SHIH-FU:

If you keep switching you won't find out which method is suitable for you. Switching back and forth, you will never penetrate a method. It's best to work on one method, and if your mind is clear enough, it should be easy to do so. When you get to a higher level, I teach other methods. The situation you are speaking of is different. In this case, it is like a stepping stone. What I discourage is random or frequent switching. If you start counting breaths and then switch to shikantaza with good results, then by all means do it.

STUDENT:

Sometimes you say that counting breaths is the most basic method and later on you introduce other methods. Other times you say any method can take you all the way to the "other shore." It seems to me that counting breaths is a basic method that you eventually have to give up in favor of a better method. I've been using it for a long time. If it is a method to leave behind, I must be a pretty poor meditator.

SHIH-FU:

Here is an analogy, even if it is not fully appropriate. Counting breaths is basic. It's like walking. Almost everyone can walk, but people can also ride a bike, sail a ship, drive a car, fly a plane. There are many ways to get from one place to another. Walking is one of them. And though walking seems to be the slowest way, sometimes that is not the case. You know the story of the tortoise and the hare. Walking is slow but steady.