Deeper Meditation Part 2
Written by Jerry on February 26, 2010 – 11:49 pm -"Meditation is the way to bring us back to ourselves, where we can really experience and taste our full being, beyond all habitual patterns. In the stillness and silence of meditation, we glimpse and return to that deep inner nature that we have so long ago lost sight of amid the business and distraction of our minds. The gift of learning to meditate is the greatest gift you can give yourself in this life. For it is only through meditation that you can undertake the journey to discover your true nature, and so find the stability and confidence you will need to live, and die, well. Meditation is the road to enlightenment."- Sogyal Rinpoche, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying
This will be the second in a series of 11 videos to take you step into the world of meditation, what it can do for you and how to practice. These videos are for anyone who wants to go beyond meditation for just relaxtion purposes. I’ll have a new video for you every 2 weeks. There are 11 parts so, please ignore the video titles. I hope you enjoy them.
Never Stop Exploring Life!
Jerry L Saunders, RM
Tags: Confidence, Distraction, Glimpse, Habitual Patterns, Inner Nature, Jerry L, Journey, Meditation, Relaxtion, Rm, Road To Enlightenment, Saunders, Silence, Sogyal Rinpoche, Stillness, Tibetan Book, True Nature, Video Titles
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Deeper Meditation Part 1
Written by Jerry on February 13, 2010 – 6:30 am -"Meditation is the way to bring us back to ourselves, where we can really experience and taste our full being, beyond all habitual patterns. In the stillness and silence of meditation, we glimpse and return to that deep inner nature that we have so long ago lost sight of amid the business and distraction of our minds. The gift of learning to meditate is the greatest gift you can give yourself in this life. For it is only through meditation that you can undertake the journey to discover your true nature, and so find the stability and confidence you will need to live, and die, well. Meditation is the road to enlightenment."- Sogyal Rinpoche, The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying
This will be the first in a series of 11 videos to take you step into the world of meditation, what it can do for you and how to practice. These videos are for anyone who wants to go beyond meditation for just relaxtion purposes. I’ll have a new video for you every 2 weeks. There are 11 parts so, please ignore the video titles. I hope you enjoy them.
Never Stop Exploring Life!
Jerry L Saunders, RM
Tags: Confidence, Distraction, Glimpse, Habitual Patterns, Inner Nature, Jerry L, Journey, Meditation, Relaxtion, Rm, Road To Enlightenment, Saunders, Silence, Sogyal Rinpoche, Stillness, Tibetan Book, True Nature, Video Titles
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Who Am I?
Written by Jerry on January 23, 2010 – 3:19 am -Who am I?
What comes to mind when you ask yourself this? How many different memories, ideas, and things seem like a part of you? What do you identify with? Does this process of identification help you, or cause suffering? Get ready to find out.
Maybe when your favorite baseball team loses, you suffer as though YOU lost. When your bank balance is low, you feel low. When somebody attacks what you say, it seems as though they actually attacking your true inner self.
How can you escape personalizing everything?
By seeing who and what you are not. Understanding the process of identification clearly can free you from the ego attachments that cause you to suffer. Meditation that can help you with this.
"Who Am I" Meditation
Sit or lay comfortably in a quiet place.
Relax, close your eyes, and take several slow deep breaths. Breathe in through your nose and out through your mouth, eventually letting your breathing fall into a natural pattern. Let breathing just happen on its own now, but pay attention to the air moving in and out of your lungs. Let the tension drain from your body.
Ask the question in your mind. "Who am I?"
Then ask, "What am I?"
Just let these questions rest for a moment in your mind.
Become aware of your body, and consider your leg. Would you cease to exist if you lost it? Are you your leg?
Continue through several parts of your body, asking of each part, "Is this what I am?"
Then open your eyes and look around. Are you any of these things? You might feel mental pain when your favorite CD breaks, as if it were you, but you are not that CD. Are any of the things you own YOU?
Ask, "Am I this?"
Now close your eyes again and say your own name in your mind. Is there a sense of identity? And if you had no name? Would you still exist if you had no name? Ask yourself "Am I really…" and say your name again. Consider the answer.
Try saying "I am…" and insert any other name. Note how, when you call yourself by another name, you feel differently.
Let feelings arise, and ask "Am I this fear?… this pain, desire, pleasure, or anger? You can see that your feelings are not you – they just pass through you.
Clothes, body, reputation – none of them are your true identity, is it?
Take a deep breath and get up, noticing if you feel different – maybe less worried or less attached to things, feelings and thoughts.Try this meditation for 5 or 10 minutes the few times and when you are comfortable with it continue this meditation for twenty minutes or so.
After you have done this meditation maybe a dozen times over a week or two, you might want to practice this meditation about one a month just to remind you of what you are not.
By the way, you really don’t need to answer the question, "Who am I?"
Never Stop Exploring Life!
Jerry L Saunders, RM
Tags: Attachments, Bank Balance, Deep Breaths, Ego, Favorite Baseball Team, Lungs, Meditation, Memories, Quiet Place, Quot, Sit, Tension Drain, True Inner Self
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Meditation for Very Busy People
Written by Jerry on January 2, 2010 – 5:04 am -SelfGrowth.com founder David Riklan explains the best ways to get started with meditation that you can apply – no matter how busy your lifestyle!
Meditation for Very Busy People
Happy New Year and Enjoy!
Never Stop Exploring Life!
Jerry L Saunders, RM
Tags: Busy People, David Riklan, Founder David, Happy New Year, Jerry L, Lifestyle, Meditation, Nbsp, New Year, Rm, Saunders
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The Stages of the Mind
Written by Jerry on November 21, 2009 – 2:17 am -The Stages of the Mind
For our purpose here, there are three unique stages in the mind that depict how it’s functioning at any given time. Some meditation experts and psychologists may define many more levels but, I want to keep it simple, short and useful for you.
One: The Normal Mind
In the “normal” state of mind, your mind is working in many directions – which means it’s bouncing from one idea and thought to the next. In fact, this is really an abnormal activity for the mind because it needs to focus on fewer ideas if it’s to be successful in dealing with daily life.
Stimuli from all around you are constantly coming at your mind. When something new stimulates your mind, it moves from its previous thought to the new one. Although you feel like you are completely in control of yourself during this, you probably aren’t.
You have very little control over the way that you behave and think during this "mind bouncing." Not only do your thoughts move from one thing to the next thing quickly, but your body begins to speed up too. Your emotions will follow soon.
An example of this type of brain activity can be as simple as seeing a child playing. If you see the child while you are driving, your mind goes from control of the vehicle to the child. She’s cute, playing and riding her bike. Then, your mind moves to thoughts from your own childhood. You feel good and smile at the happy memories.
Of course, it doesn’t always play out so innocently. You can go through these same thought and emotional processes with negative images too.
Consider if that child was a teenager, doing something that they shouldn’t be. Now, you might start wondering about your own children and what they are doing that you don’t know about. And, your emotions are now fearful and tense.
In a negative situation, you are likely to become distracted by the thoughts bouncing through your mind, which then directly impacts the way that you drive your vehicle. Perhaps you run a red light or, you narrowly miss a car accident.
As you can see, in your "normal state" of mind, your emotions as well as your physical being are brought into play. Each plays their own role in the outcome of this "mental event."
Often, stress builds up during this process and since it’s our “normal” state of mind, they pile on over time. You can find yourself unable to concentrate on anything for more than a few seconds and, over time, you can have trouble balancing your everyday life.
For the most part, your “normal” way of thinking may be creating a quiet havoc in your life.
Two: Concentration
Concentration is the first state that leads to meditation. But, don’t confuse concentration with meditation. It’s something very different.
During this second stage of mind, you can begin to get control of your thinking. When you learn to keep yourself in this mind frame, you’ll improve the quality of your life considerably.
In concentration, your goal seems simple but its actually quite difficult to master. You need to concentrate on only one thing or object.
To be successful, you need to keep your mind focused on that one thing and not be distracted by any thoughts or external events that happen to pop up. Focus on it, without allowing your mind to wander. It’s not as easy as it seems.
During concentration, the problem is the mind’s ability to trick you back into its “normal” state of being. By moving away from the actual concentration topic and focusing on another, it pulls you back.
For example, if you need to concentrate on a report for school, you could be sitting down thinking and working. You’ll allow your mind to focus and relax on the topic at hand.
Then, you think of what your teacher had to say about the report. That leads to thoughts of what your friend said next to you while the teacher was talking. Within a matter of minutes, you are thinking about something completely different than the topic of your report.
The result is that you are distracted so much that you are back at the “normal” stage of thinking, having accomplished little in way of concentrating on your report. This is just not going to work.
Now you must use your awareness to realize what’s just happened. When you can realize that you’ve been distracted and that your mind has fooled you, then you can come back and actually concentrate.
This is part of the cycle of concentration. It looks sort of like this:
Normal State==> Concentration==> Distraction==> Normal State==> Awareness==> Concentration==> Distraction….
When you can master the art of keeping your mind focused and concentrating, you’ll experience a new level of thinking. You’ll be able to relax more and you’ll be able to actually feel better about your life. That’s an amazing feeling!
Three: Meditative State
In a meditative state, the third stage, you enter a completely different realm. Now, you are able to fully concentrate on the object or thought without falling for any type of distraction. Here, distractions seem to just disappear.
This is the stage that you are striving for because it really can offer you a new outlook on life. In many ways, you’ll be able to focus so much that you can better understand yourself. You will begin to reshape your emotions and make better decisions.
During concentration, your mind is concentrating on the object of focus in a minimal way. Distraction breaks the stream of concentrative thoughts. This means you must become aware of the problem and to go back and change it.
In a meditative state, this is no longer the case. Now, you are keeping the ongoing stream of thought moving. There’s nothing breaking it and nothing that is able to pull your mind from it. This is the ultimate experience in meditation.
Consider this. If you think about just one topic, over and over again, anything and everything connected to that topic will come to you in one form or another. Let’s say that the word that you use is that of love.
If you think of love in a meditative state, you concentrate on that one word which leads to other terms connected to love. You love something, you love someone, different types of love, and so on. Eventually, you have connected in practically every way possible to love. You physically feel it, you emotionally feel it. You have thought about it over and over. And, eventually, you have connected everything you can to love.
When you have achieved this state of meditation, you’ve elevated yourself to a whole new level. You’ve gone far beyond the simple level of concentration. Now, you have entered the important stage of meditation which is called contemplation. This part of the final stages of meditation is the very best level of consciousness that your mind and body can enter. In a sense, you "become" what you meditate upon.
Although it takes some time to achieve this level of understanding, the end result is well worth it.
Never Stop Exploring Life!
Jerry L Saunders, RM
Tags: Abnormal Activity, Amp Nbsp, Brain Activity, Control, Emotional Processes, Emotions, Happy Memories, Meditation, Mind Control, Mind Moves, Mind Your Mind, Nbsp, Negative Images, Negative Situation, Psychologists, Rsquo, Smile, Stimuli, Teenager
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