Meditation is for EVERYONE.

My qigong classes are meditation and movement combined.....

You CAN meditate. It's dead simple. If you

• can’t - or won’t - sit in the lotus position
• can’t - or won’t - empty your mind
• can’t - or won’t spend much time on it
• you’re not religious, and put off by oriental hocus-pocus

Whenever the word ‘meditation’ comes up, it is accompanied by a picture of an attractive young person, sitting cross-legged, preferably on a beach.
Don’t I hate those!! You can meditate in ANY position, provided you are comfortable. I have meditated for years sitting in a chair, with good back support. These days I do my favourite: walking meditation.
Many are also put off by the idea that you have to ‘empty your mind’. Emptying your mind is impossible. The harder you try, the more full it gets.
Meditating is actually easy: whenever your mind wanders, as it is bound to do, just gently steer it back, time and again. And again. Without worrying. Without telling it off. It doesn’t matter at all!

Here are a few nice websites for beginners: just experiment.
. Ignore the pic!

Ignore the pic!

If sitting still, even in a chair, is your problem, try Walking Meditation:

Or you can do ‘Mindfulness Meditation’, which means simply paying attention to whatever you are experiencing at that moment. It can be done while brushing your teeth, driving or washing up.

For a beginners technique see .

Just experiment - play around. It may be the best thing you’ve done this year.

nobody needs to meditate. Yet people will insist on this method that, their version, others version.....this word has been highjacked and misused. The whole concept needs to be abandoned. The most 'cunning' clients I come across are the ones who have been meditating. The longer the period, the more tight and rigid...and
If mediatation does not loose the cunningness of mind, it is nothing but deadly poison.
Life lived in open heart is worth more than any meditation.

nobody needs to meditate.

I did not say they "have to" Jnani. I said everyone "can".
If you want to, don't be put off by this lotus etc. image.
If you don't want to, fine!

I learned to meditate from Acem at a course (), twelve years ago. I have since followed many courses by them, some of them very intensive. I have found every meditator there very pleasant, the longer they had done it (up to 40 years) the nicer. Apart from that, I have not met many who do it. Of course, on this forum you probably get more of a mix of contributors, with different backgrounds and ideas.

I practice chi kung, tai chi and mindfulness. But that includes lifting weights and gymnastics. And tennis. And playing the piano. And eating. 😀

The most 'cunning' clients I come across are the ones who have been meditating. The longer the period, the more tight and rigid...and

Tell us more? 🙂

=I practice chi kung, tai chi and mindfulness. But that includes lifting weights and gymnastics. And tennis. And playing the piano. And eating.

Tell us more? 🙂

I thought I said it all.
Glad you do it the fun way. Then it does not even need being called meditation. It is just living. direct and simple responding to life.

Meditation is not suitable for everyone, contrary to popular belief. Infact it should be avoided by the large percentage of population. Say for instance who did meditation in west other than monks and nuns in 18th, 19, even early 20th century? Ordinary folks in India even don't sit and meditate, they pray, do the ritual and back to living their lives.
There were hardships, but also tremendous grace in how people were more directly engaged with life.
Today it is all so heady, thanks to all the spiritual information we have stuffed in our heads

....and people were just doing fine. They were living a more grounded and real life. They were dealing with life just fine. Those folks were more connected to life than most of us are today.

Now- mediation, yoga etc etc are all the rage....It has brought a subtle sense of dis- connect. Heady, informed, in claim to knowing this, experiencing this as in I do this and I do that and the benefits and regurgitations of experiences during meditations...the essence is lost....circus has become the pivot.
The way meditation is being projected in the west is quite pretentious, cerebral and perfunctory. It scratches the surface, if that

Clients with Long experience of meditations....are the ones that can resist most perfectly and it is amazingly subtle. The first thing, they are told, is to stop all practices, yoga, all healings, all forms of self help. Every last bit of circus that they think will bring them peace....Entering the state of vulnerability...then something can happen. Otherwise it just adds more layers of doer ship

Rather than talking of methods of meditation, the whole rethinking ought to be about, what meditation is not...In that clarity, it is not possible to do meditation for 30-40 years. It is simply not possible to keep knocking at the same door for that long, Or go to school and end up learning the alphabet for 20 yeras. And people take pride in how long they have been meditating!

A rethink or more aptly undoing the mis-understanding that meditation has become

.
Many are also put off by the idea that you have to ‘empty your mind’. Emptying your mind is impossible. The harder you try, the more full it gets.

Absolutely. Whenever I've been in a group meditation and the person leading says "empty your mind" (or similar) it just makes me cringe, as it just highlights their own lack of understanding of what they are saying.... i.e. they're just regurgitating what they think is a good thing for meditation, without actually understanding it.

You cannot empty your mind - your mind is an autonomous part of you and is always active.

The "empty your mind" phrase comes from a misinterpretation of the Buddhist teachings around "emptiness", which is nicely described in the pranjaparamitra sutra (heart sutra), and refers to simply letting go of attachments (which are held within our mind).

You CAN meditate. It's dead simple. If you

• can’t - or won’t - sit in the lotus position
• can’t - or won’t - empty your mind
• can’t - or won’t spend much time on it
• you’re not religious, and put off by oriental hocus-pocus

Whenever the word ‘meditation’ comes up, it is accompanied by a picture of an attractive young person, sitting cross-legged, preferably on a beach.
Don’t I hate those!! You can meditate in ANY position, provided you are comfortable. I have meditated for years sitting in a chair, with good back support. These days I do my favourite: walking meditation.
Many are also put off by the idea that you have to ‘empty your mind’. Emptying your mind is impossible. The harder you try, the more full it gets.
Meditating is actually easy: whenever your mind wanders, as it is bound to do, just gently steer it back, time and again. And again. Without worrying. Without telling it off. It doesn’t matter at all!

Here are a few nice websites for beginners: just experiment.
. Ignore the pic!

Ignore the pic!

If sitting still, even in a chair, is your problem, try Walking Meditation:

Or you can do ‘Mindfulness Meditation’, which means simply paying attention to whatever you are experiencing at that moment. It can be done while brushing your teeth, driving or washing up.

For a beginners technique see .

Just experiment - play around. It may be the best thing you’ve done this year.

Thank you for this reminder and food for thought and action.

I thought I said it all.
Glad you do it the fun way. Then it does not even need being called meditation. It is just living. direct and simple responding to life.

Meditation is not suitable for everyone, contrary to popular belief. Infact it should be avoided by the large percentage of population. Say for instance who did meditation in west other than monks and nuns in 18th, 19, even early 20th century? Ordinary folks in India even don't sit and meditate, they pray, do the ritual and back to living their lives.
There were hardships, but also tremendous grace in how people were more directly engaged with life.
Today it is all so heady, thanks to all the spiritual information we have stuffed in our heads

....and people were just doing fine. They were living a more grounded and real life. They were dealing with life just fine. Those folks were more connected to life than most of us are today.

Now- mediation, yoga etc etc are all the rage....It has brought a subtle sense of dis- connect. Heady, informed, in claim to knowing this, experiencing this as in I do this and I do that and the benefits and regurgitations of experiences during meditations...the essence is lost....circus has become the pivot.
The way meditation is being projected in the west is quite pretentious, cerebral and perfunctory. It scratches the surface, if that

Clients with Long experience of meditations....are the ones that can resist most perfectly and it is amazingly subtle. The first thing, they are told, is to stop all practices, yoga, all healings, all forms of self help. Every last bit of circus that they think will bring them peace....Entering the state of vulnerability...then something can happen. Otherwise it just adds more layers of doer ship

Rather than talking of methods of meditation, the whole rethinking ought to be about, what meditation is not...In that clarity, it is not possible to do meditation for 30-40 years. It is simply not possible to keep knocking at the same door for that long, Or go to school and end up learning the alphabet for 20 yeras. And people take pride in how long they have been meditating!

A rethink or more aptly undoing the mis-understanding that meditation has become

Ah, I think I see what you mean. They become more detached from their emotions. That is a problem many people are indeed experiencing.

And then there is the other side when they start the self-examination without a suitable therapist to guide them. You may be interested to google "dark night of the soul" - one of the big problems with meditating today.

That said, I do think many people will benefit from meditating (well, doing things in a more mindful manner). The problem is that while you are right to say just live, while people are doing things which should be done in a mindful manner (eg walking), they are actually "thinking" and stressing themselves out more due to this "thinking". By learning something like mindfulness, they can actually learn to live in the moment.. The problem with mindfulness is that it does encourage what they call curiousity which can lead to self-examination and, without the help of someone like us to guide them, they get into a pickle.

Meditation is not suitable for everyone

Of course not everyone needs to meditate. Like my husband: he is, hard to describe, much more natural?? than I am. I am a head-person, a thinker, very logical somehow, and do need the morning meditation to be more relaxed.
I too hate it when things get fashionable, but that said, in today's hurried, stressful world, meditation is much more necessary than in the old days.

it is not possible to do meditation for 30-40 years

Those, in Acem (), who meditated for 40 years, did not boast about it. I worked out the time, 40 years, for myself. They just did it and had benefited, to my mind. They were normal people, all sorts (though with a preponderance of academics), who were just VERY NICE.

who were just VERY NICE

And I don't mean artificially nice, or always up and never down. They were themselves.

Of course not everyone needs to meditate. Like my husband: he is, hard to describe, much more natural?? than I am. I am a head-person, a thinker, very logical somehow, and do need the morning meditation to be more relaxed.
I too hate it when things get fashionable, but that said, in today's hurried, stressful world, meditation is much more necessary than in the old days.

Those, in Acem (), who meditated for 40 years, did not boast about it. I worked out the time, 40 years, for myself. They just did it and had benefited, to my mind. They were normal people, all sorts (though with a preponderance of academics), who were just VERY NICE.

I am not a lover of band wagons. Spiritual band wagons are no exception.
You have got my gist..Anne.
No matter how stressed life has got, meditation is not the answer for everyone...at least not in the way of sitting down quietly. Also not in the sense that it won't help them, but in the sense that the whole energy- mind transformational melarchy demands not only a deep understanding( not cerebral), but a certain humility....otherwise it is another feather up one's sleeve. Another instrument in the orchestra to sing the "I me, my mine" song louder.

The boasting isn't particularly about the organization you speak of....it is general. "The times I have heard...I have been meditating for so many years...."
"well how magnificent of you, here is your medal"

If a person is simple and direct like your husband they don't need any meditations....and if meditation is not making one simple and direct, it is just another ego-trip....

. Seeking and growing. Great insight to my seeking. Never too old to learn. Lol.