Meditation & Enlightenment

[Uma]

Originally Posted by Mr Interesting

I started meditating when I was 17 and that's a very long time ago but way back then it was little more than a way to relax. My Dad taught me a very simple technique with the proviso that it was about stilling the mind and I really enjoyed it and even during work I would spend my lunchtimes laying out in the middle of a field and drifting off into thoughtlessness.

Then I found a book about astral projection and went hell for leather getting into that and did actually do it once or twice but found I still had a healthy amount of desire in me which seemed to be the directive when I popped out and so that kinda needed some work.

But this was the early 80's and as such access to spiritual texts was somewhat limited and I was still basically a good ol' boy in search of experience so again meditation took a back seat but was still there. And it stayed there in the background for a few decades while other things like intuition came forward and I suppose looking back it was all about dealing with what desire is.

Anyways, though I could just keep on writing about my life story it seems it's about the seasons and the tides coming in and the tide going out which is to say that when, about 5 years ago I found the power of now, I was almost entirely ready for the tide of inner consciousness to come all the way in, The season was right as it were and now the tide is going out which is to say that this idea of mindfullness in life is what it all seems to be about.

There isn't the depth there was in meditations of a year or two ago but there is an expansion of quietness out into life and I seem to carry it where ever I go. So there is too a mild sadness, a kind of missing something I once had, that the dips into the abiding silence and formlessness is just a memory but at the same time it's still there but not concentrated to the within but is somehow expanded deeper into life itself.

Nice share... sounds like you had a special Dad Mr Interesting

[ThoughtOnFire]

Originally Posted by Uma

Nice share... sounds like you had a special Dad Mr Interesting

Yes thanks for sharing that Mr Interesting

[ThoughtOnFire]

Originally Posted by kkfern

to encompass your mind as including more, then yes. but in this, would not all the chakras be a state of mind? just wondered.

I suppose, though I'm sure there are intricate Sanskrit words for such things that we can't really reach clear terminology through using English words. The subtleties are IMHO beyond our scope of reference especially when we are using the same words with varying individual definitions thereof.

[Serrao]

Originally Posted by kkfern

but in this, would not all the chakras be a state of mind? just wondered.

I do believe all the chakras cause a specific state of mind when opened. Or maybe a specific state of mind can open the corresponding chakra.
But one can work on the chakras 1 to 7 with pranayama (breath control) too, in contrast to the chakras beyond the 7th.

Originally Posted by kkfern

the others are off sight in the finer bodies.

Do you know the locations of the chakras 8 and 12 in the subtler bodies?

[kkfern]

yes, i close my eyes and i see them. i breath and i feel them. i grow dizzy and feel like falling as i enter into the spin of them.

kk

[ThoughtOnFire]

Originally Posted by ThoughtOnFire

I believe Meditation to be likened to going to the gym. Various techniques of meditation increase focus, clarity, awareness, concentration and etc. I do believe that while going to the meditation gym is good, it's what you take out of the gym and what you use your own strength on in action during life that counts. I think of it like that Batman quote "It's not who I am underneath, but what I do that defines me." This is where Mindfulness comes into the picture. I consider the goal of hitting the meditation gym is to take Mindfulness wherever one goes. Mindfulness is where it's at, and the goal is to maximize Mindfulness through Meditation.

Enlightenment to me is simply the Body/Mind/Spirit of an Individual functioning at 100% in the correct way. Of course I also believe that there will be "side effects" of functioning correctly, such as Kundalini Awakening. And I feel that at this stage of the process, everything becomes a Meditation since one has peaked their Mindfulness to the fullest.

This video/audio excerpt speech from Joe Rogan nicely encapsulates in a larger sense what I mean by "Enlightenment to me is simply the Body/Mind/Spirit of an Individual functioning at 100% in the correct way."

[Gem]

My view is, the meditation is only to do with stillness of mind. There is no goal orientation simply because the purification process is consequential to still mindedness, which is essentially momentary.

[ThoughtOnFire]

Originally Posted by ThoughtOnFire

This video/audio excerpt speech from Joe Rogan nicely encapsulates in a larger sense what I mean by "Enlightenment to me is simply the Body/Mind/Spirit of an Individual functioning at 100% in the correct way."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zg8vWzd5Otg

[ThoughtOnFire]

Originally Posted by Gem

My view is, the meditation is only to do with stillness of mind. There is no goal orientation simply because the purification process is consequential to still mindedness, which is essentially momentary.

"Before Enlightenment, Chop Wood Carry Water. After Enlightenment, Chop Wood Carry Water."

Enlightenment may exist...

...but the journey before and after is where life happens.

[Gem]

Originally Posted by ThoughtOnFire

"Before Enlightenment, Chop Wood Carry Water. After Enlightenment, Chop Wood Carry Water."

Enlightenment may exist...

...but the journey before and after is where life happens.

I wouldn't worry about enlightenment, nor suggest meditation practice is a way to enlightenment. I only suggest that today's meditation makes the day a little bit better, and daily meditation has long term benefits. By far the most important thing about meditation practice is today's practice.