7/13/09
Not that anyone needs to care (and in fact, that's the point) but I'm starting a meditation class today. It's a Vedic seminar that will go a little bit each day until Friday, so if any of you have experience in that field, by all means, TRY AND KILL MY BUZZ.
Posted by Ian Williams at July 13, 2009 11:46 PMDude, I do mediations all the time. It helps if they've got candy in the break-out caucus rooms or if you have a really cool mediator. By the end of the week, you'll have your lawsuit settled--hopefully--and you can leave Vedic with all that behind you. Good luck.
oh, what a coincidence! i had been planning to go to a hot spring spa retreat thing next week where they do meditation, but then i decided it might be boring so i'm going to vegas instead.
that's wonderful, Ian. i'll be so interested to hear how it goes ... difficult, no doubt, as it is for everyone, but life changing in much the same way getting sober is life changing.
i wound up with the buddhists and a practice called vipassana - or "insight" meditation. it's the study of the mind but they are not interested in the content of thought, but in the process of it ...
however it goes know that there are lots of choices out there ... most of them valid. (when it comes to spiritual instruction, i like to stick to groups that are a couple of thousand years old -- helps weed out the loonies)
splendid. splendid.
I've done Zen meditation on and off for the past few years. The goal is to learn to be fully "there" (in the moment) in body and mind (our minds naturally tend to wander). The method is to sit quietly and count your breaths up to ten and then start again. After about 20 minutes, you walk slowly for a few minutes, still counting the breaths, and then you sit again. The trick is to learn to keep your mind focused on the counting.
I've found meditation calming even when I've gotten nothing else out of it. The more I've done it, the more I've gotten out of it. I've found improved focus to be of huge benefit in pretty much everything I do.
Vedic meditation sounds similar, with the mantra replacing the breath counting. I think the traditional sitting position is also different.
I hope you enjoy it! Please post a follow up.
I took a mindfulness based meditation course based on Jon Kabat-Zinn's program. Lots of good studies on how it can help with various medical ailments. UNC and Duke both teach the course. I wish I could say I still do it. I found it rewarding but very, very difficult to stick with, like most things that are good for you!
Good luck!
Tranquility. Meh. I sez 'meh' to that. Sitting around, being quiet, pretending to be a turnip. Freakin' Buddhists are all terrible scolds. "Sit up straight! Stop having desires! Make your mind behave!"
Nah, you guys are all right. Though I'm not sure that meditation is that much more effective (at whatever it's supposed to be effective at) than just relaxing and listening to Glenn Gould play Bach for twenty minutes a day. Add in a little bit of scotch, and I maintain the latter is indeed a superior path.
Personally, I'd rather plug in the guitar to the big honkin' tube amp and lose myself in the SOUND. A yoga of noise and movement, rather than stillness. Tantra instead of mantra, Valhalla instead of Nirvana. (Nirvana instead of Enya.)
Anyway. I'll shut up now.
30 years in, I've learned at least one thing about meditation: anyone can be Buddha for the first five seconds. :-)