To endure suffering ends suffering

I remember when I first tried full lotus posture 3 years ago. I thought it was not meant for a human body and I lasted only 1 min or less. It was extremely painful. I often hear people say, "posture is not important in meditation, you need to sit comfortably to meditate better, meditation is about mind, not body". and I ask, "but you don't know unless you try it. think about this... if this wasn't that important or that good, why would countless people have meditated in this posture. I guarantee that the pain is too much to bear if there wasn’t a good enough reward!!” (i speak from experience!)

Surely, the posture is not everything in meditation, and of course there are many other ways to cultivate. But I can tell you that... this is the best and fastest way to build a great foundation to meditate. Your mind will make countless reasons why your body is not fit for this.

I have tried to find good reasons why I don’t have to bear this indescribable pain for the past 3 years. I kept asking questions to my master and tried to convince him that my body is not good for this posture. After 3 years of continual attempts, I finally gave up. My master’s answer was always the same, go sit longer in full lotus and endure the pain no matter what reasons I brought to him. And I finally understood that all these reasons arise from my false mind. It's my ego! The posture is not important, but the pain of this posture put me through situations where my ego had to consistently reveal itself by telling me "I don't like it, it's too painful, maybe my legs will be messed up and so on". When the ego speaks, I dont even realize that it's the ego speaking. All I want is to unbuckle and release the pain.

When I finally succeeded to sit in full lotus for over an hour, I experienced the very worst and intensive pain. When the pain was finally gone, my mind was at peace. My ego tried its very best and gave it up. Don't you want to find out for yourself? Then you have to try it!

Master Hsuan Hua said "to endure suffering ends suffering". When it happened, I finally understood what he meant.