(I posed this elsewhere in a comment, and I figured I’d expand upon it here.)
Meditation, with how flighty my mind can be, is not an easy thing for me. It’s also not something that I get to do very often, which can be a great frustration, depending on how things evolve. Happily, there are a great many ways to establish an easy meditation regime.
My favorite way to meditate, which clears my mind when it’s doing the stupid “I-refuse-to-shut-up-about-anything” routine, is what I like to call my ‘Bottom of the Pond’‘ method. I’m relatively certain that I read this somewhere at the age of ten or so, when I first got started into the occult. I’ve no idea where I got it from, however.
This method relies entirely upon visualization. If you have some music that makes you think of a serene pond then play it. I require white noise of some type for my mind to not get distracted on every single little bump and thump my cat makes in her escapades.
Imagine yourself in the center of a large pond. You are just above the surface. All of your worries and issues (all the things keeping you from being still and quiet) are a giant bubble that you sit upon. It is what keeps you aloft, instead of on the bottom of the pond like you want to be. As things pop into your mind, invision them encapsulated by air, a bubble seperated from your main seat. It rises above you, reaching the surface and popping. You do nothing to stop it. You do not think about it. You do not examine it and its intriquicies. You simple acknowledge its presence and then allow it to no longer effect you.
As things leave your bubble, you continue to sink deeper into the pond. You are more relaxed. There is less left on your mind. You’ve less troubles.
When your bubble is empty (or at least can’t effect you any more), you sit at the bottom of the pond, (in theory) in a complete meditative state.
I usually manage to get 4/5ths of the way down before I have to stop. I’ve yet to get all of the air out from under my bottom. /smirk
12, July 2008 at 2:42 am
You could also try walking meditation. Just walk slowly and pay attention to your breathing and the slow footsteps.
12, July 2008 at 10:14 am
I have! It’s also a wonderful way to do it, but I also have an issue with this method. I do not real the calm, meditative state expected. However, I manage to either catch onto a thought and slip deep into it, concentrating and understanding more about it, reaching in and planning what will happen next.
Alternatively, I seem to notice everything around me. Birds. Plants. Trees. The color of the sky. The hue of the clouds. This is a singularly alternate experience, but there’s no falling inward. The examination is all outward.
13, July 2008 at 11:22 am
Actually, this sounds like a form of Stewart Swerdlow meditation for releasing sins.
Here’s one: ‘Visualize a white balloon. Instead of air, fill it with all people, places, things, or events that trouble you from past or present situations, including your fears of the future. Bless each as you put it into the balloon watching the balloon inflate as if filling it with air. After all conscious negativity is out of your mind and into the balloon, tie it off with a brown string. Hold onto the brown string feeling the tension in it. This tension represents the conflict of your wanting to let go yet your unwillingness to do so. Next, visualize and feel yourself letting go of the balloon. Watch it float off into the sky until it disappears. Empower the vision with this thought: “I forgive and release all negativity from my mind. They are gone forever and I cannot take them back.” Know that God takes care of and purges these burdens for you.’
The above is more of a prayer than a trance. Remember that prayer is for asking advice while meditation is for listening to the answers.
To slip into a meditative trance more easily, relax your focus as if gazing into a distant horizon of the ocean. Relax your jaw by letting it drop slightly. These actions relax cranial nerves 1 – 5 which allow your neural patterns to easily become lower in frequency, then you command yourself to relax at any given moment using these responses.