Active Meditation

I have been wanting to do meditation since I was in school, but really found it difficult to sit and focus even for twenty minutes straight. I could only fancy the calmness and composure of this state of meditation, but I couldn't go into myself. I just tend to get some nonsense thoughts if I just force myself to sit silent with closed eyes for more than 5-10 minutes. Over the years, I've been trying on and off and have been improving a little actually. However, in the meanwhile I have started studying about spirituality and mysticism and found that there are many many different ways of meditating. In fact, there are elaborate techniques and exercises that can lead one to a state of meditation, which don't need sitting passively with closed eyes watching one's thoughts or watching one's breath. The key is not silence or closing one's eyes but maintaining a state of watchfulness and alertness wherever, whenever, and however one can. This discovery has been quite a liberating experience for me. This watchfulness is a state of heightened self-awareness (as opposed to self-consciousness which is other-oriented). So meditation basically involves accumulating or enhancing this self-awareness. One simple practical way of doing it is while watching a movie on the TV, for example, instead of getting completely absorbed in the movie, if it is an interesting one, one has to maintain an awareness of oneself, the viewer and the subject, simultaneously while paying attention to the movie, the object of one's attention. And this procedure can be implemented at a wide variety of activities, especially while walking or doing simple exercising, which do not need any mental involvement. By trying to following this method, one's attention is not just dissipated in the world of objects, but gets recycled to some extent. And I have understood that a central finding of many schools of Eastern spirituality is that attention/consciousness is energy or life; consciousness is the primary force in the universe. Meditation is simply a way of cultivating consciousness in whatever manner we can.

 

 

 

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I totally agree with you on this. I have also been practicing meditation on and off for years now, and even though I have been getting better at it, I still find it hard to "clear" your mind of thoughts.

I only recently discovered too that meditation does not need to be so calm or focused, but can be used in the sense that you described. It was while watching a Buddist documentary that I discovered this and it amazed me. I think I may have already had this state when I was practicing martial arts, as I would find that in my hightened state, I could respond and react much quicker and with better ability then I normally would doing other activities.

So I am very interested in this, just not exactly sure how to continue this or develop it aside from more practive! However, I think I will be looking into Buddist teachings.

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I am very interested about this subject, I would ask if we can go deeper with some examples and if you can describe sensations you feel and the various type of exercises you usually make to improve your skill as this "meditation" concept that comes from martial arts is usually under explained.
Thanks a lot!

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I can try and explain how the meditation aspect works with martial art. It might be hard to understand though.

So when you do a martial art, you learn the forms and techniques. At first, you will be too concentrated on memorizing it and doing it correctly. However, the learning part is necessary, because once you know the form and you can just flow through it, you still focus on doing it properly, but once you got it right, it starts to feel right too, and the body movements come automatically. The thinking is on another level, and you just start becoming aware of not only your body, but your surroundings. I feel that if I continued to practice this martial art, and honed that state, sparring would have been very interesting. It already was in some way.

To try and give a more concrete example, and as much as the movie was not that fantastic, The Last Samurai has some very excellent moments were I felt I was practicing my martial art all over again. Moments were Tom Cruise simply holds up his sword, and is aware of his surroundings and finally understands what its like to use his sword, is that moment of meditation.

I hope that helps? lol I'm not sure if I can make this any more clear. It's really something that needs to be worked on and practiced. I only really got to this state after two years of practicing my martial art. (Which by the way, is with swords just like the movie).

 

 

 

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