Help with simple meditation

[Gem]

Originally Posted by Traveler

Also chanting a mantra. Or focusing on an external sound.

These are actually two very different things. Chanting a mantra is something you make happen, wheres an external sound is 'just happening'. The first is 'as I want it to be' and the latter is 'as it is'. Two different and even contradictory meditation approaches.

[veritliber]

Originally Posted by Gem

I think the simplest is the best. Feel yourself breathing just as you are.
If breath is shallow and fast, that's the way it is. If it's deep and slow, that's how it is. I'm just aware, it is 'this' way.
When the mind wanders away, at some stage you realise, 'mind has wandered off', and resume feeling yourself breathing.

Well thanks for this one, I've been having problems with mediation lately...
I have to make things more simple, like you say.

[Traveler]

Originally Posted by Gem

These are actually two very different things. Chanting a mantra is something you make happen, wheres an external sound is 'just happening'. The first is 'as I want it to be' and the latter is 'as it is'. Two different and even contradictory meditation approaches.

Yes, they are two different things. But isn't the outcome is the same? Your mind is focused on something which helps still the internal chatter, right?

[Gem]

Originally Posted by Traveler

Yes, they are two different things. But isn't the outcome is the same? Your mind is focused on something which helps still the internal chatter, right?

I'm not sure, but one generating a mantra must be trying to make things as they want it to be, and I have found the desire motive becomes problematic a bit further down the road.

On the other hand, 'just being aware' (such as breath awareness for example) is more like a curiosity about what 'this' is like, rather than an urge to have an experience that you want. I have found this is what one needs later on...

We tend to find, however, that despite the intention to simply be aware of what is, the mind starts generating nonsense, self-narrative, reactivity etc, and we'll notice how we desire this and that and feel adverse toward other experiences, and start to generate frustration, impatience, and such reactive states that breed discontent - and thus come to understand, 'this is how I generate my own misery'.

We could then invoke a mantra or start counting to quell the mental tendencies. That's effctive in that way, but the observer would know it is motivated by aversion to their mind-state and desire for 'something else'.

But that is what we are already doing in our lives. Avoiding this and chasing after that. Always in motion between what we don't like and what we want. And we know by now, after all this time, that that strategy has brought fleeting happiness, but the ways in which we breed our own discontent remains unresolved.

The 'just observe' approach necessitates the cessation of the dynamic away from aversion and toward desire. It's not easy because the tendency is so ingrained and habitualised, but if one is determined and persistent, by knowing what the mind gets up to, seeing the tricks of ego, and knowing, 'this is discontent', 'This is how I create my discontent', 'I need to stop doing that'... they'll be able to resolve that desire/aversion dynamic at deeper and deeper levels over time and feel more fundamentally at peace.

[Miss Hepburn]

Reminder, Admins have asked to quote others with only 2-3 sentences.
Thanks

[BigJohn]

Breathing can get you into a quiet state.

When I see my breathing moving about in my Aura, I know I am getting close.

When you look at breathing from that perspective, you can begin to realize that other things can be used besides your breath.

When I meditate, I meditate with my eyes opened and I rock gently from left to right. Doing this, it doesn't take long to see other things in the room. If other people are in the room, I generally watch various Spirits come close to them and in some cases, they seem to transfix over the individual.

[snowyowl]

I like the above posts about breathing, it was my main practice for many years. And an alternative one I use is body scan, slowly following a pre-planned route around my body if I want some more variety, and to get more awareness of my body apart from just the breath.

[Gem]

Originally Posted by snowyowl

breathing was my main practice for many years. And an alternative one I use is body scan.

It's very good practice.