If you search for types of meditation on the internet, you will find at least 23 different types of meditation. One of the definitions of meditation that makes sense to me is this: Meditation is a practice of concentrated focus upon a sound, object, visualization, the breath, movement, or attention itself in order to increase awareness of the present moment, reduce stress, promote relaxation, and enhance personal and spiritual growth. I think I have found another, and simpler definition, achieving stillness.
Over the years, I have tried several types of meditation, and I concur that the desired result is peace of mind and awareness of the present moment. The other night I was trying to go to sleep after a busy day, and I realized that although my body was tired, I was being bombarded by thoughts and images of things that seemed so important that I could not turn them off.
As I scanned this rush of ideas and images, I realized that they were not my thoughts and images, and they were coming from the beings who surround me and accompany me through life.
Instead of fighting this rush of unwanted communication, I decided to concentrate on what “I” wanted to achieve. The concept that came to mind was “stillness.” This is not an absence of physical movement but more of a complete freedom from disturbance when we can self-reflect and actually perceive the absence of thoughts.
With my eyes closed, I began to listen and observe the thoughts that were crashing in on me. I put out the intention that there would be stillness and merely acknowledged any thoughts that popped up. Within a few minutes, it got very quiet, and I just lay there enjoying the silence.
Suddenly, I found myself very much in present time and postulating solutions to several issues that I had not had time to address over the past few weeks. This resulted in a rush of activities that were very productive and left me feeling good about myself and life in general.
I have repeated this over the last few days and have come to the following conclusions. Meditating on “stillness” puts a pause on the random spiritual activity that accompanies me through life. My spiritual companions, if not gently controlled, will chatter amongst themselves about what I am doing and thinking. I pick this up as a constant form of distraction and normally try to ignore it as I go through my day.
It serves as a running commentary on everything I do, from eating breakfast to delivering a counseling session. When I am truly focused, as I am when in session or when designing something, the comments are generally helpful and focused on what I am doing. When I am just meandering through life and not particularly focused, their ideas are a constant distraction. “Oooh! Look at that!” “Let’s eat!” “I want to take a nap” “Let’s read a book on Kindle”!
Once I was able to achieve stillness for myself, I realized that my clients who are having difficulty achieving stable gains from sessions are being continually besieged by random thoughts from their spiritual companions. I can get them to focus while they are in session and we are talking, but as soon as I take my attention off them, their spiritual companions take over again.
Once I was able to achieve stillness, I realized that this increased my perception of the beings surrounding my clients. I could actually perceive beings moving in on my clients when I was not directly engaging them in a process. This also applied to people I was talking to while shopping. If I was not impinging on a person with my directed communication, they were generally being affected or being run by a committee of spiritual beings who were running the show.
This was definitely evident in a tax professional we are using. He is very pleasant, but if you ask him a technical question, one or more of his spiritual companions takes over and delivers a five-minute lecture on the topic and why it was developed, and what exactly does it mean. We have to impinge on this person to get him back in control and solving our tax problem.
We will always have spiritual companions around us, so it behooves us to find out how we can manage them and avail ourselves of their help when we need it. If we practice achieving stillness when we need to focus, I feel we will unlock the full potential of our spiritual power.
In PART TWO of this series, we will look at the possibilities of achieving stillness as a regular ability we can bring to bear on everyday problems.