A good deal has been written about meditation. There are many books that you can get that will help you and give you techniques. Some of them are very good. Some not so. Regardless, you can get your technique elsewhere. I just have a few general things to say about how to approach meditation whichever technique you choose.
I tend to shy away from any that say in one way or another that meditation doesn't need to be about your spiritual life. Meditation can have very positive benefits for you in many aspects of your life but those positive effects are peripheral. It is, first and foremost, a spiritual tool of profound benefit.
When you meditate put your mind on God. When someone is speaking we are often thinking about what we want to say rather than listening to the speaker. But we should, in fact, be giving them our attention. It is this way in meditation. Be thinking about God and address your attention to God. You're not thinking about God's traits. You aren't thinking about what God might be saying. You aren't thinking about anything besides the technique you have been given. You are simply paying attention to God as you would someone who was speaking.
There are two things that are important aspects of meditate. First, do it from the heart rather than from the mind. We in the West think of meditation as primarily a mental thing - a thing that we do with the mind. We focus the mind. This is not the essence of meditation. This is a pathway to meditation. Meditation springs from the heart while taming the mind. So you want the source and focus of your meditation to be the heart rather than the mind. Second, do not expect anything. If you are expecting you aren't in the moment. You are thinking about what will happen, what will come of your meditation. Do not expect reciprocal response. Just be in the moment and put your mind on God.
When you are distracted do not attempt to fight the distracting thoughts. This only gives them energy and importance. As Bagwan Dass put it when he spoke to Ram Dass of distracting emotions: "Emotions are like waves. Watch them disappear on the surface of the vast, calm ocean.". I would say the same about thoughts. Watch them disappear on the surface of the vast, calm ocean.
Do not be mindful of the invasion of thoughts. That will only disturb your harmony. Let them go by. Mostly the thoughts you think do not originate with you anyway so don't carry a burden of guilt, (no matter how small), for having them. They are out there in the mass mind and you. like a radio that is opened up to multiple bands, are often not discreet in what you receive. Meditation is meant to help that. That is a perk of meditation. It will give you much stronger control over your own personal radio.
OK. All of that being said what is my technique? I focus on two things that are somewhat similar. First I keep my mind on God. Not God's attributes or God's gifts or anything about God's personality. Just on God. Second, I strive to keep my focus on the third eye. This is the point at the root of the nose between the eyebrows. This is the totality of my technique. There are techniques that involve breathing exercises. These can be very beneficial both for concentration and for depth of meditation. Kryia yoga is a very high meditation technique that serves both as a tool for centering and becoming close to the Divine and as a means for burning away negative karma. There are other types of meditation that can be very beneficial. The one that I have described works for me. Find the one that works for you and do it with diligence. The rewards will be great.
One last word. If you want to learn how to meditate you can't do any better than a group called Ananda. You can contact them at "www.ananda.org/meditation/". I am not a member of Ananda and do not mean to push you in that direction but I will at times be recommending different organizations to you for the purpose of gaining information or training in different spiritual practices. If one or another of them strikes you then more power to you. In this instance I think that Ananda is a great place to learn a particularly penetrating, easy and useful meditation technique.
No comments:
Post a Comment