Im curious how many of you meditate. How often and for how long?
Also, are there any good meditation apps out there? Preferably free ones
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Im curious how many of you meditate. How often and for how long?
Also, are there any good meditation apps out there? Preferably free ones
I lived in a Zen Buddhist temple for awhile. During that time I like to think I learned a little bit about what meditation really is and how it can be practiced. The thing people often misunderstand is that you do not just sit quietly, it's takes a great deal of mental energy to remain focused. You are supposed to focus your attention on your breathing, over and over and over again. Every time you have a thought, which is constantly at first, you must recognize it and then return your focus to your breathing. It's excruciating.
We practiced this 10 hours a day, every day. Silent sitting meditation with the midday meal taken in the meditation room in silence. Often I found myself exhausted and unable to practice and I would let my mind wander. But that's not meditation, that's day dreaming.
And all that focusing on your breathing, that's just all the whitebelt work. What you REALLY want is to get to the point, after years of practice, to be able to focus on nothing and maintain that state. THAT is true meditation. When you can allow you mind to come to rest. No thoughts invade or distract, your mind is like a placid lake, still and motionless. Only then are you truly meditating. However that takes many years of dedicated practice. So much practice that very few people ever make it there. That is the black belt of meditation, and that's when the true journey begins.
I'd love to say that I can sit quietly and allow my mind to come to rest, but I cant. I never put in enough reps, I gave up.
That's not to say that sitting quietly and trying to calm your mind isn't good for you, it is! If you can find an app on your phone that helps, great! I'm sure that will help you. Just recognize that when you are doing that, all you're really doing is learning to shrimp.
When you see those guys in the orange robes just sitting there and you wonder what they are thinking about... it's nothing. Their mind is idle and at rest. They are not thinking they are hungry, or tired, or whatever. They have learned to allow their mind to become completely still. It is a huge accomplishment to get to that point, but it only comes from incredibly dedication.
It has been on my list of things to do for over a year now. I have made a few crappy attempts, but really need to dedicate some time. My mind is constantly busy and could really benefit from some rest.
yes craig! probably the best description you're gonna get on here J-Man.
that ongoing process of trying to stay in the space between thought, i dont beat myself up for how long i meditate i just try make a consistent daily effort. dunno about apps, but binural beats or zen mediation music really help me melt away the world. got em from yuutuube.
NAMASTE ;)
This sounds nice. I always meditate especially as I get closer to a tournament. It's kinda rough though. I don't care for doing it, but I have to to be mentally ready. I focus on the tournament, my strategies, my body, facing the opponent. Basically, I engage my adrenaline and breathe and focus on what is going to make my performance the best. There's definitely more to it than that, but I do it. It definitely helps get me prepared to fight whoever. You don't want to go into a fight with a weak mind, weak heart, or without a plan. Meditation helps with all of that for me.
I meditated errryday for about a month...and it was one of the best months of my life. When issues arose that were out of my control, I just mediated on the spot. Plus, it made me less self-centered. Need to get back to that livin'.
the longest daily streak i had was 16 days... but i try to meditate at least 3 times a week.
meditation is practice, practice for your mind. i honestly feel it's one of the best resources we have as humans to tap into our true potential... i wish i'd practice more often. i find that progress is very much like jiu jitsu... sometimes you wonder wtf is the point, sometimes you forget to get to practice, sometimes you have some of the most amazing epiphanies. and overall the whole experience is very rewarding.
i use headspace app .. and follow some guides on gaiam tv
Meditation and BJJ go hand in hand!
I've been meditating regularly for years but recently I've learned transcendental meditation (TM). I really recommend finding someone in your area and learning this style of mediation. It's by far the easiest and quickest meditation technique, it's 20 mins in the morning and 20 mins in the evening. Trust me you'll see the difference in your BJJ game and your entire life! The only problem with TM is it's really expensive but well worth the investment. You might be able to find some free stuff online but I recommend taking the course. http://www.tm.org/
Peace!
Look up Jack Kornfield guided meditations. Good stuff. Found him via Duncan Trussell
Transcendental, 20 minutes twice a day. My morning meditation I usually do on the train on the way to work, I do my evening one as soon as I get home, before I get ready to go to training. If I'm feeling particularly stressed or unsettled, even a couple of repetitions of my mantra and I feel like it brings me back to "normal" a lot quicker.
It's not a huge impact for me, but I definitely feel sharper when I come out. I try pretty hard to avoid missing it.
#Granklife himself is a huge believer and has been doing TM for years, he's the one that got me interested.
I have a daily practice of silence based on the Orthodox hesychastic tradition - once or twice a day, essentially sit in silence for a period and repeat a short phrase, in Orthodox practice that is typically the Jesus Prayer (in Russian "Gospodi Eesusee Kristi, Sinni Bozhe, Pomelyu Mya Greshnava"). The key is to suppress all other thoughts as they arise - don't inspect them or engage them, simply dismiss them. It's very hard. Rather than timing it, I use a "chotki" (kind of like a rosary) and after so many repetitions stop. There are many psychosomatic benefits to the neptic/meditative part - not just stress reduction, though the prayer itself is meant to become an independent, living thing throughout the day over time - you may have read something like Salinger's Franny and Zoe that talks about it (or less probably The Way of the Pilgrim).
Mantra based meditations can be very helpful (TM and what Greg was talking about with hesychastic). The mantra is a strong device to help you focus on, probably easier than just focusing on your breathing.
I find it interesting that in Catholicism when you go to confession the priest makes you repeat the same prayer dozens of times. "Ok you thought about sex, say 20 Hail Mary's and 12 Our Fathers". Coincidence? I don't think so. I think the idea is that if you're doing bad shit, you could probably be helped out by some meditation.
If you look at the hesychast literature (primarily collected in the Philokalia) there is a lot on breathing and body posture, but I think there is a universal consensus that is for someone who is under direction of a spiritual guide in their practice - the initial focus is on "watchfulness" and control of your thoughts. The idea is that as you gain control over things that spontaneously intrude on your mind you can slowly gain control over yourself more broadly. I don't know much about Catholic absolution - the Orthodox view is generally that the Church is a spiritual hospital to which you go for healing/wholeness. Confession is a bit different - typically its a discussion in the center of the Church in front of an icon and the priest will give some guidance on how to deal with issues you are struggling with. In that sense, its very complementary to the neptic/contemplative discipline - some priests will give a hesychast-like practice as a prayer rule in the context of Confession, but since the priest doesn't really give absolution the intention is clearly therapeutic. In some sense, the whole "system" works a bit like Cognitive Psychology as a therapeutic technique.
Random thought manifests partly because of neural crosstalk from sensate input; the potentials ride the loopings in the midbrain into higher brain centers where they produce random the thought. To be able to cease the arising of thoughtforms, the resonant modes of the various sensate inputs must be transformed from their normal sense-ful yang resonance to their quieted yin resonance. Only then once you experience that can you stop the bubbles of thoughtform energy from forming in the midbrain; only then do you know by experience how much energy the normal yang resonant mode consumes. They almost form like bubbles of carbonation on the side of a beer glass and detach at the slightest perturbation. But then with more training you can recognize that bubble and like squeezing a balloon, just 'stop squeezing' and that pop-out disappears.
The white belt analogy to breathwork is appropriate...the awareness game begins after that; the medulla literally becomes programmed with the instruction set practiced - the more mindfully aware, the more thoroughly the instructions are imprinted, and it becomes like riding a bike, where the programmed instruction set carries forth even while sleeping.
One starts with breath because it is the loudest and most persistent sensate feedback. There's some good threads here about some aspects of this e.g. co2 references here but the fine tuning at the neural level takes place when one learns how to stop the 40 cycles per sec active resonance of the olfactory nerve - this wiggles right into the midbrain's logical looping process that is part of decision making that the brain does based on sensate inputs.
This is why we cant feel ourselves hurtling through space at ungodly speeds from a vantage point of...[completely undefined] - because our vestibulocochlear nerve is not attuned to detect such a movement - it is completely irrelevant in the context of human evolution. Incidentally, limiting input from the vestibulocochlear nerve is why to stay still and have a quiet environment, ideally speaking.
The eyes have a push-pull configuration with the muscles that move them, but those muscles are also intrinsically cranial nerves - this is where "look at the nose" came from, but "at" is a mistranslation or misunderstanding - the root of the statement is the relaxation of cranial nerve input. The most relaxed configuration is looking down past the nose neither too high nor too low; neither to the left nor right; not focused on anything either too close or too far away. Eyelid muscles also have cranial nerve input, so about halfway is where neural input is smallest.
Herky jerky gut mechanics while breathing will agitate the vagus nerve branches and send counterproductive feedback and prevent the heart from settling. Pushing the breath duration, one has to mitigate the blood co2 meter and the fact that air perceived by the olfactory nerve will cause heartrate increase and trigger desire to breathe more. Another reason to breathe through the nose is that there is good enough oxygen uptake that the sphenoid sinus will oxygenate the midbrain, but that's something to keep gentle because too much of that will give you a headache.
Regulation: regulate until regulated, train the awareness to stay focused.
Neural input is a HUGE component
Dont use anywhere that air touches to actually facilitate the movement of air as you breathe - this puts the onus of breathing on the diaphragm and gut motion. Efficiency of breath is capped when the sinuses and air passageways are buffering the incoming air pressure. (Imagine how in efficient an engine would be if the cylinder walls could move, lol.)
The diaphragm's anchor against the spine, is the big fold-sheets of diaphragm culminating into two tendon-bands around T12-L1-L2-L3. Pull from this attachment point as if you were pulling a large sail attached to a rope. The "Gooch" spot was a martial arts secret for umpteen generations because of how much additional martial power it added - so that expands with the breath and contracts along with the front of the abdomen; both those structures should culminate as one, so that the energy of their interaction can be maximally (phase) coherent. Those two structures support the exhale, whereupon a slight "roll" takes place into the next inhale. One should work on smoothing those transitions out - for once you can breathe without setting off the olfactory nerve, and the transitions are smooth - you will reach a point where you cant even tell if you're inhaling or exhaling at that given moment. All of these coherencies and streamlining of processes will come together and as practice evolves...then one can get a sense of what fluxenergy in the gut is.....gung, if you will. /2nd battery pack added
The best meditation you can do is Trance work. Or more technically, getting into the mind awake / body asleep state where your brainwaves are in theta and eventually delta. Being in a trance automatically opens energy channels and in conjunction with energy work techniques like tactile imaging will develop you psychically and spiritually 50 times faster than other methods.
Tactile imaging is as it sounds- you imagine tactile sensation through your body such as a sponge soaked with hot water being rubbed down your legs, or a tennis ball bouncing up and down your spine, or a paint brush being circled around your palm. Basically anything you can imagine with a tactile sensation. This has the effect of stimulating and developing your etheric body. Open energy channels are essential to consciousness, period.
The whole sitting down focusing on your breath thing doesn't accomplish much. You really want to maximize your results in as little time as possible. If you are going to actually sit down and "meditate" you should have a clear and strong goal for doing so. MINDFULNESS on the other hand is essential and not only should you be focusing on your breathing at every waking and sleeping hour, but you should be aware of every square inch of your body, aware of your surroundings, aware of your mind. It becomes second nature because it IS your second nature. Your first nature is consciousness, and your second nature is to be conscious of what you are.
And regarding having a still and silent mind- thats like putting the cart before the horse. A silent mind is your natural state. Your mind is so damn noisy because your energy channels are all clogged up, astral entities are parasitically leeching off you and living in your etheric body injecting their thoughts, and especially in modern times the swarm of media and cellular towers transmissions fills your mind with endless noise. The global elite satanists have also layered on very strong black magic to Hollywood blockbusters and all television for that matter, which glue to your etheric mind and loop endlessly. Ever heard the phrase "I have a song stuck in my head". Yeah, because it's literally stuck in your head.
So in conclusion, every waking moment should be a "meditation". Free your etheric body of astral parasites, media programming and black magic and open up your energy channels and your mind will be serene like a deep and crystal clear lake pretty much all the time. And it doesn't weaken your ability to think- on the contrary it strengthens it.
A few years, albeit not very consistent.
Main reason combat PTSD.
Do you I have rough days/weeks? ... Definitely.
Has it helped? In some ways it has been the most profound and unique training of my life. If only I started to practice it regularly and in a more dedicated fashion years earlier. Would have saved me many ugly episodes.
Train your mind. Develop fortitude as you do with your body. Reconnect. Sipmle but worthy concepts.
I mostly use the headspace app... 15min. But I've tried a few techniques and will participate in "mindful in May" program. (Google)
(Sometimes its tough to strongly disagree with someone without sounding like a dick about it, so...roll with the writing style :cool: Enough of what you wrote is in direct opposition to years and years of my efforts and experience.)
I dont think I'd be quite as confident in my writings as I am if I had not...Quote:
Originally Posted by Primalredemption
-been training this for 14, 15 years
-spent first 3 years of training almost exclusively on this
-have had a wacked enough life that events have hurt my efforts here and there, so thus I have gained and lost and gained again, and with each immersion of practice-time-chunks I have had the same repeatable results and road signs - things like metabolic boosts like that of a first month's working out, simply by longevity breathing and arranging the physical in as efficient of a configuration as possible. 8, 10 separate practice chunks in my life I have arranged all this and by this point its no less familiar than driving across town to my parents house.
-taught dozens this and then some - and a couple people here and there get it enough and when the practice points are followed the benefits are well conveyed....I dont know that any of 'em were reaching the minute and a half mark that I was, because nobody put in that much effort to it...when you can average such durations over the span of hours...every day...and seeing these results over and over and devising a method that's thorough enough that 5-10 minutes of sitting and there's already *that* deep meditation happening...
Sorry bro but seeing someone write things like breathwork doesnt accomplish much, it is facepalm worthy and disappointing, it'd be like hearing a fighter say "I can strike well enough that I dont need a ground game - ever."
Spending 15 or 20 minutes here and there will not convey significant benefit - one really wont start to realize significant benefit from this until one has made a habit of at least an hour a day using efficient techniques - this is why its best to arrange affairs so that it becomes part of getting ready for bed at night (and it'll take a couple months of it before any real significant benefit amasses, but make no mistake this directly ties into Ohm's law resistance calculations and is THE way to increase energetic amplitudes - lower the resistance - the deeper the yin, the more potent the spark of yang arising from it.)
When one gets very deeply into meditation, at first, one is able to get those cool very quiet moments like if you hold your breath....once the breath is rolling well, then the states last longer and longer - but make no mistake, if you lose the focus of awareness for a moment, then byebye, its *that* precarious at first. This is the reason to blur the transitions between inhale and exhale, and one is really only able to do that well once all of the efficiency gains have been realized. (Are you getting why this is also preparing to learn how to die?)
That's where it becomes a mind-awareness game, its like standing a pencil on its freshly sharpened tip.
Once enough work is done that the states can be stabilized, the mind can be stabilized, things are maintained in this highly efficient state...
Well, the first time I realized the energetic connection between energy amassed and duration of breath able to be sustained, I drank 3 days in a row on a July 4th weekend and went from 1:20 breaths thursday to barely being able to do 25 seconds on monday - voila, breath duration is partially a function of energy amassed in the gut. Verified this one a couple different ways also. I will end here before I ramble too much further, I type fast as a mofo so sorry for being a bit verbose.
I will say it again: sitting down and focusing on the breath doesn't accomplish much. It's a basic tenet of self awareness and EVERY waking moment should be focused on your body, mind, breath, surroundings. Is prana real? Of course. But just sitting down focusing on it doesn't accomplish anything.
I don't think you've ever gone into a real trance otherwise you would not knock the method. What you are doing with trance work is basically integrating the subconscious mind with the conscious mind and establishing a neural connection so that you are "awake" while dreaming and Dreaming while awake. You are training your brain to be in theta and delta while awake. The energy channels are opened up faster than any other method because the mind awake/body asleep/lucid dreaming/astral projection state is a HIGH ENERGY STATE with a fully active kundalini. What took you 15 years of sitting could easily be accomplished in 3 months by a total beginner.
Further more, once you gain something of substance you can never lose it. If you find yourself "losing" 10 years of sitting and breathing and notice a drop in your metabolism (lol) just from missing a few sitting sessions, maybe you did not accomplish anything of lasting value. Here's what I have achieved with my methods:
-impossible to go unconscious, even when consuming high amounts of alcohol or mind altering substances.
-complete lack of fear. I literally cannot feel the emotion of fear because it is a biochemical function of the reptilian/mid-mammalian brain and my mid brain has been integrated into my Neo cortex.
-bio plasticity: severe impacts that would break a normal persons bones instead cause my joints to pop very loudly as they absorb the impact.
-hyper respiration: I can sprint at full speed for a minute straight and breath completely normal and relaxed immediately afterward.
-control of he weather: I have done this one two occasions straight from a trance state
-instant manifestation: I have created an object using only my intent
-energy orgasm: I have had an orgasm without ejaculating.
-horse stance: I can hold a horse stance indefinitely
-transmutation of poison: I can transmute lethal doses of poison by processing the accompanying energy behind it.
-ability to instantly ground others: my energy field is so strong and my level of integration so deep that I can instantly ground another person just by looking at them. They immediately start transmuting their emotions in my presence.
-complete transcendence of the fight or flight response: there is no adrenaline spike in my biology anymore. But I function better than ever before.
So I think the results speak for themselves. Of course not everyone will achieve the things I have because it takes a shit load of will power, focus, determination, perseverance, courage, self honestly, and hard ass work. People would much rather just sit on their ass and breath LOL.
I hear Sam Harris has a medication app (or is working on one).
Smoke a little more there, pal, and good luck training - you didnt understand a single word I said, if you even read it well.Quote:
Originally Posted by Primalredemption
How old are you, you display the wisdom of a 19 year oldQuote:
Originally Posted by Primalredemption
funny, because a buddy of mine told me this was the most likely outcome
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bYhTFz_SGw0
enjoy your chocolate, lol
Of course you immediately turn to insults since you lack any self control whatsoever. Good luck with the new age cult you're obviously in.Quote:
Originally Posted by Coonehh
Funny how a post about meditation turn into bickering and insults.
I didnt come here to argue with children, although I am quite used to most people out there simply not being able to recognize good information when they see it. You obviously fit in that bunch if you think you have any clue what kundalini is or if you're that utterly fkn deluded you think you can control the weather. If you knew a pinch of what the fuck you were talking about, you'd have made correlations to what your perceived "trance" state....oh wait, except that takes no training whatsoever to do, just focus.Quote:
Originally Posted by Primalredemption
I really hope you dont bring this attitude to the mat, because its going to get you hurt. (And you'll probably be mongoloid enough to take that as a threat from me in particular.)
I seriously hope you are not representative of the average 10th planet white belt.
yep, I come offer a couple small secrets one wont find in any meditation book, and I get told that the Anapanasati that the Buddha taught is worthless...cant quite facepalm hard enough for some kids...Quote:
Originally Posted by Chauncey Nuusolia