Nothing fancy. My 3 easy ways of Meditation.
Meditation can be / should be creative. There is lot of way to do meditation. Some of them may need teacher’s guidance to practice. Which involved certain theory, imagination, understanding of prana (flow of energy) or chakra etc. Is good to know different methods so that you can choose which one fits your style and need. You may find your preference varies depending on your experience or emotion.
I don’t strictly follow certain way to meditate. I tends to pick the EASY one. For me, the aim of meditation is simple : be present. Ya, we know the simplest task can be the most difficult one in the world. To serve this purpose, I think the way of meditation itself should be simple too. We don’t pick the complicated way for a simple purpose. Indeed, we want to make everything as simple as possible. So that its more accessible.
Once I in touch with the Buddhist way of mediation. I find that is easy to understand. I can’t said I’m fall in love with it, but it comes to me everytime when I sit down to mediated. So I would love to share them with you here.
Before I go into the topic
Just a littler sharing of the body gesture for meditation. Well, its all depends on your body’s situation or level of comfort. I don’t particularly force myself sit in cross leg or what. You can sit on the floor, with/out cushion, sit on the chair or even lay down. Gentle close you eyes, relax your shoulder and neck, remind a nature spine, let go your expectation and softly begins your meditation.
1/ Listen to the sound around.
I specifically love this method coz its so practical. We are not living in the library, we can’t avoid “sound” happen around during our meditation. So this method is taking “sound” as a guidance to meditate. Let us to embarrass our real life instead of create a so called “meditate environment ”.
The Method :
Start to listen to the sound around, inside the room and outside the street. Listen to every single source of sound. We are here simply listen without labelling “this is a beautiful sound and this is not”. Classical music and noisy from the air-con both are “sound”, their nature has no different. Sound is flowing in the present. When we listen to it without judgment, we are actually in every present moment.
2/ Observe your breath.
Some of you may practice this in yoga class. We observe and we counting our breath. However, in this method, we are not aim to practice breathing but use breath as the guidance to stay in the present.
The Method :
Start to realise you are actually breathing. Without using too much force, softly attached your attention to your breath. Like an observer watching the clouds flow into the sky or the water flow in the river. Simple observe it without changing your breath by making it longer or deeper. Don’t be surprised/ judge your breath by asking “ why my breath is so short? Am I not health enough?” Etc. Just let it be what it naturally to be.
3/ Listen to your heart beat.
This is not from Buddhism but my own yoga practice. Its very similar to method 2, but its more delicate. Coz heart beat is weaker the breath. So that we have to be more quite in the mind in order to observe it.
The Method :
Now we have to even slowly down our breath and make it more settle to allows us discover the heartbeat. Don’t rush if the beat not appears to you at the beginning. Noisy down your mind, calm the inner environment with awareness and be patient, like you turn the radio into mute slowly. When you start to catch your heartbeat, do feel the micro muscle movement radiated from the heart pumping. Attach your attention softly to the beat as long as you can. And come back again if your get lost track in the mid way.
All the method fits all level.
There is not ladder structure that you go next stage after you KO the beginner level. You can practice the same way of meditation for a life time. No right or wrong. Ask your body and daily mind state to choose the most comfortable one. Namaste.
Writer/ Image _Christine Sit