2. What is Chan?

Concentrating on a focal point is the key to success in everything

The method of sitting in meditation is essential to learn in cultivation. What does the word Chan mean? Chan is a Chinese abbreviation for the Sanskrit word, Dhyana. Dhyana means thought cultivation that leads to stilling our thoughts. Chan meditation is the method used to reach Dhyana, a stilling of our thoughts. Normally, when we sit, our minds wanders. Where do our minds go? They indulge in false thinking, which sends us anywhere our thoughts take us. Without having to pay for traveling, we can take a rocket trip. The false thoughts fly everywhere without restraint. Why is it people do not have wisdom? It is because the mind wanders about. Why do we age day-by-day? It is because the mind rushes to all sorts of places. Suppose someone drives a new car recklessly and aimlessly. Doing that will definitely consume and waste a lot of fuel.

Eventually, the car and its parts will be damaged and mechanical difficulties will result. This analogy applies to the human body as well. If we do not know how to take good care of it, if we endulge it without restraint, it will definitely consume a lot of ‘fuel’. What ‘fuel’ would that be? That fuel is our precious mental energy. No matter how many times we refuel, we keep using it up. Take for example people who consume tonics everyday, thinking that they are replenishing their bodies with nutrients
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If people do not treasure their mental energy and are selfindulgent, then no matter how much tonic they consume, they will never replenish the wasted energy. As a proverb says, “Concentrating on a focal point is the key to success in everything.”

We have to gather our thoughts and concentrate on a focal point. Then we will not deplete our mental energy. In other words, if we know how to drive well, we will not drive around recklessly and meet with an accident. Our car will also last longer. Similarly, if we know how to take care of ourselves, then it is possible to neither age nor die.