Inner Rave - Meditation

Meditation

Here is a more formal introduction to meditation, including a variety of exercises. Try them for yourself and see which ones work for you.

The definition of meditation is "to be undistracted". The question then becomes "undistracted from what?"

We possess six senses. The traditional five are sight, sound, touch, taste, and smell. In addition we have the mental faculty of awareness which perceives objects of the five sense fields as well as mental objects such as thoughts, memories and emotions.

The following exercises are all "non blocking awareness" exercises. Non blocking means that we are not blocking any of the sense fields and we are not blocking our thoughts. This is very important to understand. We keep our eyes open and we stay open to all sensations and our environment. We will never experience freshness by avoiding what is.

Fresh awareness is the result of being undistracted and open to what is. These exercises are training in freshness.

Visual Awareness

Visual awareness of an object has two parts. First, our eyes have to be looking at it. Second, our mind needs to be aware of it. If our mind is wandering and thinking about something else then we are not aware of the visual object even if our eyes are focused on it. That is called being distracted.

Pick a visual object in your field of view and look at it with your eyes and at the same time be aware of it with your mind. Do not overfocus on it, concentrate, or try to block out any of the other senses or suppress your thoughts. If your eyes play tricks on you such as seeing double pay no attention to that and continue looking at the object while being aware of the object.

Do not label, judge or think about what you are seeing. Just the bare awareness of the visual object itself. Keep your eyes on the object. Keep your mind merely aware of the object. If your attention wanders off simply bring it back.

That is meditation! Nothing more to it. You are being undistractedly aware of a visual object, and that is training your mind to be in the present moment, to be undistracted.

The essence of sight is luminosity-emptiness, always fresh, never fixated. Rest wide awake in that recognition.

Awareness of Sound

If there is a continuous sound in your environment you can pay attention to that, or simply be aware aware of all sounds as they arise. No need to focus your ear organs since they are always on. If you find that your mind is no longer aware of the sound bring yourself back to bare awareness of the sound or sounds.

Do not think about what is making the sound or judge the sound as good or bad. Just hear the actual sound itself without any conceptual filter.

The essence of sound is communication-emptiness, always fresh, never fixated. Rest wide awake in that recognition.

Awareness of Sensation

Sit upright with your eyes open. Place you mind in awareness of the sensations of your breathing in and out. Your feel your chest and stomach move. You can feel the air moving in and out of your nose. If your mind wanders off, bring it back to undistracted awareness of the breathing process.

Do not overfocus in the breathing. As an antidote for that, pay attention to the sensation of the outbreath and just relax during the inbreath. Pay attention and relax, pay attention and relax.

Do not attempt to suppress your thoughts or block out the other sense fields. Simple bare awareness of the breath.

The essence of sensation is presence-emptiness, always fresh, never fixated. Rest wide awake in that recognition.

Thats it! Very easy and excellent awareness training using your sense fields. You can make up your own exercises for taste and smell if you like. I use chocolate and freshly roasted coffee beans :-)

While dancing leave the sense fields wide open. Dance keenly aware and relaxed within the flow of sensation.

Awareness of Thoughts

Just about every meditator, myself included, gets confused about what meditation is really about. For example we might think "Since I regularly get distracted from nowness by getting lost in thoughts, therefore the solution is to stop thinking." Not! We will never stop thinking. Attempting to suppress our thoughts is like a futile attempt to stop the wind itself from blowing.

Why is attempting to stop thoughts futile? Because the thought "I must stop thinking" is a thought. The more we think that thought the more thoughts arise. By fighting with them we are actually feeding them. We end up with hundreds of thoughts and we feel defeated, like we are bad failed meditators.

Whenever we have thoughts in meditation we should welcome them with open arms! We say to ourselves: "I will notice every single thought the instant that it arises and I will recognize every single thought as being just a thought, nothing more, nothing less."

The moment that we recognize that "this thought is just a thought" we are instantly liberated from this thought! Since this is just a thought there is no need to follow it. Since this is just a thought there is no need to get rid of it! This thought becomes the expression of present awareness. This thought loses its power to absorb us and fades by itself.

The very next moment another thought may arise and we can recognize that this new thought is just a thought. One by one we are liberated from every single thought that arises. Pretty soon all thoughts lose their power to entrap us. They are all expressions of lucid wakefulness and no longer distract us from awareness.

There is a famous saying "Seen by merely looking, freed by merely seeing." It really is just that easy.

The essence of thought is awareness-emptiness, always fresh, never fixated. Rest wide awake in that recognition.

People often try to escape from their obsessive thinking by way of alcohol and drugs. That kind of relief is temporary and incomplete. While dancing liberate thoughts by recognizing them as simply thoughts.

Awareness Without Focus

Once we have mastered undistracted awareness of the senses and learned to liberate all thoughts it is time to meditate without any focus at all.

The act of focusing on nowness is a subtle manipulation, a kind of holding on to something. We can let go of that effort and rest in wakeful awareness without any focus at all. Nothing to meditate on, yet not distracted from open awareness.

This is called "undistracted nonmeditation". Start your session by saying "I will not be distracted. I will not meditate." By nonmeditation we mean no focus, no effort, no manipulation, no modification of anything. Really, seriously, don't meditate at all. Leave things just as they are!

When thoughts arise welcome them with open arms as explained above. When thoughts do not arise simply rest wide awake without doing anything at all.

Do not modify your state of mind in the slightest. Accept it just as it is right now without any alteration. It is impossible to improve on nonconceptual awareness wisdom so don't bother trying!

Just rest completely relaxed and vividly awake without holding any thought or concept in your mind. Be undistracted from holding nothing whatsoever in mind. This is the wisdom of unfixated open awareness which is always with us whether we recognize it or not.

Rest easily, keenly aware, without any focus or effort. This is the awakened state. Nothing more, nothing less. Anyone who composes themselves in the awakened state on a regular basis is quickly becoming enlightened.

The essence of awareness is wisdom-emptiness, always fresh, never fixated. Rest wide awake in that recognition.

Dance in the awakened state, spontaneous, joyful and free. Dance and meditation are one.