Meditation and Contemplation
Whether you call it contemplative prayer or meditation, spending a little time on this particular “wise activity” can be worthwhile. My interpretation of Yves’ comment on the previous thread is that spiritual practices involve the sort of wise passiveness and receptivity referred to in the previous post. So it’s a matter of taking action to make wise passiveness a part of our day to day lives.
Reduced to their essentials, the steps involved are as follows.
How to Meditate
1. Sit comfortably, but in a straight-backed chair. Nothing reclining or too cushy.
2. Relax your muscles and let your breathing become deep and regular.
3. When you exhale, repeat a one-syllable word to yourself – for example, peace, calm, or God. Do not reflect on the word’s meaning. The reason you return to the word with every breath is simply to keep your mind from wandering down any of the thousand different paths it would normally take if you were sitting quietly. Repeating the word is to quiet the mind as well as the body, allowing you to eventually begin to experience a different kind of consciousness. You keep returning to the word in order to interrupt distracting thoughts and let them go before they run away with your mind.
4. Build up to twenty minutes once or twice a day. It's best to be reasonably well-rested or there's a tendency to fall asleep.
What can really be expected from meditation?
First, I’d be wary of some of the salesy spirituality stuff that packages meditation as a kind of panacea promising good health, weight reduction, and financial gain. (I wish I were kidding…)
Second, going by my own experience, you can initially expect months of boredom. Though easy to learn and consuming little time, it seems to take the mind a while to figure out that it could possibly have anything to do aside from the usual worrying, daydreaming, or planning.
And frankly I don’t know whether meditation “works” for everyone. I’ve known some people who concluded that it didn’t work for them. At the same time, it did take several months before I noticed that anything was happening. I could easily have concluded that meditation wasn't for me. However, it ended up having profound, lasting, and positive impacts on my life.
Reduced to their essentials, the steps involved are as follows.
How to Meditate
1. Sit comfortably, but in a straight-backed chair. Nothing reclining or too cushy.
2. Relax your muscles and let your breathing become deep and regular.
3. When you exhale, repeat a one-syllable word to yourself – for example, peace, calm, or God. Do not reflect on the word’s meaning. The reason you return to the word with every breath is simply to keep your mind from wandering down any of the thousand different paths it would normally take if you were sitting quietly. Repeating the word is to quiet the mind as well as the body, allowing you to eventually begin to experience a different kind of consciousness. You keep returning to the word in order to interrupt distracting thoughts and let them go before they run away with your mind.
4. Build up to twenty minutes once or twice a day. It's best to be reasonably well-rested or there's a tendency to fall asleep.
What can really be expected from meditation?
First, I’d be wary of some of the salesy spirituality stuff that packages meditation as a kind of panacea promising good health, weight reduction, and financial gain. (I wish I were kidding…)
Second, going by my own experience, you can initially expect months of boredom. Though easy to learn and consuming little time, it seems to take the mind a while to figure out that it could possibly have anything to do aside from the usual worrying, daydreaming, or planning.
And frankly I don’t know whether meditation “works” for everyone. I’ve known some people who concluded that it didn’t work for them. At the same time, it did take several months before I noticed that anything was happening. I could easily have concluded that meditation wasn't for me. However, it ended up having profound, lasting, and positive impacts on my life.
Posted by Paul at 11:47 PM Permalink
25 Comments:
Did it "work"? Hm, I don't know how that could be established, one way or the other! After all that time, I was a different person, but then wouldn't you be different too, after that time? It rarely yielded any cosmic vision or direct bliss, and in fact remained the same kind of not-very-deep experience from start to finish. Perhaps the other 23 hours was enhanced in some way. On the other hand, the belief system that went with the meditation package was rather toxic: world = illusion, me = member of enlightened elite.
Things really happened for me after I packed up the meditation and the belief system. It's been about five years now and the progressive transformation has been significant. With no meditation---in the sense you describe---at all.
meditation can be done in any pose...i mostly do it when i am lieing down in my bed...
secondly to calm your mind the breathing exercise to follow is called pranayama
the right word to be chanted is OM.the word is made of three components A(as in as),u(oo) and Ma(as in malta)a is supposed to be the supreme power in the word. U you.and Ma the shakthi the power....
in hindu tradition any matra should start with OM. without that the mantra has no power.
trying force our self to do it for a set time is wrong.You should let your body carry itself.If your mind wanders..don't try to control it..it will keep trying to wander..instead as it wanders keep chanting and also observe what it shows...it is like dreaming..it reflects you deepest wants....
meditation works for everyone...each one should do it in the way they are comfie..
and when you are sitting and doing there is a pose called padmasana and the mudra is chin mudra(search in wiki for more)...
I am on the religious education committee that deals with the education of children. For the past year or so, we have been focusing on teaching the children how to meditate.
This has lead us all to remember our experiences of learning how to meditate and trying to put into words what we experience.
The interesting thing is that so many people do it in so many different ways. Paul, your four steps are a great template for beginners, but I have found that everyone has very different techniques for #3 (what Quakers call "centering") and they change as the person grows in his or her faith.
Some people imagine their thoughts as a giant octopus and they are pulling in the tentacles. Some people repeat mantras -- the short "a" words are popular (allah, ahm, abba, adda, adonai). Some people stare at light coming from the skylight. Some people rub rosaries or holy objects. Some people concentrate on sayings. Some people imagine they are on the beach and the waves are rolling in with each breath.
A great book on meditation is Mark Epstein's "Thoughts without a Thinker." But many different sources go through the stages of meditation: Gross, Subtle, Bliss, I-ness, Objectless.
As I understand it, the level you discuss, Paul, is basically the gross level: using tools to help you center.
The second level, subtle, consists of an awareness of your own thoughts and emotions, nature, space and time.
The third level, bliss, is when you are able to resolve, subside or transcend (various religions have differing perspectives on this)your feelings, thoughts and objects. When all else fades away, you can see the bliss or the truth.
The fourth level, I-ness, occurs when meditation shifts so far inward that the Object of meditation is the I-ness itself. The sense of self begins to dissolve and you become the objects around you and they become you. (This is as high as I have gotten and I have only done it a few times)
The fifth level, objectless, is when you realize that the separate you does not exist, nor does the separate object (or God) exist. You realize that you always were one collective thing.
Btw, just to be clear with everyone on this point: it isn't necessary that meditation be practiced in connection with a belief system.
VISHESH: Yes, there are many varieties of contemplative prayer and meditation. I outline the basic steps of a simple form. The feature common to all of them is to return one's attention again and again to a word, sound, or object as a way of silencing the mind's normally ceaseless chatter.
I didn't mean to suggest setting the time in a strict manner, only to give an idea of how little is required to be worthwhile.
HAZZBUZZ: While the connection between contemplation and action in the world isn't immediately apparent, it's there to be made - think, for example, of Gandhi. As to love being involved, I think so too. As an example here, consider the prominence of "compassion" in the teachings of perhaps the world's most reknowned meditator: Buddha.
SOULPEACE: Yes, there are a wide variety of specific ways to go about it. I chose the one I did as per my reply above to Vishesh.
I would want to distinguish technique from level. Technique is a matter of individual preference. What you discuss as levels, or making progress in meditation, doesn't correspond to technique. One can make the kind of progress you discuss with a very simple technique or fail to make it using special meditation postures, pillows, chants, etc.
It can be helpful to be aware of the variety of techniques that are out there and do the sort of reading you suggest to make it more likely that we find something that may work well for us.
It may also be that when you identify "tools" or techniques with "grosser levels" of meditation, you're pointing to what I think of as the distinction between sitting meditation, which tends to foster especially deep and intense experience, and what's often discussed in Buddhism as "mindfulness" - bringing something of that consciousness into our moment to moment existence in daily life.
I should mention that there are also specific techniques for developing mindfulness - for example as discussed in Thich Nhat Hahn's The Miracle of Mindfulness. But even without that, at some point sitting meditation begins to produce lasting changes in one's moment to moment state of mind.
I'm not aware that sitting meditation as a tool is ever outgrown or no longer recommended. It's a way to regularly foster opportunities to experience depths of awareness that would otherwise occur less often. Within Christianity, I'm not aware of any point at which monks are advised to stop engaging in contemplative prayer because they've gone beyond this. In Buddhism, I'm not aware of any point at which people are advised to leave off with this aspect of the Eightfold Path because they've outgrown it.
CRYSTAL: A "denial of self that's psychologically unhealthy" isn't consistent with anything I've read or known concerning the type of experience that can occur through meditation or contemplative prayer. I haven't ever heard it discussed in terms that try to relate it to phenomena like, say, abusive relationships or low self esteem.
Probably the most commonly known experience that deep states of meditation resemble is the response that many people have at times to natural surroundings - that "one with nature" or "lost in wonder" kind of experience.
PEACECHICK: It reminds me of what my mom used to call "medipration." There are definitely tranquil, helpful states of mind in addition to what's usually (imo, unfortunately) termed "mystical experience."
Lo! Brain imaging strongly suggests that meditation can alter the structure of the adult brain. And we thought the adult brain lacked plasticity and its structure could not be altered.
Here is a link to the article: What brain imaging reveals about the effects of meditation
Be sure to pay close attention to the part in the article where they talk about "compassion" meditation or generating a feeling of loving kindness toward all beings.
I am convinced that we are, in large part, what we think about most, and that we can change what we think about...and change what we are then.
there are infinite methods, depending on numerous sources.
The method I have come to love is called "Zikr". Sufi zikr.
It is the vocal repitition of various names of God, almost always a name derived from the Quran.
It could be just Allah, or Hayy (Life), Wadud (love), or also Hu (He). Hu is neat because it has a similar "taste" in my experience to the Yogic word "Aum"
It can be done quietly or audibly, it can be very loud actually, if it is done in a group. It is done by an individual or by a whole group, the largest group that I've done it with was about 100 people. There are also usually physical movements to some of them. (Whirling is common, but there are others.)
At first it may seem like simple chanting, but when it is done with the intention of coming closer to God and you have a connection with a guide or teacher, it can transform into a whole other kind of experience. Single minded focus, breath, and physical movements all combine to bring the heart and mind into one place...
I often add on soothing music and aromatherapy for meditation.
And for anyone familiar with church history, it's an ancient aspect of the Christian tradition. It wouldn't surprise me at all if Jesus himself had some sort of very profound experience along these lines. It's what got Buddha started. And Jesus must have been up to something "in the desert forty days and forty nights..." Of course this is pure speculation and we just don't have that kind of detail on the historical Jesus.
PAULINE: That's the main obstacle to people doing sitting meditation as far as I can tell. I've also gotten great benefit from active forms such as you mention. I found the two kinds related, but also very distinct experientially.
KEVIN: Thanks for those vivid descriptions. Never personally got the chance to experience a group version of this, but I do have a tape of Buddhist monks chanting, and even listening casually has a way of wanting to draw you in. I can imagine this could be powerful.
PINK GINGER: Thanks, I figured it might be worth posting. Instructions on a little pamphlet are what I first made use of - no longer than a blog post. So it's easy infomation to put out there.
Like meditation, it's interesting to see where your mind will wander off to in mid-stride. I use the practice to center myself and note those things which are drawing me away.
I'm glad to hear you've benefited from meditation. Formal meditation seems so daunting to me.
ENEMY: Sounds great - but are you sure? When I visited a monastery there was a sign on the road that said something like "no women beyond this point!" So don't go causing any trouble now, we don't want you having to change your name to Enemy of the Monasteries, lol...
But that was 25 years ago, maybe it's different now.
DON I: Good to "see" you, thanks for stopping by. If I have a chance I want to do more posts on religious experience, which would be right up your alley, so your perspective would be interesting. But I'm sort of holding back - other irons in the fire, and it's the kind of topic that could get complicated.
whatever is most challenging in your life!
I am grateful that I learned this from meditation--
I like what peacechickmary says, it sounds like my experience too!
My mind and I can hang out together now, it's like turning off the radio and hearing the birds...
alhumduallah! being able to switch from one state to another is indeed very wonderful. My shaykh, my spiritual guide, had said to me that sufis have no need for drugs or any of that because all we need to do is close our eyes and we are in that state of consciousness instantly.
Sometimes I can, sometimes not.
After bliss then what? There is a state described in our tradition is "Fanallah" Losing one's self in God...
I found some neat videos of sufi zikr that I posted if any would care to look.
peace!
KEVIN: Thanks for that link. After bliss then fana... or before... That happens to have been my experience.
I'm not so sure with regard to stages of development in meditation. I think, for example, of the Buddha and how his enlightenment experience occured as a young man. But then it may be that there is something to the idea of stages. There certainly seems to have been a lot written about it - I've run across such material from time to time.
But if there is something to this idea, there are also definitley exceptions and things that happen spontaneously and "out of sequence," so to speak.
The many quotes of Andy for the Day
"Downtown Joplin is growing like a weed. Downtown Joplin better slow down the growth or else the streets will be to filled with cars from all over the four states."
"I think love will lead people to the Messiah, for he is coming for us to take us to his kingdom and people will be singing songs like great and mighty is he and rejoicing in the house of the Lord."
"I have needs and they are a little less worrisome, would anyone like to help me fulfill my needs?"
"This vulgar stuff has to stop, it is enough to see it on TV, but also in the newspaper is enough. It this stuff continues people will end up with not only a broken arm, but a broken heart."
Post a Comment