Yoga is not a passive practice. It is a practice leading to conscious awareness. Begin to notice, without judging, your thoughts. Begin to notice what you are drawn towards. Your life is a movement toward something. It can be a movement toward greater joy. It can be a movement toward pain and despair. We have choices. And whether or not we choose to exercise those choices is still a choice. Let me give you an example...

Five people are sitting facing each other in the same geographical location. They are in the same place for the same purpose. After a little while they stand up and begin to walk around. Each one is drawn to something different. Perhaps, to an onlooker, it would appear that they are all five doing the same thing: wandering around within a few feet of each other. But all five people are going in different directions. After a few minutes they each return to their original location and sit in exactly the same positions from whence they began. As they relate their experiences it seems that they were (and are) in completely different worlds. One observes a nut on the ground and sunshine reflecting off a pool. Others are distracted by some activity near-by. While sitting, two people watch an object fall from above. One notices the pecan in the grass, the other the squirrel up in a tree. For five minutes, in the same general location, on the same day @ the same time, five people with the same goal - mindful awareness - have five completely different experiences. Why?

Concentration is an effortful holding of the mind to one thought. It is a continuous stream of thought. We need to practice concentration in order to be able to meditate. When we enter a light meditation, we experience brief mental quietude interrupted by intermittent thoughts. In deep meditation, however, we are effortlessly holding an intuitive feeling state. Effortlessly and without interruption.  Feeling is the precursor to thought. This is an expansive state. Feeling is an awareness that has no compulsion to it. It really doesn't matter what you meditate on, so long as it produces a pleasant feeling.

Let's look @ this another way. Notice what you feel. Right now, @ this moment, what do you feel? If you feel afraid, you will find yourself producing fearful thoughts. And so it is if you are feeling joyful. Joyful feelings, joyful thoughts. As we think, so too do we act. We can notice, without judging, the contents of our thoughts. You/we/us have the opportunity to change our thoughts. 

Meditation has three levels because the mind has three levels. We call these surface mind, inner mind and depth mind. Karma affects the surface mind. It can never affect the depth mind.

Regardless of how scattered the surface mind is, it can not and does not affect the tranquility of the depth mind. This tranquility exists for and within everyone.
Through meditation we are attempting to attune to and become aware of the inner mind, and then the depth mind. As I/you/we draw closer to this depth mind, there is more awareness of cosmic peace and tranquility. As I/we/you begin to bring our lives into greater balance and the meditation practice is established, it becomes easier and easier to be released from the thoughts and emotions of the day. Pulling away from sense objects and the activities of the senses is a major step towards meditation.

There are three distinct phases of meditation:
1) Mindfulness
2) Attentiveness
3) Wisdom

Begin with the practice of mindfulness. The rest will follow. Different paths. Same destination.

Shanti and Namaste,
  S.

Somewhere along the path we learn that we are responsible for the contents of our own minds.

By becoming conscious through the practice of meditation, we begin to see when a destructive thought arises in the mind. We have a choice: Allow the thought to repeat itself continually or observe it and let it go. This does not mean to avoid looking @ the contents of our minds. It simply means to learn detachment. Before we can change our thoughts (and thereby our habits), we have to be willing to really see what's there first. 

Sometimes, without realizing it, we surround ourselves with negativity. We play music with angry lyrics, we watch movies where people are being killed, we gravitate toward stories that illustrate the absolute worst human tendencies. If we fill our minds with horror, we think horrible thoughts. Thinking horrible thoughts, eventually, we say horrible things. If we think and say horrible things, then, perhaps, we might find ourselves becoming horrible. This leads to horrible behavior. 

There is a simple technique to change the habit of ruminating on the worst...make it a habit to fill your mind with the very best by surrounding yourself with beauty.

If we find ourselves wishing harm to another person, become aware of that thought and change it. Visualize something wonderful happening to that person. Wish them well and then let it go. Look @ the walls of your home. Look @ your book shelves. Try to fill your living space with objects that are uplifting, that you find beautiful. 

Here's an example of one way that I remind myself to be positive. When I read something inspirational or see a beautiful photograph in a magazine, I cut it out. I put the image on my refrigerator or I pin it to the wall of my studio. In this way I remind myself that Life is beautiful. I try to remember, if I find myself thinking an ugly thought, that I can replace it with something beautiful. 

By becoming more positive, we draw more beauty into our lives. Think of all the ways that you can surround yourself w/ beauty. 

Meditating on beauty is just as powerful. Visualize the most beautiful object or scene in nature. Do not meditate on a human being as this may draw a lot of emotionality into the consciousness making it difficult for the mind to settle down, to be uplifted. When you can see the object of beauty clearly, feel yourself drawing near to it. If it can be held, touch it. If it has an aroma, smell it. If it has a sound, listen to it. If it can be tasted, then experience it that way as well. When you are holding nothing but the object of beauty in your mind, when you are completely immersed in it, then notice how you feel. Yes, beauty is a feeling. Now, let go of the visual image of beauty and meditate on this feeling. When it is time to end your meditation, open your eyes slowly. Return to your outward senses slowly...and try to hold the feeling of beauty. 

Practicing this meditation technique gives us an important tool that we can use in our everyday lives. And we will be able to return to this beautiful feeling state anytime, any place, anywhere.

Shanti,
  S.

This evening we met @ the Rothko Chapel to experience the teachings of the Venerable Master Miao Tsan. I won't do the master an injustice by paraphrasing his teachings, instead I'll make a recommendation. On your journey on the path toward enlightenment, take the time to learn as much as you can from meditation masters in different traditions. It is my experience that there is no substitute for the darshan of being in the presence of one with a lifelong practice. It is also my experience that regardless the tradition, or the techniques incorporated, that the key is conscious awareness. 

Change your mind, change yourself. Change yourself, change your world. 

Shanti. Namaste. Deepest Blessings.

  S.

I used to know the minister of a church in Chicago. She had a saying that she used often: "If you spot it, you got it." This was a concept that was new to me and I found it interesting. In yoga we say, "You can only see that which you are relative to." No matter how we express this concept, it simply means that if we/me/you find ourselves judging another person, we are only able to see that aspect of their personality because we ourselves possess that exact same attribute. "If you spot it, you got it."

Have you ever found yourself in a family situation where one of your relatives seemed, let's say, particularly irritating? Perhaps you found that person to be controlling and critical. Or maybe @ your place of work there was or is one person in particular that you feel the entire organization would be better off without? Do you find that this person disturbs you to the point that you go home running the behavior of this individual over and over in your mind until you are completely distracted thinking about them? Did you ever wonder why? Did you ever find yourself blaming them internally for the irritation in your own mind? I think you see where this is going. It's not about them.

As we meditate we begin to see things more clearly. We judge less. When we do find ourselves judging, we are able to observe the workings of our own mind and notice what the mind likes to attach itself to. And then we can ask the question, "Why is my mind attaching itself to that thought-form?" We learn. We let go.

Every single being that comes into our lives is there to teach us. It's not an accident. They are there for a period of time, however long that period is. I am a being living in a human body. If you are reading this then probably you are a being living in a human body, too. Humans are mirrors. They show us what we need to see and understand in ourselves. Do we see compassion? Generosity? Kindness? Do we see ignorance? Anger? Cruelty?

One of the finest teachers I have ever known was not a human being. She was a little brown dog with soft, fat feet and floppy ears. She taught me forgiveness. She had a love forcefield as large as a city block. She knew how to meditate on loving-kindness and she taught me the value of the transcendental. In her I found that my heart center could open and that I could give and receive love unconditionally, freely. I learned patience. I understood contentment. Through this small, perfect teacher I learned all these things. Because I saw these qualities in her, I became aware of them in myself.

Blessings, blessings everywhere. Blessings, blessings everyone.

Deepest Shanti,
  S.

“Plant your own garden and decorate your own soul, instead of waiting for someone to bring you flowers.”
~ Veronica A. Shoffstall

“Friendship with oneself is all-important, because without it one cannot be friends with anyone else.”
~ Eleanor Roosevelt

“A loving person lives in a loving world. A hostile person lives in a hostile world. Everyone you meet is your mirror.”
~ Ken Keyes

“Your task is not to seek for Love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.”
~ Rumi, thirteenth century Sufi poet

"Don't ever criticize yourself. Don't go around all day long thinking, 'I'm unattractive, I'm slow, I'm not as smart as my brother.' God wasn't having a bad day when he made you... If you don't love yourself in the right way, you can't love your neighbour. You can't be as good as you are supposed to be."
~ Joel Osteen