Sōsan, known as the Third Zen Patriarch, is remembered less for a distinctive technical method of meditation and more for a particular orientation of mind expressed in the *Xinxin Ming* (“Faith in Mind”). Historical records do not preserve detailed instructions from him on posture, breath work, or step‑by‑step technique, and later formal systems such as kōan practice or codified “just sitting” are not explicitly tied to his name. Instead, his teaching turns repeatedly toward the transformation of the way mind relates to experience. The central emphasis is on non‑dualistic awareness, where the habitual movement of preference and aversion is allowed to fall away. This is the spirit behind the famous line that the Great Way is not difficult for those who have no preferences, pointing to a practice grounded in relinquishing all picking and choosing.

From this standpoint, meditation associated with Sōsan’s teaching can be understood as a kind of simple, objectless awareness. One sits or abides quietly, without seizing upon thoughts or attempting to drive them out, and without turning enlightenment into an object to be pursued. Experience is neither pursued nor rejected; thoughts, sensations, and feelings are allowed to arise and pass without interference or commentary. Such practice does not aim at manufacturing a special state, but at recognizing that the mind’s original nature is already complete and undivided. Disturbance is traced not to phenomena themselves but to the discriminating activity that divides them into opposing categories.

This orientation naturally entails a deep cultivation of non‑attachment. Concepts, opinions, and experiences are not treated as possessions to be clung to, nor as enemies to be expelled, but as transient appearances within a wider, undivided field of awareness. The practitioner is encouraged to trust this original nature rather than to construct elaborate strategies of attainment. In this way, meditation becomes an effortless contemplation: a relaxed, uncontrived resting in what is present, free from the compulsion to improve, judge, or refine it. Everyday life, under such a view, is not separate from practice; each moment offers an opportunity to let go of discrimination and to abide in the faith that mind, in its depth, is already aligned with the Way.