Someone asked: normally one just keeps sitting, but when sitting more, up to hours, should there be a method to sit better, or just keep sitting to clear impurity?

One Must Have a Goal, or the Neutral Force Comes to Coax One to Stop

If we just keep sitting, the neutral force comes to coax us to quit. We must have a goal — and there are two important goals.

Goal One: Develop It Into an Automatic Inner System

The first goal is to develop until it becomes automatic — from semi-automatic to automatic. Once so, in the future we can do other work while the automatic inner system still draws the pure energy of merit in and cleanses our elements to purity, and we keep being liberated — working on the coarse and subtle bodies together. The outer and inner worlds are alike; today cars and devices are increasingly automatic, but the inner instruments can be developed even better than the outer ones. So we must develop our inner instrument to be automatic.

Goal Two: Sit Continuously, From Hours to Days and Nights

Resolve that sitting should develop from one hour to two, three, four, until one can sit across days and nights — many days and nights. Without setting this goal, in this life one can never sit continuously. Sitting continuously is so the Triple Gem can abide and appear radiant at our center, and nibbana can overlay and refine. Practice is bringing body and mind for the Triple Gem and nibbana to overlay and refine. With little time, the process is brief and can't go deep. For it to go deep, we must give more time — from days to nights, many days and nights. We must set both goals — automaticity and long sitting — to develop into the automatic inner state that lets them overlay and refine continuously and deeply.