Bring4th

I keep getting to a point where i hear intense vibrations in my head and i can never keep going, my mind drifts every time....

(08-15-2017, 07:21 PM)LostSoul Wrote: [ -> ]I keep getting to a point where i hear intense vibrations in my head and i can never keep going, my mind drifts every time....

When that happens I let my mind wander - but I watch the wandering. Recently I noticed I was blocking my mind from doing its business instead of letting it go free. Your job is only to watch it, like holding onto a little scurrying dog on a leash but you do not let the dog take you all over the place.

You can use a binaural beats program to entrain your brain into deeper meditative states. Then it won't matter if your mind wanders.

There are a number of free ones out there like Brainwave Generator (http://www.bwgen.com/download.htm). I believe it's still free.

Or you can go with Neuro Programmer 3 which isn't too costly and you can make your own meditative tracks, which may require stereo headphones.

Or even go to like $1700 for a 10+ year meditative practice like with Holosync.

I find that incorporating binaural technology makes my meditations more effective.

Try some meditation melody you enjoy, or meditate in nature there's too much sounds of life to be startled.

Like sjel said, just allow the wandering. Sometimes the wandering is meaningful in that it could be your subconscious leading you somewhere or it could simply be overthinking which I'm quite guilty of as well lol.

If it gets to a point where it seems useless, I'll envision the scene melt away. Once this melting happens enough, I noticed that it'll quite my mind

This is advice from Pema Chödrön. Every time you find your mind wandering, label what you're doing "thinking" and gently bring yourself back to stillness of mind. Just say to yourself "thinking" and basically start over. This is difficult at first but be gentle and kind to yourself about it. Everybody's mind wanders. The key, in my opinion, is the dedication to just bring it back to stillness, time after time after time. Eventually it becomes easier.

Practice, my friend! My mind still wonders as well. You are doing just fine. Keep sitting and meditating each day and eventually your mind will become more still. You can count your breath or follow it, for example. Whenever you notice that you are thinking return to the breath.

Practice, patience, persistence.

(08-16-2017, 07:00 AM)rva_jeremy Wrote: [ -> ]This is advice from Pema Chödrön.  Every time you find your mind wandering, label what you're doing "thinking" and gently bring yourself back to stillness of mind.  Just say to yourself "thinking" and basically start over.  This is difficult at first but be gentle and kind to yourself about it.  Everybody's mind wanders.  The key, in my opinion, is the dedication to just bring it back to stillness, time after time after time.  Eventually it becomes easier.

Oh that's great! I'm totally incorporating this.

What I do, is to work on it throughout each day. In my opinion sitting down for fifteen mintues, to an hour. And trying to quite the brain, isn't enough. I practice throughout the day, staying pointed, single minded, and quiet. Its a lifelong progression. There are many things to help, from life style to dietary. Don't give up keep practicing.

(08-15-2017, 07:25 PM)sjel Wrote: [ -> ]When that happens I let my mind wander - but I watch the wandering. Recently I noticed I was blocking my mind from doing its business instead of letting it go free. Your job is only to watch it, like holding onto a little scurrying dog on a leash but you do not let the dog take you all over the place.

I think this is awesome, too. There's a time for discipline -- discipline meaning never giving up on yourself, always willing to return to stillness when you catch yourself -- and there's a time for contemplation and allowing the mind to unravel itself. I guess probably the common themes of both practices are silence and observation.

Sjel, do you consider letting the mind wander "mediation"?

(08-16-2017, 04:59 PM)rva_jeremy Wrote: [ -> ]

(08-15-2017, 07:25 PM)sjel Wrote: [ -> ]When that happens I let my mind wander - but I watch the wandering. Recently I noticed I was blocking my mind from doing its business instead of letting it go free. Your job is only to watch it, like holding onto a little scurrying dog on a leash but you do not let the dog take you all over the place.

I think this is awesome, too.  There's a time for discipline -- discipline meaning never giving up on yourself, always willing to return to stillness when you catch yourself -- and there's a time for contemplation and allowing the mind to unravel itself.  I guess probably the common themes of both practices are silence and observation.

Sjel, do you consider letting the mind wander "mediation"?

Yes I enjoy mediating a compromise between my hostile mind and myself :)

But honestly I believe that sitting down and doing the absolute best you can to watch your mind is meditation. That's until you begin to hear the silence, which I only recently began to hear in depth. I think what it comes down to is that your attention falls on that which is most interesting to you. And for most, myself included, the mind is predominantly more interesting than inner silence! At least I can hear the inner silence now, even if it's just in little glimpses, halts and jumps. I used to literally have no silence at all, and was unaware that silence existed.

There was a time I was struggling with that too.
It seems I was nervous of what greatness was awaiting me.
Hard to explain but it was self sabotage.

I eventually just accepted I was afraid of the blessing coming and was resisting it.
At that point I just figured I needed more time so didn't worry about it. Stopped when I needed to or was getting no where. No pressure.
It then just sort of went away on its own, now my mind doesn't wander I quickly slip into bliss.

(08-16-2017, 03:08 PM)Infinite Unity Wrote: [ -> ]What I do, is to work on it throughout each day. In my opinion sitting down for fifteen mintues, to an hour. And trying to quite the brain, isn't enough. I practice throughout the day, staying pointed, single minded, and quiet. Its a lifelong progression. There are many things to help, from life style to dietary. Don't give up keep practicing.

I do this to. If I'm driving I sometimes decide I'm going to just listen and observe. Need silence to hear so I would drive leaving silence to hear my higher self or intuition.
I'd assume this was habit forming. The more frequent you tune into stillness of the mind even if you don't at first stay there long the easier it is to get there.

Great answer sjel! I like your definition. I simply think meditation has a huge tradition with specific practices, so it's a good idea to ask people what they mean when they use the word.

(08-16-2017, 04:59 PM)rva_jeremy Wrote: [ -> ]

(08-15-2017, 07:25 PM)sjel Wrote: [ -> ]When that happens I let my mind wander - but I watch the wandering. Recently I noticed I was blocking my mind from doing its business instead of letting it go free. Your job is only to watch it, like holding onto a little scurrying dog on a leash but you do not let the dog take you all over the place.

I think this is awesome, too. There's a time for discipline -- discipline meaning never giving up on yourself, always willing to return to stillness when you catch yourself -- and there's a time for contemplation and allowing the mind to unravel itself. I guess probably the common themes of both practices are silence and observation.

Sjel, do you consider letting the mind wander "mediation"?

It's a very interesting point! Sometimes I allow my mind to wander and I think things that I hadn't thought before, or I receive insight on some things.

Another important point I want to share is when uncomfortable thoughts or feelings etc arise during meditation. We don't want to manipulate our minds. Sometimes you'll get a thought and think "I don't want to be thinking this." But you are. We often judge ourselves and say some thoughts are bad and that we should push them aside. But what I've found is that when you catch yourself trying to manipulate your mind, such as turning that "negative" thought into something else, stop the manipulation and observe that thought as it is. You might find that the way out is the way through... We contain all things, both light and dark. We must love our shadow, not deny or reject it.

I find it very helpful to just step back from the thought - or feeling - without changing it in any way, and become the observer - the "I" consciousness that witnesses the thoughts as they occur. Then, let the thoughts do whatever they want - they're not me, it's like watching a movie. The difference between being so sucked into a movie that you forget everything else, vs. seeing it as something irrelevant playing on a screen in front of you.

In the observer consciousness, there is constant peace regardless of what the consciousness is witnessing - as long as you step back from all that noise, back into being the Witness.

I'm not very much experienced in meditation. I just want to share what helped me to focus and clear. Using breathing and mantra - repeating a word or a short prayer. This old method works for me. Everytime I observe my mind starts wandering I gently focus back to breathing and mantra. It's like an anchor.

From yesterdays daily Quote session. Quo's thoughts on meditation:

... 

There are other means of working upon knowledge of the self. One passive but extremely helpful way is meditation. Now, meditation has been greatly misunderstood among your peoples. It is thought that one is to make one’s intelligence a blank tablet, a “tabula rasa.” One is supposed to find silence within. Only then in that silence is the meditation considered successful. This is not our understanding of the helpful value of meditation. The intention of those who meditate is that they may be open to spiritual grace—not knowledge, for there is no such absolute within third density—but grace. Thusly, whatever thoughts come into the mind, even if they pelter one, moment by moment by moment, it is the resistance to this listening to the voices within that cannot be stilled that creates a poor meditation.

If one is simply mindful, and notes without emotion or condemnation each thought that moves through, allowing it to arise, allowing it to dissolve, then meditation has done that which it was intended for. It has allowed the entity to step back from the trees and see the forest. It has removed the tension of judgment and consideration and allowed a time that is truly free, a time in which the observer may simply watch thoughts arise and dissolve. Not turning them away, not holding onto them. One may plan an entire menu, a shopping list or any other thought whatsoever during meditation if it is observed without that feeling of necessity to solidify the intelligence of the mind around the shopping list or the menu.
Let this thought about meditation sink deeply within each, for when one judges oneself for having a poor meditation, one has just stripped oneself of the saving help which is available to the meditator. The key of meditation is a silent, accepting and nonjudgmental observer, not that “thing in itself” [ding an sicht]. Never judge, calibrate or measure in any way the spiritual work that you do. Firstly, that which is done out of fear—the fear of not being worthy or any other fear—is liable to catastrophe. It is far, far better to have what is subjectively called a bad meditation and find the self being able to accept the bad meditator.

(08-16-2017, 05:31 PM)Glow Wrote: [ -> ]

(08-16-2017, 03:08 PM)Infinite Unity Wrote: [ -> ]What I do, is to work on it throughout each day. In my opinion sitting down for fifteen mintues, to an hour. And trying to quite the brain, isn't enough. I practice throughout the day, staying pointed, single minded, and quiet. Its a lifelong progression. There are many things to help, from life style to dietary. Don't give up keep practicing.

I do this to. If I'm driving I sometimes decide I'm going to just listen and observe. Need silence to hear so I would drive leaving silence to hear my higher self or intuition.
I'd assume this was habit forming. The more frequent you tune into stillness of the mind even if you don't at first stay there long the easier it is to get there.

The car driving, is like one of the best places for me, to meditate. I just naturally enter a deep state while driving. I actually have to focus really hard on driving. LOL

I have had that experience over a long period of the life cycle myself, I was afraid of blessings, and mine all came from a lack of self worth.