Introduction To Meditation
Meditation is best understood as a state of mind, which you can achieve, and not as an activity to be performed. You can become completely awake, alert and under full control of your senses and brain. But without thoughts or with very few in the head and you should feel a sense of tranquility or relaxation. Initially, there could be other sensations because everybody is in a different condition when they learn to meditate.
Talking about meditation is like trying to explain how a recipe will taste after the ingredients have been cooked. Nothing can beat the real experience of tasting the food. Similarly, until you have been successful with meditation, you cannot imagine how it should feel. When meditation is successful, it takes you beyond your mind. The experience cannot be conveyed to the mind, in the form of words.
With a little practice of meditation, for a few minutes, once or twice each day, it is not difficult to derive benefits in many areas of your life, particularly health. These come naturally, as your nervous system develops more of its own inner qualities. You should notice something within hours or days.
Most important to understand is that true meditation is natural and the body, brain and central nervous system are designed for it to occur. For those reasons, you should not pay anyone for 'knowledge' or for instruction. Did you pay to learn breathing or eating? All the mechanisms required are already built inside the human being. Only they need to find the right moment for activation. These ideas are not new, even in England. Around 200 years ago, William Blake wrote:
"Man brings all that he has or can have into the world with him. Man is born like a garden ready planted and sown."
and
"Knowledge of ideal beauty is not to be acquired. It is born with us. Innate ideas are in every man, born with him; they are truly himself."
Why Do People Meditate?
Some people will try meditation because they are not happy or they are not satisfied with life. Others may be suffering from worries or various forms of stress. Some people hope to understand life more or to evolve spiritually. Meditation is very helpful during pregnancy. The foetus shares the mother's hormones, so the more healthy and happy the mother, the healthier and happier will be the baby. Some people meditate to improve their health but success is not guaranteed.
Meditation is not just a treatment for keeping us sane and sanitised. It is not just an antidote for the pressures of modern life. Much more than these, it is a mechanism and a state which promotes our evolution as human beings and as spiritual beings. Without meditation, we would remain as limited personalities.
How To Meditate?
Practitioners of different styles of meditation advocate different methods to be followed and the results may vary, both in terms of ease of performance and of the nature of the resulting experience. As suggested before, something that you have to 'do' is not meditation and may not achieve meditation. Some, so called, meditation techniques can even have harmful long term side effects. For example, the repetition of mantras.
Without the awakening of the Kundalini, it is unlikely that the true state of meditation will be experienced. When the Kundalini has reached the brain, with sufficient strength, a person tends to feel relaxed and meditative without effort. The thinking process starts to subside and the person is better able to enjoy the present.
TO BE CONTINUED...
29/12/2012
Meditation is best understood as a state of mind, which you can achieve, and not as an activity to be performed. You can become completely awake, alert and under full control of your senses and brain. But without thoughts or with very few in the head and you should feel a sense of tranquility or relaxation. Initially, there could be other sensations because everybody is in a different condition when they learn to meditate.
Talking about meditation is like trying to explain how a recipe will taste after the ingredients have been cooked. Nothing can beat the real experience of tasting the food. Similarly, until you have been successful with meditation, you cannot imagine how it should feel. When meditation is successful, it takes you beyond your mind. The experience cannot be conveyed to the mind, in the form of words.
With a little practice of meditation, for a few minutes, once or twice each day, it is not difficult to derive benefits in many areas of your life, particularly health. These come naturally, as your nervous system develops more of its own inner qualities. You should notice something within hours or days.
Most important to understand is that true meditation is natural and the body, brain and central nervous system are designed for it to occur. For those reasons, you should not pay anyone for 'knowledge' or for instruction. Did you pay to learn breathing or eating? All the mechanisms required are already built inside the human being. Only they need to find the right moment for activation. These ideas are not new, even in England. Around 200 years ago, William Blake wrote:
"Man brings all that he has or can have into the world with him. Man is born like a garden ready planted and sown."
and
"Knowledge of ideal beauty is not to be acquired. It is born with us. Innate ideas are in every man, born with him; they are truly himself."
Why Do People Meditate?
Some people will try meditation because they are not happy or they are not satisfied with life. Others may be suffering from worries or various forms of stress. Some people hope to understand life more or to evolve spiritually. Meditation is very helpful during pregnancy. The foetus shares the mother's hormones, so the more healthy and happy the mother, the healthier and happier will be the baby. Some people meditate to improve their health but success is not guaranteed.
Meditation is not just a treatment for keeping us sane and sanitised. It is not just an antidote for the pressures of modern life. Much more than these, it is a mechanism and a state which promotes our evolution as human beings and as spiritual beings. Without meditation, we would remain as limited personalities.
How To Meditate?
Practitioners of different styles of meditation advocate different methods to be followed and the results may vary, both in terms of ease of performance and of the nature of the resulting experience. As suggested before, something that you have to 'do' is not meditation and may not achieve meditation. Some, so called, meditation techniques can even have harmful long term side effects. For example, the repetition of mantras.
Without the awakening of the Kundalini, it is unlikely that the true state of meditation will be experienced. When the Kundalini has reached the brain, with sufficient strength, a person tends to feel relaxed and meditative without effort. The thinking process starts to subside and the person is better able to enjoy the present.
TO BE CONTINUED...
29/12/2012