Week long meditation challenge? (experience)

[Scarlett Wampus]

Excellent Revasser. I'm looking forward to seeing how we all get on.

Apologies for the lateness of this post. Work was slightly more busy than I was expecting! And woah, suggest a swim and a bunch of fish turn up. How about this: if you meditate regularly already find a method you've never used before try it for a week in addition or instead of what you normally do. Its often advised to vary methods after all. For others relatively new to meditation or out of practice the widely known 'mindfulness of breathing' exercise (described below) should be a good way to go. Plenty of people here to offer advice & commentary in that case.

Mindfulness of Breathing Meditation

Decide on a good time and place to practice where you're unlikely to be disturbed by your environment. If your life is chaos then for this week you'll need to organise this in advance.

Try to meditate for at least 15 minutes, twice a day if possible. If you find you need/want longer then you can increase the time each sitting until you find your natural cut off point. This might be where you get a feeling of being as 'full' of meditation as you are going to get, or further meditation becomes impractical due to other commitments.

Make sure you aren't going to freeze to death or burn up. Your clothing should be loose and your sitting posture should be comfortable enough to remain in for the duration but you must keep a straight back. If you can get into half lotus or full lotus thats fine, so is sitting on a suitable chair i.e. one that leaves your feet on the ground, your legs not too tense and doesn't sink more than an inch when you sit on it. Put your hands in your lap, rest them on your knees, or place them anywhere else where you won't feel the need to move them.

To prepare for meditation you might want to burn some incense, do some stretching, pray and/or play some gentle beautiful music. Anything that's likely to calm you down really.

If possible set up some kind of automated reminder of when your session is over, otherwise you might be tempted to keep glancing at the clock. Ideally a sound like a bell being struck or relaxing music is best but an alarm clock will do if nothing else.

Now, for the mindfulness of breathing exercise itself: -

• Sit still and don't fidget. If you fidget anyway don't worry, just bring yourself back to your posture.
• Breathe naturally and concentrate your attention on your breathing keeping it rested in this.
• Be aware of the body expanding and contracting with the inhalation and exhalation, the sensation of it entering your nostrils and leaving out through the mouth, the moments of fullness and emptiness of breath.
• No doubt you'll become aware of all sorts of thoughts and physical sensations other than your breath. Don't try to shut them out, just let them come and then let them go, returning your attention back to your breath.
• If you're having a lot of trouble concentrating try counting each in breath and out breath up to ten. If your mind wanders away bring it back and start the counting again. Alternatively you might like to repeat a suitable mantra with the breathing such as, "relax, let go, be mindful" or "primal source, great stillness".

That's it. Incidentally the most common thing people feel when they first try meditation is that they can't do it. This is normal and typical of even very practiced people, many Zen stories allude to this. The most important thing is to bring your attention back when it wavers time and time again. This is the real work of meditation.

If we all begin this coming Sunday the 5th I'll start a thread (where on RF should I do this?) and you can outline what method you are going to try in your first post. If you are having any difficulties or something unusual comes up post your thoughts on the thread and I'm sure you'll get some helpful responses. If there are any questions before we start please ask.

[Engyo]

Scarlett -

May I add one or two things? When setting up, one should be seated with one's back straight (not leaning back into a chair) with one's head centered over the body. All muscles should be relaxed (not tense anywhere). One should feel still and solid, balanced and steady. If you don't, adjust your posture until you do, and are comfortable. One's knees should be lower than one's hips, in order to relieve stress on the lower back. If you sit on the floor, and don't use a standard meditating posture like seiza, or one of the lotus positions, then I recommend a cushion or stool so that the knees are lower than the hips. Sitting in hunza, or indian fashion (crosslegged) isn't recommended.

It is also helpful to either pick a spot on the wall (something which doesn't change, in other words not a window) to focus on, or to close one's eyes and then open them just a slit. Fully closed eyes aren't recommended, as one tends to fall asleep very easily. When using the slightly open eyes, focus as if you are staring through your eyelids straight ahead. The idea is to minimize the visual stimuli while also preventing sleep.

Some Buddhists will use a mandala or a Buddha image as their focus point, but this isn't necessary; one can find something else to focus on if desired, but it preferrably will be something that one can tune out, rather than becoming lost in (especially don't use a TV as your focus unless it's off!). Hope this helps......

[Scarlett Wampus]

Thanks so much Engyo. Thats great advice.

I'm naturally not a sleepy person so its typical that I overlook such a thing as what to do with the eyes - I almost always have mine closed.

[Buttons*]

*smiles* i'm looking forward to this!

[Dentonz]

Can I add one more thing?

As you find a relaxing position as you have described, make sure that you are centered. What I mean is physically centered. You need to be perfectly balanced, meaning your center of gravity is located in the center of your body about a couple inches below your belly button.

I think this is a great idea.

[Scarlett Wampus]

Thanks Dentonz, thats a good tip on posture. Leaning slightly forward or backwards, twisting to either side, etc. puts unusual pressures on the body and isn't healthy.

Ok I'm going to start the thread ready for tomorrow under the 'prayers, meditations and poetry' section.

[Luke Wolf]

I try to meditate everyday. I just need to reorganize my life. I want to do too much, but don't have enough time to do it all.

[Dentonz]

Originally Posted by Scarlett Wampus

Thanks Dentonz, thats a good tip on posture. Leaning slightly forward or backwards, twisting to either side, etc. puts unusual pressures on the body and isn't healthy.

Ok I'm going to start the thread ready for tomorrow under the 'prayers, meditations and poetry' section.

Thank's for clarifying, it's kind of hard to desribe without actually showing someone.

[Scarlett Wampus]

If you don't know already and wondered what is happening the thread for all this is at Meditation week (5th feb - 12th feb)