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I meditate every morning after doing some pranayams (Yoga based breathing exercises). My meditation is based on a mantra. I silently say Om Namah Shivay as I follow my breath. For a few minutes, the mind is quite active but the thoughts slowly settle. When thoughts do arise, I acknowledge the thought and move on. I do not follow the thought. Nor do I try to fight the thoughts.

Siggiesmom,

That sounds like a wonderful practice. I was raised as a Christian and practice Buddhism now. I guess I dont think of myself as a nonchristian but some of my beliefs have changed.

Anyway, one of the reasons I got into eastern yoga and meditation practices was because my church did not really emphasize contemplative practices. A few years back one of my yoga students asked me if I knew anything about Centering Prayer.

I did a little research on the internet and found out about a version of the Bible called "The Spiritual Formation Bible". I just pulled it off my bookshelf and saw the words "Lectio Divina" as one of (5) time-tested spiritual disciplines.

Do you have this Bible or have you heard of it?

Thanks for reminding me of this -- this Bible has been on my bookshelf for a long time and I forgot about it.

Candace

True meditation has no direction, goals, or method. All methods aim at achieving a certain state of mind. All states are limited, impermanent and conditioned. Fascination with states leads only to bondage and dependency. True meditation is abidance as primordial consciousness.

True meditation appears in consciousness spontaneously when awareness is not fixated on objects of perception. When you first start to meditate, you notice that awareness is always focused on some object: on thoughts, bodily sensations, emotions, memories, sounds, etc. This is because the mind is conditioned to focus and contract upon objects. Then the mind compulsively interprets what it is aware of (the object) in a mechanical and distorted way. It begins to draw conclusions and make assumptions according to past conditioning.

In true meditation all objects are left to their natural functioning. This means that no effort should be made to manipulate or suppress any object of awareness. In true meditation the emphasis is on being awareness; not on being aware of objects, but on resting as primordial awareness itself. Primordial awareness (consciousness) is the source in which all objects arise and subside.

As you gently relax into awareness, into listening, the mind's compulsive contraction around objects will fade. Silence of being will come more clearly into consciousness as a welcoming to rest and abide. An attitude of open receptivity, free of any goal or anticipation, will facilitate the presence of silence and stillness to be revealed as your natural condition.

Silence and stillness are not states and therefore cannot be produced or created. Silence is the non-state in which all states arise and subside. Silence, stillness and awareness are not states and can never be perceived in their totality as objects. Silence is itself the eternal witness without form or attributes.

As you rest more profoundly as the witness, all objects take on their natural functionality, and awareness becomes free of the mind's compulsive contractions and identifications. It returns to its natural non-state of Presence.

The simple yet profound question "Who Am I?" can then reveal one's self not to be the endless tyranny of the ego-personality, but objectless Freedom of Being -- Primordial Consciousness in which all states and all objects come and go as manifestations of the Eternal Unborn Self that YOU ARE.

http://www.pranichealingfl.com/meditation.htm

Hi there,

Thank you for this post. It’s being great.

I’d like to ad something about the word “practice” because I think it is very important here.

According to Genpo Roshi, when a person begins in the meditation practice he or she does it for different reasons. At fist the person seeks improvement; there is something in his or her life that that particular person wants to improve. As that person evolves would attend to meditation for empowerment; obviously meditation has that effect that can really be apply in our daily life. After that the practitioner would seek enlightenment; now I want to wake up. As we see until here all the reasons are personal.

The fourth reason after seeking enlightenment is that you go to the sangha and you meditate for the sake of others, which means you do it in order to help others to rise their experience and make them easier to achieve that state.

Finally, the Fifth reason is there is no reason. You do it because it is your life, because it is what you do.

While we are stuck with the word “practice” we do meditate, or “practice” just during that particular time. It is like when you learn to play guitar. You practice with the guitar, let’s say two hours a day, and the rest of the day you are not practicing, just doing your normal life. But when you meditate because it is what you do, because it is your life, you don’t separate that meditation from your life, it is like a straight line in which that state, which is our natural state, is always present regardless of what you are doing. You don’t need specific clothes, or candles, or a particular position, just pay attention to who is doing, thinking, looking, working, cleaning, or enjoying a glass of good wine.

Is not that meditation? Who is reading this post? Is not consciousness itself?

Thank you for reading,

Debora.