The problem with the modern world is the frenetic activity most of us are engaged in.
This is partly a world of our own creation.
We 'need' far more things now than past generations.
Part of this is because the things we feel we need didn't exist 50 years ago and part is because we have an acquisitive nature.
There's nothing wrong with this.
If it wasn't this way then we would never have moved out of the stone age.
No, I hear you say, we are inventive.
Yes, I affirm, we are inventive to be acquisitive.
We never invented weapons and started to think what we might use them for.
It was obvious, I want to kill that animal so that I can eat it.
The fact that weapons then became the means of acquiring more of everything - land, money, slaves - is not something we should be too proud of.
I will concede that some people and some inventions have been sincerely for the good of mankind.
But I don't see too many people in the health industry, for example, saying I have invented this new wonder drug and I want everyone to have it for free.
Medicine is still the preserve of the rich.
I am sure you can think of other things that have made individuals wealthy when what they were selling should have been given away.
This acquisitive nature has determined that we should create a society where everyone must work as hard as they can to acquire as much as they can.
This takes time, as does looking after the kids and home, maintaining a social life...
add as many things as you like.
I am not being critical.
I am just as much involved in acquisition as the next person.
I love my old iPad and sometimes wonder how I ever lived without it.
The point I am getting to, in a roundabout way, is that the place of meditation for most of us in the modern world cannot be the same as it used to be because we don't have the time or head space for it.
If you can take yourself off to a monastery or retreat for a month or year, then clearly you don't have to worry about getting the kids to school on Monday or paying the mortgage.
And if you don't have the million and one consequential add-ons to go with those two activities, then your head is going to be less full when you meditate which will makes meditation that much easier.
We cannot say, 'I think I'll put a few years into meditation and see what happens' because we don't allow ourselves that much spare time.
We want results pretty quickly, so we must start with the intention of feeling we are going to get somewhere.
That means knowing why you want to meditate and what you expect to get out of it.
There is nothing shameful in having this intent.
I'm sure Buddha didn't just aimlessly sit under a tree with the chance of becoming a couch potato or finding nirvana, he had intent.
He knew what he was looking for and adopted the best method he knew to try to achieve it.
Our aims are likely to be less ambitious, but it still makes sense to be clear about what we want from meditation and adopt the meditation techniques that help us get to where we want to be.