The Practice of....
Meditation! I come back, on a regular basis, to the importance of the practice of Meditation. If you want to improve your life and your health in the New Year, you too might want to begin the practice of meditation, or improve upon your practice, if you have been doing it for a long time. I have practiced meditation, in one form or another, for over fifty years, and I find the practice becomes increasingly important for me. I have written about it in various places, and I often find myself trying to improve on what I have said before. Here is the gist of it:
Meditation! I come back, on a regular basis, to the importance of the practice of Meditation. If you want to improve your life and your health in the New Year, you too might want to begin the practice of meditation, or improve upon your practice, if you have been doing it for a long time. I have practiced meditation, in one form or another, for over fifty years, and I find the practice becomes increasingly important for me. I have written about it in various places, and I often find myself trying to improve on what I have said before. Here is the gist of it:
Set
aside some secure time, find a comfortable position, and meditate just
for the sake of meditation. Focus your mind on your breathing, and
meditate with no specific purpose in mind. Do not be surprised if, over
time, meditation becomes the root of major changes in your attitudes and
dispositions. It has been well documented that meditation works to
reduce the feelings of stress, and we all face some major sources of
stress each day. Meditation can easily become the most important
activity of your day. "Meditation is not the killing of time. It is the
deepening and enriching of time."
There
are many sources of stress in our lives. Most cardiac care programs are
composed of sessions on diet, exercise, and stress reduction. I handle
the stresses of daily life much better, if I start off the day with a
few minutes of walking meditation, in which I do nothing but try to
breathe deeply, while setting my mind at peace. There are many different
masters of meditation, and many different religious traditions have
generated their own methods of meditation. I have found Thich Nhat
Hanh's book, Peace Is Every Step, to be particularly helpful, and
I find what he says is applicable to many different forms of
meditation. The following paragraph says it better than I ever could:
"Do
not lose yourself in dispersion and in your surroundings. Practice
mindful breathing in order to come back to what is happening in the
present moment. Be in touch with what is wondrous, refreshing, and
healing, both inside and around yourself. Plant the seeds of joy, peace,
and understanding in yourself in order to facilitate the work of
transformation in the depths of your consciousness."
--With
the New Year, I know I have many new readers for these "occasional"
reminders about "the things that really matter." What I offer is the
distillation of many years of "philosophical" thought, results of my
encounters with people much wiser than I, and people who have in one way
or another mastered the art of living. I have been a cardiac patient,
and have been "in death's vestibule" a time or two, so I have a deeper
sense of the importance of living each day as well as possible. The year
2012 has all the earmarks of becoming a year of multiple sources of
stress for all of us. Is it too much to ask of yourself that you set
aside a few minutes everyday to practice some form of meditation, to be
sure you spend some time concentrating on your own breathing, and
develop some sense of trying to live in harmony with your surroundings?
It might be one way of making sure that you make the most of the golden
opportunities that every new year brings...
--Gene Bammel
1 comment:
Hi Vegan Tummy! You're it! I've tagged you, and have questions for you to answer on my recent blog post.
:-) Marion
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