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LETTER TO A STUDENT
The following is excerpted from a letter written by Master Yin Zhao Shakya.
Nothing that lives makes its first appearance fully grown. A Zen practice is a living creature and like all living creatures it is the result of desire, conception, gestation and birth. And that is only the beginning.
If you want to raise your practice to a higher level, you must be prepared to work for it when you're tired, to attend to it when you're sleepy, and to nurture it above all other commitments you've made.
Devotion to the Dharma can't be second to anything else. Yes, many parts of your life can fit into the Dharma. But the Dharma can't be thought of as something that's an important but small part of your life - a part that you can fit into your schedule whenever it's convenient. The only attitude that works is to fit your "off-work" schedule into your practice.
You say that because you had trouble with the music meditation, you tried other methods - also without success. Going from one method to another is not a strategy for success. Learning how to concentrate and to lose your ego-self in an activity is too important to abandon after a few weeks or months of practice.
As to the music meditation, you were listening to orchestral music and perhaps that was part of the problem. Someone who has musical training can focus on the composition and its performance, the nuances and other technical features of the piece. You have no technical appreciation of music - and neither do I. For enjoyment, I, too, listen to classical music; but preferring the classics is not a reason to use them in the music meditation. Symphonies and concertos lack lyrics. We habituate to a melody quickly. It's when we explore the different levels of meaning in the lyrics that we can keep our attention engaged in much the same way a koan can engage us. So unless you're listening to opera and are fluent in the language being sung, your best bet is to concentrate on music sung in English. Focussing on the words and finding a word or a line or two that have special meaning is more important than you think.
I listen to old Rock and Roll albums. Sometimes when my mind fixes on a line, the line will suddenly fill with significance, and I get a charge of excitement, a kind of high. It's a form of Zen Disease.
Words are processed on the left side of the brain; but when you start to enter the meditative state you are mostly in the centers on the right side where words and phrases are alien. You then have to probe and discover a new kind of intuitive understanding, a new kind of illumination. Occasionally you can get a glimpse of the process when you're reading - and really concentrating on a passage, and for some peculiar reason an ordinary word looks strange. You question its spelling. It doesn't seem correct. And the more it baffles you and captures your attention, the more it can lead you into the wonderment of discovery. In a kind of "Ahaa" moment, an entire line can be infused with profound significance. The line can be so meaningful that it will stay with you and act as a triggering mechanism for re-establishing a meditative connection.
"Then one day you find ten years have got behind you.
No one told you when to run. You missed the starting gun."
-- Pink Floyd
You don't have to make a big investment in CDs, trying different groups to find one that uses lyrics that appeal to you. Go to a store that sells used CDs and buy yourself a bunch of albums.
As to the rest of your program, you need to follow a specific order of "skills." Whenever you're working on a program that has steps, don't move up to a higher step until you have mastered the one you're on. For now, you should start over and forget what you've done in the past. Clean the slate. Just assume that you know nothing.
It isn't reasonable to think that if you can't perform a basic program, you'll succeed with an advanced program. First, you need to accustom yourself to entering the meditative state in a controlled effort. If you don't want to use the music method, that's fine. Use any of the traditional meditation methods. But don't leave the basics until you've learned them.
Also, although I advise a male student to be competent in meditation before he begins any Kundalini type program, I appreciate that this is often a man's introduction to the spiritual life. If you do decide to pursue this method, I suggest that you start with the Ajna chakra, the chakra that is located in the center of the forehead, just above the eyes. You've probably read books that start a Kundalini program at the Muladhara or base chakra. In my view, and in the view of a few other teachers, this is a serious mistake. The first spiritual center that should be opened is Ajna.
The first goal is to develop the ability to concentrate on the Ajna Chakra. See it as a light disk in the forehead as seen on the Dao Wall Rubbing. Ajna means "command" and this is the obvious place to start since it is the Ajna that gives us control over the forces we unleash in the course of the chakra program. Also, when this chakra is awakened and stimulated, an inner alchemical (transformative) agent is released. This agent begins the cultivation of prajna - the feminine, "lunar" power of wisdom - as in the Pranjaparamita.
At the outset, the Ajna will give you the wisdom to be cooler and more balanced in your appraisal of events. It provides an insight into the truth of things, and a respect for "solar" intelligence that prevents it from degenerating into intellectualism. Prajna "completes" the Kundalini's sexual force, maturing and deepening it. Activation of the Muladhara chakra usually initiates a strong sexual response along with a tendency to react emotionally to ordinary situations. Without the control of Ajna, people easily lose control of their practice and then it then becomes something that has nothing to do with Zen Buddhism or enlightenment. By activating the Ajna first, the rest of the chakras or gates are smoothly traversed.
Before you activate Kundalini energy you should also clear the twelve pairs of psychic "meridian" channels. This also develops an ability to concentrate and to create a ball of light which you can circulate through your body via the meridian channels. See this ball of light as a small sphere that rests in the beginning of the first meridian, the Lung. Whenever you mentally succeed in pushing the ball to the end of one meridian, imagine that it arcs across to the beginning of the next meridian. When you come to the end of the Lung meridian mentally jump across to the second meridian, the Large Intestine. Continue to do this throughout the course. When you come to a meridian that splits into two branches, just make twins of the one ball of light, and then reunite them when the two paths again coincide. As you push the ball through the meridians, it will glow more brightly. When you are ready to start a chakra program you can send the energy down the Conception channel and then let it rise through the Governor or Sushumna channel to the various chakras or gates.
But first devote yourself to your pracice. Don't be anxious for results, always looking ahead to the next level. Each part of the practice is a source of great satisfaction.
Go to: Master Yin Zhao's Biography 
