Meditation

[kilgore trout]

hi astrogreen,

the tradition for buddhist meditation is that the practice should only be taken up for the selfless reason of the liberation of all beings.

now days that precept is totally disregarded, its taught for free, to anyone, whch is cool for me, cause i never would have learned it otherwise and would be alot less better off.

but i do see why such a strict rule was applied

meditation is not recommended to severely depressed people, and also it is recommended when you are in a strong mental state, such as anger or sadness.

the reason for this, from what i can see, is that any thought you focus apon will become greater in strength.

when you are in a meditative state your concentration is increased, and the strength of the above process is increased, any thoughts you concentrate upon while under meditation, will increase greatly in strength.

this is the basis of what could be seen as the "moral" part of meditation, restructuring the habits by choosing where you apply your awareness, will or concentration.

buddhists say that all thoughts ilisit a response, when we direct our attention to those thoughts, they gain what is called "habit energy" and when these thoughts arrise again, they have a greater emotional strength or a greater habit energy.

buddhists use this process to encourage "right" thoughts and discourage "wrong" thoughts, by concentrating on the right ones, or even purposely introducing them and "letting go" of the "wrong" thoughts.

letting go is something that is learnt, to some extent, when you turn back to your breath, after becoming aware that you have been distracted, while counting breaths.

awareness and concentration are also taught by counting breaths, its cool all round, and does no harm

but i will say meditation, full on, using the skills learned by counting breaths or being aware of your breath, is not a toy and can have very serious concequences when used with the wrong goals in mind

i started meditation, not to be a bit happier, but becuase i had to know the "truth", even that would be seen as the "wrong" reason in traditional buddhism, they saw these techniques as so powerful and dangerous that they could only be taught after a strict selfless vow had been taken.

it is very common, after a while of practicing meditation, for the collection of thoughts, with all their habit energy, to get the hump and make ya life hell. when this happened to me, iwas scared to hell, but i read a quote by christmas humphreys that said it was a very common state of affairs for the negative aspcts of ya self to make a fuss, because they wish to cotinue being in charge of you, is how id put it.

anyhows, that sort of effect is just one of the reasons for taking proper meditation techniques seriously. to be in a meditative state and visualise self centered goals is very "wrong" from a buddhist point of view, but is a common practice in self help systems and all sorts of positive thinking, psychological techniques, this would be seen as encouraging "wrong" thoughts by traditional buddhists, encouraging "wrong" traits like pride and greed.

visualisation, in buddhist meditation is used to promote selflessness, not selfishness

sorry this is sooo long, and id encourage anyone to take up meditation, but serious practice should only be done for the right reasons, and it is a very powerfull thing, proberbly the best tool in the world

Edited September 16, 2007 by kilgore trout

[spungebob psycopants]

i beleave the key is to reach a relaxed sleep like state but dont fall asleep and just let your brain pump drugs into your system so you feel good and at piece with yourself

[Twine]

[callywally]

Ive only had one experience of it, went to a meditation camp in the mountains of Thailand, seems to be mainly about watching your breath.

living like a buddhist monk, by the end i certainly felt better but couldn't help but think.. sleeping on a wood block with a wooden pillow and meditating every day and rejecting all materialism to seek a higher truth seems like a bit of waste of time (imagine if there was no life after death) then all the monks have just wasted their entire lives.

Amusing to see the monks falling asleep while meditating