Meditation 101

Originally posted by lucifershammer
You forget one:

4. (Revenge of the Sith objection) - Focusing one's attention inwards is the path to the Dark Side ...

LOL, sorry, but equating meditation with evil is too funny. Nice Superman costume by the way. You check out the Batman movie yet? 😲

Actually the Jedi training was very much concerned with "inward development", much like a Taoist or Shaolin master.

But even the Jedi, as symbols of an order of "light workers", were not perfect. Like the Knights Templer they got too caught up in politics and power.

The Sith, in some ways, were less hypocritical.

But neither Sith nor Jedi were exactly shining examples of enlightenment or wisdom.

Originally posted by Metamorphosis
Well actually, the symbol in Vedic Hinduism used for spiritual enlightenment attained via meditation practice is often that of Shiva -- a horned guy with a trident-pitchfork. No kidding.

Shiva represents stability, centeredness. Shakti, his counterpart, represents the "divine wind" -- not the divine breaking wind, I should hasten to clarify ...[text shortened]... of Shiva. Ramana was considered by many to have been India greatest sage of the 20th century...

Speaking of breaking wind, one cannot meditate it away.
Que sera sera
Not me, someone else used to meditate during modelling for an art school.
Could not stop nature.
Nope.

Originally posted by KneverKnight
Speaking of breaking wind, one cannot meditate it away.
Que sera sera
Not me, someone else used to meditate during modelling for an art school.
Could not stop nature.
Nope.

No, but you can medicate it away...weren't you reading about frogstomp's laxatives...? 😕

Anyway you should try meditating in an ashram in India when the "divine wind" breaks....if that doesn't motivate you to get enlightened and graduate, not much will...

Speaking of which, meditation can help digestion in general, by reducing anxiety levels.

Originally posted by Metamorphosis
No, but you can medicate it away...weren't you reading about frogstomp's laxatives...? 😕

Anyway you should try meditating in an ashram in India when the "divine wind" breaks....if that doesn't motivate you to get enlig ...[text shortened]... tation can help digestion in general, by reducing anxiety levels.

might be a motivation to motivate away from there too

btw did you intend to call this thread Medication 101 ?

Originally posted by frogstomp
might be a motivation to motivate away from there too

btw did you intend to call this thread Medication 101 ?

Might as well call it "Medication 101"...that would probably attract more interest, lol.

Meditation is a useful means for “sidestepping” all the busy-ness of the “artifactual” “somebody self” (sometimes called the ego-self, but that can be a loaded term). Nothing wrong with the somebody-self—it’s a wonderful treasure, as long as you realize that it’s contents is made-up. We all have gone through cultural, familial, social (etc. etc.) “somebody-ness training,” and some of the somebody-ness making we do ourselves. The question is, who is the “maker?” Once it gets going, it is quite capable, within its own parameters, of making and remaking itself over and over--for good or ill.

I use my personal koan: “Behind all the makings of my mind, before all images, thoughts and words, who—?” No glib answers! That is just more making! No making, just being, just being that who. Not focusing inward (certainly not focusing inwardly on the somebody-self, caught up in it’s endless makings—though it is interesting to “see” that), just being that who and, as Alan Watts put it, “grooving” with what’s going on around me—“grooving” as in being in harmonious synch with—listening to birdsong, feeding the goats, doing tai chi, mowing the grass, conversing with my friend…

Meditation itself is not the point. Routine is not the point. Taking time to “meditate” is, for me, taking time to remember that “I” am not all that busy-mind stuff (including thoughts of “I”—behind all the makings of your mind, can you find an “I” that is not just another thought, idea-complex, another making?). A daily “practice” of that helps me to “remember” more often—and live from that who a bit more—during my daily living. I still have a tendency to “forget” during all the doings of life. (I think it was Ram Dass who said that the most difficult thing is to remember—to remember to remember!)

I also have some Centering Prayer background, and first really found that who on an 8-day intensive retreat (the makings of the fabricated self fell away like pick-up sticks, and for the first time there was an immense, alive, aware silence).

Anyway, now that I’ve turned this whole thing all serious again—time to go work on the lawn-mower…. 🙂

Originally posted by vistesd
Meditation is a useful means for “sidestepping” all the busy-ness of the “artifactual” “somebody self” (sometimes called the ego-self, but that can be a loaded term). Nothing wrong with the somebody-self—it’s a wonderful treasure, as long as you realize that it’s contents is made-up. We all have gone through cultural, familial, social (etc. etc.) “somebod ...[text shortened]... now that I’ve turned this whole thing all serious again—time to go work on the lawn-mower…. 🙂

Why are we servants to lawns? Time for me to cut grass yet again.

I'm not that "deeply" into meditation, I think of it as being like a computer restart; the mind gets a chance to let go of all the conflicting thoughts running around in there and is refreshed. Nothing too cosmic about that.

Originally posted by KneverKnight
Why are we servants to lawns? Time for me to cut grass yet again.

I'm not that "deeply" into meditation, I think of it as being like a computer restart; the mind gets a chance to let go of all the conflicting thoughts running around in there and is refreshed. Nothing too cosmic about that.

Why are we servants to lawns? Time for me to cut grass yet again.

LOL! You’re the one that was telling me about rediscovering the joy of mowing! And I’ve been trying to get into it... 😉

On the other hand, I have two mowers on the blink, and it’s 90 in the shade to day—so why am I trying to get them started? 😛

Originally posted by vistesd
[b]Why are we servants to lawns? Time for me to cut grass yet again.

LOL! You’re the one that was telling me about rediscovering the joy of mowing! And I’ve been trying to get into it... 😉

On the other hand, I have two mowers on the blink, and it’s 90 in the shade to day—so why am I trying to get them started? 😛
[/b]

I have one perky little mower that's always raring to go!
I need to capture some of that essence, ignore the heat (it's bloody hot here too-that's what has me mired) and get into that old-time grass-cutting spirit, but first, I will take a short spin in the car for some gas to put into the perky mower.
Either that or rent a few goats.

Originally posted by KneverKnight
I have one perky little mower that's always raring to go!
I need to capture some of that essence, ignore the heat (it's bloody hot here too-that's what has me mired) and get into that old-time grass-cutting spirit, but first, I will take a short spin in the car for some gas to put into the perky mower.
Either that or rent a few goats.

Feed that perky mower well; talk sweetly to her...

I'm going to meditate for awhile, focusing on this shiny new spark-plug to perk my one mower up, then after I've mediated on it long enough...

...I'm going to go take a nap!

Originally posted by vistesd
Feed that perky mower well; talk sweetly to her...

I'm going to meditate for awhile, focusing on this shiny new spark-plug to perk my one mower up, then after I've mediated on it long enough...

...I'm going to go take a nap!

Naps are antithetical to meditation; I saw a Buddhist temple (on TV) that had a guy with a stick available to strike the meditators back to alertness if they felt they were nodding off.
Once again the mowing focussed me and Nature obliged my efforts by providing a cool breeze and it looks like rain, all is harmony ...
Aaaaahhhh
🙂

Originally posted by KneverKnight
Naps are antithetical to meditation; I saw a Buddhist temple (on TV) that had a guy with a stick available to strike the meditators back to alertness if they felt they were nodding off.
Once again the mowing focussed me and Nature obliged my efforts by providing a cool breeze and it looks like rain, all is harmony ...
Aaaaahhhh
🙂

🙂 Okay, look, I expect to see you here at 7:00 AM tomorrow, with your perky mower! 🙂

Why bother with lawn mowers? Just get something that eats the grass, like a cow... 😛

In Tibet they have an interesting phrase -- "meditation isn't; getting used to, is."

That's an expression of the idea that there is actually no such thing as "meditating oneself to enlightenment". The meditation practice itself is not the thing, it's more the demonstration of undertaking it that's all-important. So in the act of sitting in meditation (or active meditations) one is really only involved in "getting used to" the mental state of this practice, that being awareness of one's thoughts.

So in sitting quietly, one is simply "getting used to" one's own mind, minus the external distractions upon which the mind normally projects. It's a bit like when we watch a movie, and get engrossed in these characters playing out on a 2-dimensional screen, all the while forgetting that the images are really originating in the projector in the back of the cinema. To get lost in the movie is to identify with it (intellectually, emotionally, even physically). To keep one's awareness on the projector is to remember that the screen is actually just a screen. That's a metaphor for beginning to see how our mind creates our experience of reality, via its conceptual filters.

Originally posted by Metamorphosis
Why bother with lawn mowers? Just get something that eats the grass, like a cow... 😛

In Tibet they have an interesting phrase -- "meditation isn't; getting used to, is."

That's an expression of the idea that t ...[text shortened]... ind creates our experience of reality, via its conceptual filters.

Why bother with lawn mowers? Just get something that eats the grass, like a cow…

LOL! We actually have two goats, but they eat everything! Especially grapes and lilies and tomatoes and…well, such things as we have around the house and don’t want to individually fence in. Easier to fence the goats where you want them…

So in sitting quietly, one is simply "getting used to" one's own mind, minus the external distractions upon which the mind normally projects. It's a bit like when we watch a movie, and get engrossed in these characters playing out on a 2-dimensional screen, all the while forgetting that the images are really originating in the projector in the back of the cinema. To get lost in the movie is to identify with it (intellectually, emotionally, even physically). To keep one's awareness on the projector is to remember that the screen is actually just a screen. That's a metaphor for beginning to see how our mind creates our experience of reality, via its conceptual filters.

Thank you. That describes exactly my experience (especially since I like movies), but didn’t know how to say it.

I've heard about the voraciousness of goats...reminds me of the Buddhist tale told at the beginning of the movie "Little Buddha" (Bertolucci's film -- you'd enjoy it if you haven't seen it yet). In the tale, a priest is sacrificing goats, when he notices one goat weeping. He tells the goat not to despair. The goat replies "I'm not crying for me, but for you. You are going to have to be reborn as a goat one thousand times to repay your goat-killing karma..."

And then there is the Biblical scapegoat...the repository for the projected guilt of an entire community...