IU Zen meets to meditate, sit silently twice weekly

Twice a week in the Bryan Room, on the eighth floor of the Student Building, IU students and Bloomington residents meet to sit in silence for 30 minutes.

They practice Zazen, or sitting meditation.

The essential art of Zazen is letting thoughts go, or non-thinking, according to Bloomington’s Sanshin Zen Community Web site.

Joe McGibbon, the organizer of IU Zen, begins and ends each session with three rings of a bell. Between, there is soundless meditation.

IU Zen meets from 6:30 to 7 p.m. Mondays and noon to 12:30 p.m. Fridays in the Bryan Room. For instruction on how to meditate, participants can arrive 10 minutes early.

“I’ve seen in my own experience that practicing meditation is a foundation for living a happy and peaceful way of life,” McGibbon said. “It helps me and helps other people to be more aware of what’s going on.”

Participants meditate facing away from each other. They sit on zabatons, or mats, supporting their weight with a zafu, or cushion, in one of several positions.

In the lotus position, one sits cross-legged with both feet tucked upward. In the half-lotus, only one leg is situated above the other.

One can also kneel, resting on a wooden seat for balance. The back is straight, and the hands form an “O” at the navel. One focuses on breathing slowly, counting 10 breaths and starting over.

McGibbon, an IU graduate and religious studies major, has been involved with IU Zen for two years. He began practicing Zazen while studying Buddhism but emphasized that IU Zen is open to everyone.

“IU Zen is not about being religious or not religious,” McGibbon said. “Anyone can meditate.”

Alex Smith, a second-year master’s student who began attending IU Zen sessions last semester, finds many benefits to the practice.

“It helps me get to know my own mind and be present in my own life,” Smith said. “By meditating I’m taking time to step back.”

Ivy Tech student Jordan Tredelman has been attending IU Zen for four years.

“You come to the point where you’re not doing it for any particular reason,” Trendelman said.

Eighty-three-year-old participant Richard Hendrickson has been practicing Zazen for eight years using a guiding principal as his reason for continuing to do it.

“Supposedly it will liberate all being,” Hendrickson said. “That’s what they say.”
IU students who do not meditate said a heavy workload takes priority.

“I’ve never really thought about it, I’ve got too much work,” freshman Jared Basssaid.

Zazen can help people learn to relax and live in the present moment, McGibbon said. It can also reduce stress and anxiety, improve sleep patterns and increase concentration. Zazen focuses on one’s existence in the present, to be oneself and sit.

“The now is all we’ve got,” Hendrickson said.