There are too many forms of meditation to get into here. There's walking and breathing meditation.
One that was popular was Transcendental Meditation. There are web sites that can cost you a bit to learn. It is a form of mantra meditation. That's my favorite.
Meditation is used as an aid to clear your mind. So... here is a brief mantra meditation technique.
Choose a word that doesn't mean anything to you. For example Om, or Ah, or Hum. Om is a Sanskrit word.
Sit calmly and relaxed. No need for a Yoga pose or anything special. Just sit up, so you don't fall asleep. Sleep is not the goal.
The technique. ...
OK, now repeat slowly the word you have chosen. Om, Om, Om.... Focus only on that word. attempting to remove ALL thoughts from your mind. Keep repeating. As outside thoughts enter your mind, remove them as well. This is normal. Just focus on your word. Learning to release them, might take more practice. It does take time and practice. Your mind has not been disciplined to be quiet. Do this for 15 or 20 minutes a day.
There. You have learned the basic technique of the popular Transcendental Meditation as taught by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. For free. Don't be fooled into paying for such a thing.
*edit* The special word should be repeated silently in you mind, not aloud.
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- Jim "The most powerful force ever known on this planet is human cooperation � a force for construction and destruction.� (Jonathan Haidt)
Last edited by jfh; 05-08-2012 at 03:24 PM.
Reason: add instruction
Here's a bit about just one type of meditation/relaxation...
Quote:
Finding Inspiration Series: Meditation
My 'Finding Inspiration' series was written out of a need that comes up in my
practice, most often in Spring and Fall. I feel we all need a bit of
encouragement and enlightenment now and then to help us move forward. Finding
motivation through inspiration can be the spark which sets you on your way!
Meditation is a time-honored technique that can take you into infinite
dimensions of consciousness. It is a simple effort that becomes effortless as we
do it more and more. One major principle to meditation is the ability to
completely quiet your mind. Quieting the mind comes as a result of meditating
over a long period of time, but any time you are looking within, you are
meditating. Meditation helps us live a healthier, less stressful life.
The physical and psychological benefits are wonderful and many people meditate
only for those reasons. The practice of meditation helps us temporarily let the
physical world go so that we can begin to see ourselves as we truly are -
spiritually enlightened beings.
Meditation can transform our lives. As we meditate and expand our consciousness
we open ourselves up to love and light. We begin to see things from a more
loving, spiritual view. We become more tolerant of others. We find more inner
peace and joy...that inner peace touches everyone we come in contact with.
There are endless, boundless benefits to relaxation and meditation. Stress can
often be a daily part of our lives. The fight or flight response can occur when
an individual is subjected to severe stress such as a threatening situation or a
resistant or hostile event. The response may be one of confrontation or one of
avoidance such as running. The response involves all parts of the nervous
system, as well as the endocrine system, and can be consciously or unconsciously
mediated. The autonomic part of the fight-or-flight response results in a
general increase in sympathetic activity, including heart rate, blood pressure,
sweating, muscular strength, and can trigger an adrenaline surge that quickens
your pulse, raises blood pressure, kick-starts anxiety and prepares you for
"fight or flight."
The fight-or-flight response is adaptive because it enables the individual to
resist or move away from a threatening situation. can trigger an adrenaline
surge that quickens your pulse, raises blood pressure, kick-starts anxiety and
prepares you for "fight or flight."
As meditation is practiced regularly, we find that we are able to handle
everyday problems in a calmer and more relaxed manner. Our problems and
difficulties are seen from a new perspective. Our coping skills are increased
and we seem to find a new inner strength. Many studies have been done which show
how our lives are enhanced by meditation. Both mental and physcial benefits have
proven to be effective through relaxation and meditation techniques.
The physical benefits include:
Decrease in respiration
Decrease in heart rate
Decrease in blood pressure
Decrease in sympathetic nervous system
Decrease in body metabolism
Try this meditation:
Progressive Relaxation is a slow transition from a tense, immobile state to a
calmer more supple mind and body. This is a way of releasing tension in the
muscles. There are many variations of Progressive Relaxation. Here is one of
them:
Begin by laying on your back in a comfortable position.
Take a series of deep slow breaths and then focus your awareness on different
parts of the body in turn, becoming aware of any muscular tension and releasing
it.
One way to do this is to first tense a muscle deliberately and then relax it.
You can start with the top of the body, tensing and relaxing the muscles of the
upper face, then moving on to the jaw, neck, chest, front of the arms, abdomen,
thighs, lower legs, feet, and toes.
Then do the same down the back of the body. Finally, lie still with the eyes
closed, concentrating on your breath. Allow the whole body to relax into the
ground. Feel the floor underneath you, supporting you. Feel the earth supporting
the floor. Feel yourself now deeply rooted and grounded into the earth beneath
you.
Enjoying this deep feeling of peace and freedom from muscular tension.
In all forms of meditation, it is best to eliminate all external interruptions. Once you have mastered the meditation, external stuff will not even bother you. This is difficult for me to achieve, because it puts me to sleep. I have to be sitting up with no back support.
Self hypnosis is similar, in that one internally focuses on something visually comforting, until one is as comfortable and quiet as possible. Then gives oneself goals.
Another great self help program is positive affirmations. In this, you repeat affirmations over and over. Actually, you record them and listen to them. My best buddy, Dr Harlan Fisher, wrote a book, Fifiteen Minute Miracle: A practical approach to POSITIVE CHANGE. I learned it from there and from him. I recorded positive sentences on a CD and listen to it for 15 minutes everyday. He has samples in the book, but you can easily make your own. Just record very positive sentences like, "I love myself", "I am healthy", etc. Record many of them. They must be positive. For example you would not say "I will not do ...."
Another very positive self help, is prayer or repeating a poem or listening to wordless music. If prayer, it should be something that can be memorized and repeated daily.
Apparently repetition is the key to any form of meditation. Elimination stress it the goal.
Alot of horrible advice in this thread. I recommend not to follow what you read here.
Take out from a library or buy one of the books by Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche and learn from a real master. I would recommend to start with his first book The Joy of Living: Unlocking the Secret and Science of Happiness. In the book he will tell how to you meditate in different ways and tell you to put the book down and try, at that point you should actually try or you just develop useless theoretical knowledge without application or a habit of practice. Eventually you will also want to find a legitimate dharma center and teacher in your area if possible.
What are the basic steps to do a basic meditation?
If you could, please be specific.
I think anything you do to clear your mind could be considered meditating.
Being at the shore does it for me.. the only sound you can hear are the waves.
All you need to do is close your eyes, do deep breathing (stomach extends, not your lungs) and within minutes you'll start to feel your muscles relaxing.
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Please be advised that I am not an advocate for the health blogs that are permitted to link to NMT. Also, some of the member provided content in the Alternative Therapies Forum is highly controversial in my opinion and may be incorrect or dangerous. We strongly encourage you to exercise caution & good judgment in order to ensure a healthy and safe experience.
The art of medicine consists of amusing the patient while nature cures the disease
Meditating is not about "clearing the mind", whatever that means. It is more about being aware of what comes and goes through the mind, which people tend to neglect to focus instead on externalities.
Sort of, but that would be misleading, it is not definitely not about focusing on the past or future. According to the Tibetan Buddhist conception of the mind, one of its essential components is emptiness or dharmakaya. This does mean that the mind is nothing, but that it is like an empty vessel that is filled with a fleeting thought, then it resets to nothingness, allowing another thought to enter, then the next passing thought and it returns to nothingness again, and so on and so on. There is also the aspect of natural cognizance to the mind called sambhogakaya, since we are aware of our mind, our existence, and we can recognize the various thoughts passing through if we focus. These two aspects of mind combine in the nirmanakaya, the unity of emptiness of cognizance because it is important that they cannot exist separately, the mind cannot be pure emptiness with the exclusion of cognition, or pure cognition without emptiness.
So what meditating is, is when you inwardly focus on these normally "hidden" mental processes and focus your cognizance on the thoughts in your mind, the mind's nature, etc. The more contact you have with the nature of mind, the less effect external problems have on you, because you know you can just simply let that thought pass and allow room for another thought. I would again recommend to look into the books written by Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, which are also available in audiobook(and even pirated on torrent sites ...).
How Do You Meditate?
Linear Mode
