This post presents the following:
Additional motivations;
Relation between initial and ultimate motivations;
Criticism on some of the motivations.
1. Additional Motivations
Retreat participants—also called ‘students’—often mention among other things the following as their motivation to attend.
1.1 Answering “Who am I?”
This question often arises when one encounters obstacles to ‘authentic’ living. Due to our innate traits, upbringing, social circumstances, and life events, we acquire an identity that can make us feel limited in our actions. The Buddhadhamma claims to teach how to relinquish such hindrances. At the other end of the spectrum some people want to live a life of grandeur and excitement, in unrealistic ways. Meditation also can relinquish such illusions.
1.2 Finding a Purpose in Life
People may sometimes feel at a loss as to how to organize their lives. In The Empty Mirror1, author Jan Willem van de Wetering describes how, in 1958 at the age of 27, he knocked on the gate of a Zen monastery in Kyoto to ask whether he could meditate there. He was permitted in, provided he stayed for at least 11 months—and so it happened. During his first conversation with the Zen master, he was asked why he wanted to meditate. Jan Willem provocatively replied, “There’s only one thing I enjoy: drinking and sex.” The master’s unexpected reaction was: “Oh, but drinking and sex are very pleasant indeed! However, if these are the only things that give you satisfaction, then yes, you are in the right place here.”
The Buddhadhamma claims to teach purposeful living, based on generosity (versus greed), unconditional love (versus hatred), and wisdom (versus ignorance). These are claimed to be wholesome mind-states that lead to the attenuation—and eventually the elimination—of suffering, while greed, desire, and ignorance increase the likelihood of suffering.
1.3 Re-experiencing Extraordinary States
Some students report experiencing great mind-states during meditation: ecstatic concentration and sublime joy. In some cases, joy is replaced by serene equanimity. These states are called jhanas, and meditators often wish to repeat them. The jhanas are cultivated in forms of meditation that focus on concentration. They can also arise during Vipassana, either intentionally or as a side effect. These states are helpful but not strictly necessary for the realization of the ultimate goals of meditation.
1.4 Curiosity
A student may be curious about what meditation can offer. This was my own motivation. Since my early teenage years, I would have a strong ‘existential mind-state’ about once a year, on the border of being and non-being. I called it ‘experience A’. It lasted only a few seconds, was paradoxically both beautiful and terrifying, and felt deeply significant. For a long time, I didn’t understand it and couldn’t summon it at will. I hoped that meditation would allow me to relive it, for the sake of curiosity and further investigation. Through Japanese Zen meditation, the experience occasionally returned. Through Burmese Vipassana, the terrifying aspect became domesticated. Eventually, Tibetan Mahamudra meditation taught how to relax and let the domesticated experience A arise naturally. This quest took many years.
1.5 Appreciating Time
As children visiting grandparents or other relatives, time often feels different—a single day may feel like a year. As we grow older, a year may start feeling like a day. If the latter is the case, we only have at most a few months left to live. Meditation helps shift this perception of time back to the one during childhood special days. Then, we still have decades—or even centuries—to live.
1.6 Wise attention* [Added after seeing a post mentioning that, as observed by H. A. Simon, already in the 1960 we live in a world with an overdose of information and much more so in 2025, the following motivation is added.]
Being able to focus attention on wisely selected items and to disregard other information.
2. Initial and Ultimate Motivations
2.1 Lasting Effect
There is a distinct difference between initial and ultimate motivations for meditating. The initial goal for practitioners is to gain something—generally to feel better: less tension, more happiness. This inner drive is called ‘ego’, based on desire and aversion. Such an effect is certainly possible through meditation, but it is ephemeral. As external or inner conditions always change, one must work to maintain these better feelings, either by manipulating conditions or by changing one’s response to them. The ultimate motivation of meditation, on the other hand, is to sustainably relinquish this inner drive toward particular mind-states. This brings freedom through a wider space of choice possibilities.
2.2 Changing Personality
The promises of both the initial and ultimate goals of meditation include the reduction of suffering. In the initial goal, this means less tension and more satisfaction; in the ultimate goal, it means freedom—achieved by attenuating and eventually eliminating aversion and desire. One might wonder what motivation remains once the ultimate goal is reached. At that point, motivation will be based on loving-kindness and generosity. While desire creates a separation between us and others, generosity creates connection. Similarly, aversion creates separation, while loving-kindness takes others’ needs into account.
2.3 Forms of Buddhadhamma
The legend The Life of the Buddha (Buddhacarita, written around 100 AD by the monk and poet Ashvagosha) recounts how Indian crown prince Gautama Siddhartha, who lived a life of luxury in his palace, asked his driver to take him outside the royal gardens. He was shocked to discover the impermanence of life—realizing that everyone, including himself, would one day die. He was also impressed by having seen the serenity of a mendicant monk. Inspired by this, Siddhartha left his palace to seek the meaning of life, despite its transient nature. After six years of searching, he found his answer and became the Buddha, the liberated one.
From then on, he started the oral tradition of transmitting the Buddhadhamma—the teaching of the Buddha—including behavioral rules and meditation methods to develop concentration and insight leading to liberation. These teachings were written down only centuries later, by which time 18 different schools of Buddhism already existed, each with its own interpretation. As the book Buddhist Religions: A Historical Perspective2 notes, this diversity means there is no single “correct” dhamma. In these pages, we speak of the Buddhadhamma as we have understood it—shaped by reading, oral teachings from masters, meditation, and personal insight. The monk Nyanaponika Thera (1901–1994) recommends viewing the Buddhadhamma not as dogma, but as a science akin to physics.
2.4 The Main Traditions
The main traditions that have come to us are called Theravada, Mahayana, and Vajrayana, each consisting of a group of related liberation paths.
Theravada—sometimes pejoratively called Hinayana (“the small path”)—is practiced in Southeast Asia and promotes as liberation paths Vipassana meditation. It focuses on the ultimate goal of meditation: the attenuation and eventual eradication of suffering. An initial less demanding and more widely accessible version includes popular mindfulness courses, aimed at relieving tension and increasing happiness. These may be a stepping stone to Vipassana.
Mahayana (the large path), which includes Zen meditation, developed in India, China, Korea, and Japan. It considered the full eradication of suffering to be too demanding for (lay) practitioners. Instead, Mahayana encourages ritual, meditation, and social improvement through loving-kindness and generosity.3
Vajrayana (the Diamond Vehicle) emerged in India and was further developed in Tibet. After the Tibetan diaspora in 1959, it spread to other countries. This tradition combines insight for liberation with a focus on creating a more compassionate world.
A schematic view.
In strict Theravada, one follows from ‘Start’ the arrow to the right until having eradicated all unwholesome mental states, becoming a fully liberated Arhat. This is considered the endpoint. The bullets indicate moments of liberation at four levels as explained below.
In Mahayana and Vajrayana, going upwards from ‘Start’, practitioners begin by cultivating loving-kindness and generosity. Zen also emphasizes discipline, explained in the next post. Upon making the Bodhisattva vow—a resolution to help all beings achieve liberation before oneself—they commit to continue working toward enlightenment while supporting others.
Vajrayana encourages a combination of Mahayana compassion and Theravada insight, going to the right from ‘Bodhisattva’ aiming to eventually become a Buddha. In traditions involving rebirth, the Bodhisattva vow includes the intention to be reborn to continue the work.
A flexible teaching style is sometimes called ‘Suttayana’, the diagonal path based on the Buddha’s original discourses (Suttas), which did not prescribe a single path but used a variety of suitable approaches.
2.5 Four Levels of Liberation
According to the Theravada tradition, liberation is described in four levels, each associated with the attenuation or relinquishment of specific unwholesome tendencies (also called “fetters”). We list some principal fetters.
First Level: Stream-enterer
This stage removes Wrong View—the belief in a permanent, independent self.Second Level: Once-returner
At this level, sensual desire and ill will are significantly weakened.Third Level: Non-returner
Here, sensual desire and ill will are completely eradicated. The practitioner no longer seeks gratification through the senses and is free from aversion.Fourth Level: Arhat
The final stage involves the eradication of deeper tendencies, of which an important one is mana (often translated as ‘conceit’ or ‘pride’). A more nuanced understanding of mana is: “the tendency to maintain a fixed self-image.” It indicates some rigidity. For example, consider the metaphor of a wallflower—someone who would like to dance but stands in the background, believing they are not worthy. This self-fulfilling mind-state, is also a form of mana.
At this fourth stage, restlessness and sleepiness are also eradicated.
To summarize, the progressive relinquishment involves:
Wrong View
Ill Will
Sensual Desire
Mana (conceit, rigidity)
Other latent tendencies also dissolve in this process, but these four highlight the core of the transformations.
3. Criticism on Some of the Motivations
3.1 Goal versus No Goal
In Theravada, Vipassana meditation is described as having a goal—liberation. However, in Zen (Mahayana), the practitioner is often told that “there is no goal.” At best Zen would state “The path is the goal.” These look like disagreeing views, but the contradiction is only apparent. The statement in Zen is not denying the possibility of transformation, but rather a pedagogical method to avoid fixating on outcomes, which can become an obstacle. Think of a child who wants to be a musician and asks after a few lessons, “Am I already a musician?” The teacher then smiles saying, “Just keep playing and enjoy the music.” Likewise, Zen tells us: “just practice.” Thus, in some meditation traditions, the goal is deliberately denied for didactic reasons.
3.2 Spiritual Materialism
Meditation can lead to highly pleasurable mind-states known as jhanas (also seen in Christian mysticism). These states offer deep satisfaction—but they are not the goal of meditation. The reason is that these states are not permanent and can create complacency. They may even inflate the ego, thus reinforcing what meditation seeks to dissolve. This attitude, known as spiritual materialism, is discouraged by teachers. Still, the jhanas are valuable—though not indispensable—tools that support the path when used skillfully.
3.3 Politics
Karl Marx once wrote“Religion is the opium of the people.” He critiqued religion—and perhaps meditation by extension—as a tool to pacify the oppressed, discouraging rebellion against injustice. In The Capital, Marx called for technological progress to reduce suffering4. Meditation might seem like a retreat from social responsibility. But this criticism misses the point. A wise approach to reacting to worldly affairs is possible, as stated in the ‘Serenity Prayer’ by American theologian Reinhold Niebuhr5.
Oh, God, give us courage to change what must be altered,
serenity to accept what cannot be helped,
and insight to know the one from the other.
The meditation path cultivates confidence, acceptance, and clarity. If possible, we can change things. If not, we better accept them. To distinguish between the two, a consideration based on calm attention is more useful than impulsive actions that might lead to regret. This Serenity Prayer aligns with Stoic philosophy, especially as taught by Epictetus, who distinguished between what is under our control and what is not.
3.4 Nihilism
Critics sometimes say: “If meditation means giving up everything—including identity—then that is death, not joy.” Thus, they accuse the path of being nihilistic. But the emptiness spoken of in the Buddhadhamma is not nothingness—it is the awareness of absence, not annihilation. It is freedom from compulsive grasping, not apathy. Bhikkhu Analayo, in Abiding in Emptiness (based on the Cula- and Maha-Suññata Suttas, Majjhima Nikaya 121 and 122), points out that dwelling in emptiness is a purified, undistorted awareness.
The following statement, from the Buddhadhamma, is valuable and worth investigating during our practice. “Experiencing one moment of such calm emptiness is worth more than a hundred years without it.” The following quote was inspired by the partner of a Dhamma teacher. “People desperately look for a hold in the quicksand of thingness, while they can find it in [the experience of] no-thingness.” The latter is like an empty space in which the phenomena of our perception are projected as a hologram.
The philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre used an invented verb to express the value of nothingness: “to denothing (néantiser)” rather than “to destroy (annihiler).” It means something like “dissolving into nothingness” and applies, for example, to an emotion. We see that Sartre was careful not to be mistaken as a nihilist.
3.5 Adverse Effects
Students of meditation may encounter unpleasant mind-states. During the early phase of the meditation path, this is understandable. In corners of our consciousness, there may be unhappy memories. To relinquish the nagging effect of these, they need to be revisited with calm equanimity. The suffering caused by these memories can be domesticated by observing the stream of patterns they form—how they arise, create feelings and emotions, and then pass away. If the memory is traumatic, then in order to reach sufficient concentration, the student may first need one-on-one coaching or therapy before addressing the issue in their meditation practice. All of this is challenging, but generally understandable to the student and eventually doable.
In the middle phase of the meditation path, more unexpected existential discomforts may arise—such as fear, delusion, and disenchantment. These and similar states are referred to in the tradition as: “Things that may happen.”
Having a theoretical understanding of why these effects occur makes them more bearable. Our perception of the world is shaped not only by what surrounds us but also by our expectations, attention, desires, and fears. As such, our worldview is very personal. Yet we often mistake it for objective reality. When two people’s worldviews conflict, tension or even violence may result. It is important to realize that what we perceive as “the world” is in fact a mental construction, a virtual reality.
Even more personal is our sense of self. But it is another virtual reality. Realizing this intuitively gives the experience of non-self. The path toward the ultimate goal of insight meditation reveals that both our worldview and our self-view are personally developed virtual realities. This insight can cause the adverse effects described earlier. It feels as if we break apart. But the insight is also liberating. If the student is well prepared, the transition through this “dark night of the soul” can proceed smoothly, sometimes requiring only a day or two6.
Insight meditation cultivates this flexibility in how we relate to both the worldview and the self-view—treating them as dynamic processes, not fixed entities.
Lack and Spleen, mentioned in the previous post, are symptoms of the felt absence of a self. The ultimate goal of insight meditation is to train a flexibility attitude—so that one can do the following. Instantly create an adequate self when needed and let go of it when it is no longer needed; or rest peacefully in its absence.
A poem on an ink-drawings of Zen monk Gibon Sengai (1750–1837) hints at this liberated state, to which the student is drawn.
Patience Perhaps there are winds that only please the weeping willow.
The weeping willow is happy with all winds—and with none whatsoever. (R. H. Blyth)
The Empty Mirror, Jan Willem van de Wetering, St. Martin's Griffin, 1973. Original Dutch version: De Lege Spiegel, Saga, 2021.
Buddhist Religions, A Historical Introduction, R. H. Robinson, W. L. Johnson, Thanissaro Bhikkhu, Fifth Edition, Wadsworth Cengage Learning, 2005.
Some teachers of Zen, including Linji (Rinzai, ?-866 AD), find this Mahayana goal too limited and encouraged their students to go for the real thing: full liberation. This is also the case for other Mahayana branches.
In the book Marx in the Anthropocene, Cambridge University Press, 2022, by Kohei Saito, it is claimed that Marx later realized that unchecked production harms the environment, an insight underemphasized in Das Kapital (which Engels completed). The book is a plea for degrowth.
Evidence for the attribution to Niebuhr.
As reassurance, I tell students: “Wearing prism glasses that invert up and down can make your world feel upside down. After a day or two, the mind adapts. Removing the glasses causes disorientation again. Eventually, the mind becomes flexible.”