscape.
A few ways I see labeling work in our practice daily:
- Taking away the topic of a dharma talk. After we listen, a theme or phrase may stay with us. Beginning a meditation with that word can feel focusing. Sometimes it carries through the whole meditation; sometimes it drops away and something else takes over.
- A word or image emerging during meditation. It wakes us up a little. We may feel curious about what it means. Sometimes these words, images, or feelings do hold deeper meaning; other times they seem nonsensical or mysterious. It’s hard not to attribute something to them, so become more interested in what you do with them. Often they feel like gifts to me.
- A word that carries more dukkha than we can feel right then. Even a single word can hold sorrow, trauma, or discomfort. Describing our experience in meditation can translate into everyday life description; discerning when to go deeper, when to stay put, and when to stretch a little further.
I want to return to learning from the bodymind we actually have—not the one we think we should have. This is true personally for us as individuals and also in how we live with one another in the world. We keep meeting what is here, not what would be here if we were more disciplined, more spiritual, more healed, more anything.
Recently I’ve been reading an article by Bhikkhu Analayo, a Theravada monk and scholar, titled Emptiness Requires Contextualization. It’s a response to a school of thought re-emerging in Buddhism that emphasizes a context-free attainment of emptiness. I used to be able to read these kinds of articles and formulate my own response. But from where I stand today—not only in years and body complaints, but also in the responsibility of caring for injured family members, compounded by the larger political stress—I find I can only take away a few words.
It’s interesting to notice which ones stuck: Thus I have heard. Analayo points out that before the Buddha’s teachings were given, there was almost always an introduction—a way of noting where he was standing that day. Literally, naming the place, but also using words to orient his listeners to the context from which the teachings arose: “Just after his awakening,” or “Soon after a monk had left the discipline and Ananda took his role,” or “Soon after the schism when Devadatta departed.” Even important deaths functioned as markers: “Soon after two disciples had attained final nirvana.”
These introductions weren’t just formalities. They reminded listeners that the teachings arise from somewhere—from a moment, a condition, a pressure, a relationship, a change.
And this brings me back to our practice. When we describe our meditation experience, we are also saying our own quiet version of thus I have heard. We are situating the dharma in the conditions of our actual lives: in an aging body, in a stressed household, in a world that is politically charged, in a mind that today is hopeful, or scattered, or grieving.
Our words—simple as they are—become a way of acknowledging where we are standing. They give context. They reveal conditions. And they help us meet the bodymind we have with a little more collectedness, a little more humility, and some kindness.
