The Simple Act of Meditation

One of the most universal practices today in helping us achieve clarity, focus and serenity along with well documented health benefits is that of meditation. As a regular practitioner for over twenty-five years I wholly endorse the following quote from ‘Way of Meditation’, a book written by Christina Feldman, published by Thorsons (ISBN0-00-711684-5) and available through Local Libraries.

“The purpose of meditation is to transform and awaken us. It is intended to bring about change – through understanding, compassion and clarity of seeing. Through meditation practice, our way of seeing ourselves – our minds, bodies, characters – alters through a process of becoming increasingly sensitive and aware. Our minds have greater access to calmness and clarity, our ways of perceiving ourselves become more intuitive and direct and we begin to understand ourselves with greater depth and compassion. We learn the art of simplicity and disentangling ourselves from the knots of confusion, images, habitual reactions and tensions. We learn the skills of calmness and discover a way to be at peace with ourselves. The personal transformation that occurs translates into a growing capacity to approach our lives with increasing skillfulness, wisdom and care. The choices we make in our lives, our way of relating to other people and the events in our lives, are guided by sensitivity, mindfulness and calm.”

There are many methods of meditation and different dispositions will be drawn to different practices but all have a common core of developing inner happiness, a dynamic path of unfoldment, ethics, right attitude, patience, acceptance and simplicity. The practice usually involves giving gentle attention to a visual object (mandala), a particular sound (mantra), effortlessly focusing on the inner and outer movements of the breath or counting. Some find it helpful to regularly connect with a teacher who is well practiced in meditation but this isn’t essential. Community Colleges, Healing and Natural Health Centres may offer opportunities to learn meditation and ‘The Way of Meditation’ along with countless other books also offer guidance and instruction.

By taking a different perspective on life and altering our mind-set, we can often find creative and original ways of handling situations to best advantage and in a way that will profoundly enhance our future prospects, health and well-being.