I spent my first years at Louisiana State Penitentiary in solitary confinement. I was detained 23 hours a day in a cell that was just slightly larger than a king-size mattress.
I now think of that period in solitary as wasted time. I could have been meditating.
Why meditate?
For the last year I’ve sat zazen — a Japanese term that translates to “seated meditation” or “seated practice” — for half an hour daily. But why?
Norman Fisher thought the answer was, “To relieve suffering.” Venerable H. Gunaratan Mhathera wrote that the answer is personal transformation: “The you that goes in one side of the meditation experience is not the same you that comes out the other side.”
Incarcerated people certainly suffer, and they often have a vested interest in personal transformation. However, my favorite answer to the question, “Why meditate?” is: “Why not?”
Do people in prison honestly have anything better to do with that 10 to 20 minutes a day they could be meditating? Nobody is suggesting you give up working on your legal appeal or abandon your exercise routine. But I’m betting there’s space in your day you aren’t using.
The reason I consider my time in solitary wasted is that I didn’t “do” anything. I spent my time waiting to be let out of the cells. I watched about a million movies, read about a billion books and masturbated a lot. The problem with that approach is that life doesn’t pause just because you don’t want to act.
Robert Aitken Roshi recommends treating zazen as an experiment. This is a good way to approach meditation. It’s something you try, to see if it works. Meditation works for me. It might work for you. Here’s how to get started.
Where to sit
First, find some quiet. If you are doing time in solitary, you won’t have much choice in where you sit. If you are confined to a multi-person cell, your problem will be selecting a time and negotiating respect. As a general rule, if you ask politely, people will respond politely.
If you are in the general population, then you should have more options. I’m fortunate. My current institutional job is clerking for a faith-based drug rehabilitation program. This allows me to use a small office to do my meditation. I can duck off into relative silence and privacy.
If your prison has a church or chapel, you might consider asking permission to sit inside it during off-hours. If incarcerated people at your institution have rooms or offices, like me, you could ask to borrow one. If you absolutely have to, you can meditate in the dormitory. Meditating in such a shared space is less than ideal, but it’s not impossible, especially in the early morning or late at night when there’s a minimum of people awake to distract you or give you funny looks.
Wherever you are, choose a place with a plain view. Zen meditation is traditionally done facing an undecorated wall to avoid distractions.
How to sit
I like to make the effort to sit on the floor on an improvised “zafu,” or meditation cushion, made of blankets and sweatshirts. But you can also meditate in a chair, a pew or on your bunk with your thighs parallel to the floor.
If you are sitting on the floor, you’ll need to decide what to do with your legs. The traditional posture is the full lotus, with your feet on your thighs. I sit Burmese style, a compromise where you keep your knees to the floor and ankles parallel.
Whatever you choose, your spine should be straight, each vertebrae stacked one above the other. Hands should be cupped over one another and rest on your lap with the palms turned upward, your thumbs barely touching. This creates an oval called the “mudra.”
How to breathe
Now, find your breath’s natural rhythm. Count your breaths as high as 10 and the start over. Breathe in — one. Breathe out — two. In … out … in …
While you’re doing this, don’t close your eyes. If you take away visual input, your mind has more bandwidth to devote to your other senses and becomes easily distracted. Instead, adopt a soft, blurred gaze directed down and in front of you. I’m reminded that I’m in the real world but I’m not overly invested in what’s in front of me.
What to do with your mind
When you sit zazen, you want to think of nothing, which is difficult. As soon as you sit and tell yourself, “Don’t think,” your mind will go into overdrive.
The trick is to focus on your breathing. When a thought rises from the depths of your mind, don’t snatch it. Let it go on its way. If you catch yourself replaying moments from your past or having a sexual fantasy or composing a personal essay to submit to PJP, don’t freak out but also don’t follow the thread. Let it go and return to counting your breaths.
One … two … three … I wonder what’s for lunch today … one … two … three … What was the name of that movie? The one with Jennifer Lawrence … one … two …
And so on and so forth forever.
Be patient with yourself
You train your mind the way I see guys here train service dogs. The hardest command these pups struggle with is “side.” When it hears that, the dog is supposed to park itself next to the trainer’s ankle and sit.
The part that’s difficult is staying still. The dog can barely go a few seconds before its nose starts twitching. At that point the trainer gives a gentle emphasis or tug on the leash with just enough pressure to remind the dog what it’s supposed to be doing.
None of the dogs master this in a day. A dog that’s undergone a year’s worth of training still needs to have its leash pulled now and again. And that’s OK. The best trainers are endlessly patient.
Whenever you catch your mind drifting away from your breath, gently remind it what it is supposed to be doing. Be endlessly patient.
These are the basics of meditation. There are times in your life when there is nothing to do, times when nothing can be done. Prison is full of those. Meditation is, in my opinion, the best way to do nothing.
