...when you are trying to communicate an experience with language, the language is often the barrier to communication.

Two disciple monks went out of the Zen monastery to find a place they could smoke a cigarette. Settling with cigarettes in hand, they noticed that their Master was sitting a short distance away at the banks of the nearby river. One disciple said, "I would like to ask our beloved Master what he thinks of smoking, whether smoking is ok for us disciples to do, or is it something that should not to be done with regards to meditation?."

The other monk said, "Oh, yes, I would also like to know what he has to say about this, also." The other said, "Ok, later I will meet you back inside the monastery and tell you what he had to say." 

After finishing their cigarettes, the one monk went over to the Master to ask the question while the other headed back. The next day the two met within the garden of the monastery. The monk reported to the other and said that the Master said a flat 'No' about smoking cigarettes. The other monk said, "mmmm... that is odd because earlier this morning I found our Master sitting in this garden, I had also wanted to know what his answer would be to the question of smoking, so I went to see what his answer is for myself, and he told me 'Yes', that there is not a problem with it." After a slight pause, he continued, "I am curious as to how you precisely posed the question to him?"

The other monk said, "I had asked him if it was ok to smoke while meditating?" And he said, "Absolutely NOT!" The other said, "Well, I think that explains it. Because my question was 'Can I meditate while smoking?" And he told me, "Most definitely 'Yes'!

Concentration is often confused with meditation. Concentration is the closing down, a narrowing, of the mind. It is an attempt to put up a barrier to prevent something from distracting your attention. Meditation is an opening, it is relaxing into the situation that one finds oneself in. If you think that the sound of a barking dog is a sound that doesn't fit with your idea of meditation, and you try to block it out, then you are creating a conflict, a tension, by not wanting the sound to be there. Accepting the sound of the barking dog as inclusive, instead of trying to exclude it, that it is a part of nature, a part of the whole, something to be allowed, something to be observed with everything else that passes within earshot. This is the difference. 

Consider... the barking is the dog's meditation, he is 100% into his barking.