Spiritual Forums

Home


Donate!


Articles


CHAT!


Shop


 
Welcome to Spiritual Forums!.

We created this community for people from all backgrounds to discuss Spiritual, Paranormal, Metaphysical, Philosophical, Supernatural, and Esoteric subjects. From Astral Projection to Zen, all topics are welcome. We hope you enjoy your visits.

You are currently viewing our boards as a guest, which gives you limited access to most discussions and articles. By joining our free community you will be able to post messages, communicate privately with other members (PM), respond to polls, upload your own photos, and gain access to our Chat Rooms, Registration is fast, simple, and free, so please, join our community today! !

If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, check our FAQs before contacting support. Please read our forum rules, since they are enforced by our volunteer staff. This will help you avoid any infractions and issues.

Go Back   Spiritual Forums > Spirituality & Beliefs > Meditation

Reply
 
Thread Tools Display Modes
  #11  
Old 20-04-2021, 04:00 AM
zinnat
Posts: n/a
 
As i said in my opening post, i am going to discuss not only what but why too so after reading my suggestion of doing of above mentioned practice each night, the first question that must have been crossed to everybody's mind, is why do all this, in the first place? What is its purpose, why it is necessary, or how it can be helpful in any way? What it has to do with the meditation? Is it meditation, and if not, what else is meditation?

Let me address these questions to the best of my abilities: what i experienced in person, what i derived via those and what i learned through other sources. But, let me make one thing very clear here that, though my explanations may have some borrowed portions, but my experiences are absolutely not.

The first thing that is required while discussing anything is its definition. One cannot know for what exactly one is looking after unless one has its that much clear definition, which is enough to recognize that particular thing.

Thus, first of all, we have to define meditation, but, the problem is that the meditation neither can be defined nor understood without understanding our mind, thus, we have to go though those details of the mind which are necessary to understand meditation.

As most of the intellectuals agree that mind is basically works in two ways: consciously and subconsciously, or we can say that our mind is divided into two basic parts: conscious and subconscious. Conscious part/working or the mind is that phenomenon, with which we mostly determine as ourselves. We have direct and total control over it. On the other hand, we consider that our subconscious mind is not in total control of ours. It rather learn/experience though conscious mind, derive conclusions autonomously, and impose those on the conscious mind. This theory is by and large true.

But, there are some more details, which are very pertinent here to understand both of the working of the mind and meditation as well.

The fact of the matter is that our subconscious is even more dominant over its counterpart that we assume. It is subconscious that takes most of our decisions, though mostly indirectly. The act of thinking/learning is mostly done by the subconscious mind only. Being in the direct control of the body, conscious merely implement the decisions of the subconscious. What we consider as habits, are nothing but the default/permanent decisions of the subconscious, and that is precisely what forms what we use to term as will. And, for whatever reasons, whenever conscious goes against those default/permanent decisions of the subconscious, we call it will power. And, that is precisely why it is called free will. It is called free only because it is still within the capacity of the conscious, but this does not mean that it very easy to implement, though the term free gives somewhat impression. Free merely means it is available, nothing else.

And, meditation is all about this will power. In simple terms, meditation is nothing but breaking that default dominance of the subconscious and making it listen to the conscious.

One more important thing to understand here is that though conscious and subconscious use to interact constantly, but it is mostly one way traffic: from subconscious to conscious. The duty of the conscious is mostly limited to inform the subconscious, what conscious has experienced through the body. Or rather, the system works in such a way that being in a kind of witness/spectator position, subconscious is automatically aware of the experiences of the conscious. Conscious cannot hide anything from the subconscious, but on the other hand, the majority of the working of the subconscious remains hidden from the conscious.

Again, meditation is all about removing this one sided veil and allowing conscious not only witness but also interfere in the working of the subconscious by converting this one way traffic into two way.

I think that is enough for one post.

One thing i want to say the readers. I do not want this thread to become a monologue. All questions and criticisms are welcome and i will try to address those to the best of my abilities.

with love,
sanjay
Reply With Quote
  #12  
Old 20-04-2021, 07:35 AM
Unseeking Seeker Unseeking Seeker is offline
Master
Join Date: Sep 2018
Location: Delhi, India
Posts: 10,939
  Unseeking Seeker's Avatar
A continuum of mindfulness, wherein our softened attention remains within reach of our active awareness, with continued practice, as a way of life, possibly blurs boundaries between layers of consciousness.

Reworded, taking the subconscious to be latent impressions and conscious to be our prioritised cognitions, once we deselect accordance of mind body (ego) related preference, we get nearer to a continuum of unbroken awareness, on an as is, where is basis.

Someone recently was asking about difference between waking, dreaming and deep sleep. Now, if we be relatively, in as much as able, impressionless, simply present, we may witness mind body slipping into sleep, whilst awareness is held still, effortlessly. On ‘waking up’, the mind body awakens whereas we always were awake. Just citing this as an illustration.

Likening subconscious to tamas, conscious to Rajas and meditation to sattva Guna of state of being, our affinity as of hearts desire births manifestations.

But what determines hearts desire? How may it be brought closer to Gods love vibration? These are matters for contemplation in aloneness.
__________________
The Self has no attribute
Reply With Quote
  #13  
Old 21-04-2021, 03:27 AM
zinnat
Posts: n/a
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Unseeking Seeker
A continuum of mindfulness, wherein our softened attention remains within reach of our active awareness, with continued practice, as a way of life, possibly blurs boundaries between layers of consciousness.

Reworded, taking the subconscious to be latent impressions and conscious to be our prioritised cognitions, once we deselect accordance of mind body (ego) related preference, we get nearer to a continuum of unbroken awareness, on an as is, where is basis.
....

seeker,

i am sorry to say that i cannot wrap my head around your post. I simply fail to understand what you exactly mean by all that thus unable to comment anything.

Please avoid highly metamorphic language as more often than not it becomes vague. Secondly, as english is not my first language so it troubles me more. I would appreciate simple, plain, clear and to the point conversation.

with love,
sanjay
Reply With Quote
  #14  
Old 21-04-2021, 03:45 AM
Unseeking Seeker Unseeking Seeker is offline
Master
Join Date: Sep 2018
Location: Delhi, India
Posts: 10,939
  Unseeking Seeker's Avatar
@ zinat ... please ignore my post and continue! :)
__________________
The Self has no attribute
Reply With Quote
  #15  
Old 21-04-2021, 03:47 AM
zinnat
Posts: n/a
 
Let us continue with the main issue of the thread.

After reading what i said about daily introspection practice at night and the relation and working of conscious and subconscious minds, one is entitled to ask a question how all that fits in the context. So, first of all i must make it clear what is purpose of all that.


If we take a closer look at the mind, we would find that mind mostly remember things via references or markers. That is a quite natural phenomenon. As it stores a lot of memory, many times more that we assume, thus, it cannot be put in any unorganized manner scattered all over the place. There has to be some kind of order otherwise it would be very difficult to recall any old memory when it is required immediately. This arrangement is quite similar to that of a big library, where books can be placed either alphabetically or according to the time frame, but there has to be some order to enable the locator to find the required book in real tine. in the same way, the mind uses a small reference or marker to remember a long event. It is its default mechanism and cannot be overruled in any case.

To explain this phenomenon further, i would like to put forth an old folklore from Hinduism.

Once there was a very learned and famous sage, and people used to come to him for learning and help in issues from all over. He also had a son, who was stupid and lazy but wanted to get the benefits from the knowledge of his father. So, one day he asked his father to teach him the mantras for immorality. The sage refused by saying that there are no such mantras, but the son kept on insisting. And, when his father continued to ignore him, the son gave up eating and said he would die fasting if his father did not grant his wish. Seeing no other option, the sage lastly agreed to teach those mantras to his son. The son became very pleased to hear that and also asked his father to teach mantras immediately. But, the sage calmed him down and said that he would teach the mantras tomorrow early morning just after taking the bath.

Next day, as asked by the father, the son took the bath in river and came to the sage eagerly. Then, the sage said that though he (sage) is telling the mantras to him (son), but also warned that there is still a small but necessary condition remains to be fulfilled. The son asked what it is, and the sage told that it is necessary that the remembrance of the monkeys should not come in one's mind at all while reciting those mantras, otherwise immortality could never be achieved.

Hearing this, the son laughed saying that as the thoughts regarding the monkeys never come to his mind, so it is a non issue for him. The sage told the mantras, asked his son to repeat 100 times, warned his son again regarding the monkeys, and left.

Now, as soon as the son started reciting the mantras, the first thing popped up in his mind, was a monkey. He became surprised and thought it is just a chance, but monkeys refused to vacate his mind. He kept trying to forget them, but the more he tried to forget them, the more they continued to haunt him. Years passed, but neither monkeys left the son nor he became immortal.

Obviously, the story is not true but fabricated only, but its moral is absolutely true. That happens in reality because that is how our mind works. And, my suggested mental exercise is based precisely on the moral of above mentioned folklore.

We use to come across to many different circumstances daily, and quite obviously, we have to somehow deal with those too. But, our way of dealing does not always happen to be in such a way what it ought to be, even according to ourselves. And, for meditation, that intent is the first thing to have. It is not the issue here what is right or wrong according to one's thinking. That is still to be known by one, but one must be committed to follow honestly what he considers right. My focus is on the intent of being right, not much on the right deduction of being right. If the intent of being right will be there, being right will follow sooner or later. And realize, that this what it ought to be is not regarding only societal issues, but all verticals of the life like business, profession, job etc.

But, in the loud noise of ambiance, and also because of that much fast pace life we live today for whatever reasons, we never get the chance to reevaluate what we have been done, thus lose the opportunity to correct it too. This mental exercise will certainly help in that regard.

But, the question, how it can help, is still unanswered.

When we would start reevaluating our every day's actions and our frame mind while doing those also, that would slowly but surely start creating a reference/mark in our mind about our intents and actions. Of course, we will judge (or came to know later through experience) some of our intent/actions right and some wrong, but every such reevaluation would darker the reference in our subconscious mind by one notch. And, if one keep doing it for long enough and continuously too, that will create a default warning system in the subconscious mind, and whenever that very situation arises again, it would tell conscious mind immediately how to handle that situation.

It is something like what we have safety software in our phones and computers. Whenever that software finds any bug, or we try to do anything such which may harm the device in any way, safety software immediately warn about the danger, and we correct the course too. The same this mental exercise can do for our mind. Though, our mind still uses this mechanism, but only sparingly, not always.

With this, i think have covered all questions that may arise pertaining to what i have been said till now, thus I will move to the basics of the meditation methodologies/exercises from the next post.

with love,
sanjay
Reply With Quote
  #16  
Old 21-04-2021, 04:17 AM
zinnat
Posts: n/a
 
One more thing.

I have gone through many threads posted in this forum and found many pertinent questions put up by posters like various experiences during meditation and importance of stillness during meditation etc. I will try to cover all that in this thread as much as possible.

Having said that, posters can also put their questions/queries directly here in case i miss anything.

with love,
sanjay
Reply With Quote
  #17  
Old 21-04-2021, 01:32 PM
lomax lomax is offline
Master
Join Date: Jul 2018
Location: Greece
Posts: 2,934
  lomax's Avatar
Nice thread zinnat.
__________________
Γνώθι σ’αυτόν
Reply With Quote
  #18  
Old 21-04-2021, 05:02 PM
Still_Waters Still_Waters is offline
Master
Join Date: Apr 2016
Location: Brooklyn, New York
Posts: 4,447
  Still_Waters's Avatar
QUOTE 16 EXCERPT:
Quote:
Originally Posted by zinnat
I have gone through many threads posted in this forum and found many pertinent questions put up by posters like various experiences during meditation and importance of stillness during meditation etc. I will try to cover all that in this thread as much as possible.
I am looking forward to your insights on the "various experiences during meditation and the importance of stillness during meditation etc."
Reply With Quote
  #19  
Old 22-04-2021, 03:15 AM
zinnat
Posts: n/a
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Unseeking Seeker
@ zinat ... please ignore my post and continue! :)
Ignoring you or anyone else is not intention. My only point is that conversation in such issues is that much clear so no one gets confused. All issues, irrespective of how complex they are, can be narrated in plain and simple language. There is no need of any kind of intellectual contraption.

Secondly, seeing Delhi as your location, i am assuming that you are also an Indian like me. I live at Jhansi (U.P) which is around 400 km south from Delhi.

with love,
sanjay
Reply With Quote
  #20  
Old 22-04-2021, 03:16 AM
zinnat
Posts: n/a
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by lomax
Nice thread zinnat.
Thanks.

with love,
sanjay
Reply With Quote
Reply


Thread Tools
Display Modes

Posting Rules
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts

vB code is On
Smilies are On
[IMG] code is On
HTML code is Off
Forum Jump


All times are GMT. The time now is 03:36 PM.


Powered by vBulletin
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, Jelsoft Enterprises Ltd.
(c) Spiritual Forums