Meditation Is Not Easy

It seems to me that meditation is very misunderstood. I know when I first started I thought it would be simple, just sit, calm down and do nothing. Quiet the mind, relax and be at peace. Think this is easy; try to quiet your mind. It goes something like this. Concentrate on the candle flame and relax. Start with the toes and let the tension sink out of them. Relax and think of the muscles letting go of tension. Picture the tension flowing away into the ground. Next relax the lower leg, Look at the candle and wonder why you said that to whomever. Oops stop return to relaxing. Let go the tension in the lower back and feel it flow away into the flame of the candle. Wonder what’s for supper maybe we should have…stop return to relaxing. The, should do, might have said, will say, want that, what shall we eat, conversations inside you pop up again and again and finally you realize the mind, your mind, my mind is a very noisy place. The practice of meditation is like lifting weights done with your mind. It takes practice and is not as simple as it seems. There is no right way to meditate. There are almost as many techniques as there are people but they can be placed into five broad categories. These are:

• Guided meditation, where someone leads you through one of the following meditation types but helps keep you on track.
• Fixed point meditation, focusing on a single point such as a crack in the wall a candle flame until only that point is what you think of.
• Mindful meditation, being aware of your breath and body and all around you, understanding what you smell, taste, hear, and see without placing a label of some kind, verbal or pictorial and letting the emotions rise to the surface but not reacting to them simply acknowledging them and letting them go.
• Prayerful meditation, where a mantra or prayer is chanted either quietly or aloud over and over again.
• Open mind meditation, the most difficult to do, letting the mind acknowledge all thoughts until they have all been let go and calm peaceful joy is what is left.

Eventually the periods of concentration get longer, the relaxation of the body more complete, more familiar and easier to accomplish at deeper and deeper levels. The ability to understand what you can control and what you cannot grows. Responses to other people and events become more reasoned less reflexive because you become more aware of Self. When things annoy you, you find it easier to remain calm and return to a ‘normal’ state. The strength of your mind and your understanding of how your mind works grows. You eventually no longer require the pictures or words to understand things that your mind tends to form. Understanding becomes knowing without labeling. You feel knowledge and in feeling no longer have extremes in response to events that happen. This doesn’t mean you never feel anything it means you learn to know what you feel and not let the emotions felt take control of your actions. It does more than this though. Eventually you begin to get a real sense of Self.

After all the mystery is in you, just as much as you are in it.