MORE CONVENTIONAL (MOSTLY "EXOTIC")
SPIRITUAL PRACTICES
It requires dedication and discipline to stay in the mid-stream of the river of life. We cannot think our way into this state of balance – spiritual practice in whatever form is essential. This is also how we find the middle way of the Buddha.
The Four Noble Truths of the Buddha are ...
The Truth of suffering.
The Truth of the cause of suffering.
The Truth of the end of suffering.
The Truth of the path that leads to its end.
The First Truth - the Four Rivers of Suffering
Uncontrolled Birth.
Uncontrolled Sickness.
Uncontrolled Aging.
Uncontrolled Death.
Buddhism has remedies and various meditations for helping us control these as well as ego, shadow and monkey mind.
The lighter we tread with the mind,
the higher the soul will soar.
Use the mind, do not let the mind use you.
The mind must mind what the mind minds best.
Use it to support the soul and the heart’s wisdom.
Functional MRI studies have localized "Mind" (as in Monkey Mind) to the primitive areas of the brain. This is linked to a sympathetic, survival, stress response. Most of us, without spiritual practice and a method of going inwards, default to this area of the brain. Folks with OCD, PTSD, anxiety and depression tend to dwell here almost all the time. Nothing creative happens in this space.
Spacious (Big) Mind, Buddha Mind, Christ Consciousness resides in the prefrontal lobe which is linked to the parasympathetic relaxation response. Advance meditators default to the prefrontal lobe and seem to have more neuronal density here as well.
Interestingly those who practice gratitude appear to have a similar default on MRI. We will include gratitude later as an Unconventional form of practice. Spacious Mind is the gateway to the Field, dreams, our guides, the Creator and our own creativity.
The most profound sound of all is that of silence - not the silence that is the absence of noise, of quietness but that in which we hear the longings of our heart and ponder our response.
Mind Meditative
Passive vs. Active
Most of us are more familiar with Passive, Eastern meditation. This form differs from the Ancestors’, more Kabbalistic concept of Active Meditation.
There is a difference between passive meditation and active meditation.
Passive meditation makes the effort to calm the mind from inner stimulus.
(Attaining a "clear, blue sky" or "water in a calm pond without ripples.")
"Do you have the patience to wait until your mind settles and the water is clear.
Can you remain unmoving until right action arises by itself." Tao te Ching
"Stop thinking and talking about things and there is nothing you will not be able to know." Zen saying
Passive meditation seeks to disengage from mental activity.
Active meditation engages mental faculties to a directed focus. Imaging is part of this form.
Using imagination for spiritual transformation - moving from where we are to where we want to be.
Active meditation actually animates and intensifies inner thoughts to help concentrate, reflect and contemplate. It is rather to ponder and focus until one is lost in the thought of imagining or sensing and becomes one with it.
They also differ in purpose. Passive is done for oneself to better one’s state of being.
Active is to use the imagination to spiritually transform.
Through meditation with imagery we connect mentally, emotionally and spiritually with that perfection we ultimately will embody.
Active it is also for loving the Divine, to know Him/Her, to experience Him and to come into the realization of our own Self, made in the Creator’s image.
The Sufi poets' devotion to the Divine, Bhakti devotional yoga, and David the Psalmist.
"Search for me with all your heart."
Imagery can reprogram the subconscious positively, helping us to Self-realize.
Guided imagery with active imagination, usually driven by music is also a successful method of enlivening our Inner Healer. The Inner healer is part of the soul and has the unbounded, divine potential to heal if we enable it.
We need to see ourselves in a new way, not just as someone striving and trying but as someone already having succeeded; not just intending or wanting but already at the desired level, free from all negative energy.
Active imagination is also a way of telling our guides and the Great Spirit the details of what we need (preferably in order to help others.) Because of the cosmic law of free will we must give permission and ask to receive. Active imagination gives the "Field" the context of that detail.
Vipassana or mindfulness meditation is a Mind-Active meditation – focusing on internal and external sensations to keep away from the flow of our thoughts.
Food and wine can also be a Zen like meditation - being in the moment with each morsel.
Thich Nhat Han taught a slow walking, one foot in front of the other, form of active meditation usually done in nature.
Body meditative
can be Active or Passive.
Active
as in Yoga asanas, Tai Chi, Chi Gong etc.
Passive
when it is done to us, such as massage, acupressure, ... or any form of body work that induces inner peace.
We need to enjoy and be in joy to the best of our bodies' abilities. One can do yoga or Tai Chi in a chair or lying down.
Pranayama or breath meditation
is distinctly sensory and active. The asanas or postures in yoga and pranayama - two of the eight limbs of the yoga path are sensory. This may be one of the reasons for yoga's success in the West. Some of us have difficulties with the challenges of passive meditation to quieten the mind.
There are many other ways of having an active and sensory meditation. Drumming or playing an instrument, painting, writing, surfing, hiking or dancing can be active, joyful, embodied ways of going inward if they are done for their own sake and not to groom the persona.
The senses are used to create a supportive climate.
From my flesh shall I behold the Divine.
Embodied meditations enlist the senses to distract from and stop Monkey Minds babbling incessancy.
The souls conservation is not of the mind. It is best heard with the senses.
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