To Get Back There

Excerpt from The Science of Enlightenment (Session 3) by Shinzen Young: 

When we practice meditation, we may practice within a certain tradition, but we are linked to a global phenomenon that has been at the core of human experience all over this planet for a long time. 

In point of fact, it is probably the case that our very ancient ancestors—before the arising of civilization, when we were still in a tribal state—lived an awful lot of their lives in a meditative state just naturally. 

And then, with the arising of civilization, that becomes lost and it's necessary to create conceptual frameworks and specific practice techniques to get back there. 

So we are linked with something very, very large when we practice meditation. And I think that's just a very wonderful and beautiful thing.