I have heard so much about meditation and types of meditation. I don't understand that why it is so important and have greater benefits?
2007-09-21 08:12:47 · 10 answers · asked by c 2 in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
*Research has proven that people who regularly practice "mindfulness" meditation are able to focus and concentrate better; statistics indicate that mindfulness meditation improves our memory. Mindfulness Meditation is an effective type of meditation practiced in many countries, including the United States. *Studies given by Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn PhD at Massachusetts General Hospital show that regular Mindfulness Meditation thickens the cerebral cortex in the brain by increasing the blood flow to that region - enhancing attention span, focus, concentration and improving memory.
*Am in the habit of practicing two types of Meditation daily:
1) Mindfulness (Vipassana) Meditation:
*Below is an excellent "How To Manuel" on Mindfulness (Vipassana) Meditation called
"Mindfulness in Plain English"
By - Ven. Henepola Gunaratana:
http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma4/mpe.html
2.) Loving-kindness (Loving-friendliness) Meditation:
Loving-kindness Meditation is usually practiced right before practicing Vipassana (Mindfulness) Meditation.
An Example of Loving-kindness Meditation:
1. *May I be well, happy and peaceful. May no harm come to me. May no difficulties come to me. May no problems come to me. May I always meet with success. May I also have patience, courage, understanding, and determination to meet and overcome inevitable difficulties, problems, and failures in life.
2. *May my parents and be well, happy and peaceful. May no harm come to them. May no difficulties come to them. May no problems come to them. May they always meet with success.
May they also have patience, courage, understanding, and determination to meet and overcome inevitable difficulties, problems, and failures in life.
3. *May my relatives be well, happy and peaceful. May no harm come to them. May no difficulties come to them. May no problems come to them. May they always meet with success.
May they also have patience, courage, understanding, and determination to meet and overcome inevitable difficulties, problems, and failures in life.
4. *May my teachers be well, happy and peaceful. May no harm come to them. May no difficulties come to them. May no problems come to them. May they always meet with success.
May they also have patience, courage, understanding, and determination to meet and overcome inevitable difficulties, problems, and failures in life.
5. *May my friends be well, happy and peaceful. May no harm come to them. May no difficulties come to them. May no problems come to them. May they always meet with success.
May they also have patience, courage, understanding, and determination to meet and overcome inevitable difficulties, problems, and failures in life.
6. *May all indifferent persons be well, happy and peaceful. May no harm come to them. May no difficulties come to them. May no problems come to them. May they always meet with success.
May they also have patience, courage, understanding, and determination to meet and overcome inevitable difficulties, problems, and failures in life.
7. *May my enemies be well, happy and peaceful. May no harm come to them. May no difficulties come to them. May no problems come to them. May they always meet with success.
May they also have patience, courage, understanding, and determination to meet and overcome inevitable difficulties, problems, and failures in life.
8. *May all living beings be well, happy and peaceful. May no harm come to them. May no difficulties come to them. May no problems come to them. May they always meet with success.
May they also have patience, courage, understanding, and determination to meet and overcome inevitable difficulties, problems, and failures in life.
The practice of Universal Loving-Kindness is recommended for bedtime and just after arising in the morning. It helps one sleep well and prevents nightmares. It also makes it easier to get up in the mornings. And Loving-kindness Meditation makes you more patient, gentle, compassionate, loving, friendly and open toward everybody, friend or foe, human or otherwise.
Metta (loving-kindness; loving-friendliness) to all
2007-09-24 04:04:55 · answer #1 · answered by McLeod 3 · 2⤊ 0⤋
As you can see already in the answers so far, there are different types of meditation, different kinds of potential benefits, and different understandings about what it's really for.
I've studied it in some depth, both academically (psychology, world religions) and in direct practice (30 years' worth). There is a lot of variety, but in the end I feel meditation comes down to a practice of a deep kind of honesty.
Meditation is paying immediate, intimate attention to your present experience. It's sort of like giving life a chance to inform you itself about itself, rather than us deciding through beliefs and philosophical ideas what life is.
So, again, there are lots of kinds, but one thing many meditation approaches have in common, is simply setting aside our tendency to rely on our thoughts, and listening in a more simple and direct way to life with our hearts and immediate experience.
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2007-09-21 08:47:21 · answer #2 · answered by bodhidave 5 · 1⤊ 1⤋
meditation important effective
2016-02-02 04:39:44 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Since we were born, or even conceived, our mind/brain start to function non stop, in dream and fantasy, we crave for food, love, money, sex, power, beauty and fun. Such craving lead us to many undesirable sins, jealous, hatre, revenge and saddness within us. But all these don't last, it only a moment in your life. the awakening one will realise that it is our brain/our mind that is playing the devil with us.
In order to stop or reduce the devilish mind, you meditate, think of nothing, nothing is where you come from, do appropriate breathing exercise, just keep thinking of one momentum such as counting 1 to 4 with each breathing, or in higher mediation, (Jap Zen meditation) you can even imagine u fly thru to ocean, mountain and think of all those wonderful things the world has to offer. You will find resistance from your brain/your mind to tell you to forgo such free thinking, and for most of us, in our whole life, we never reject our mind, we think it is smart and make good decision, but then why are most of us end up in saddness, loneliness, felt betrayed, angry, jealousy and revengeful leading to sins and illness within our body.
Meditation is a thinking of pure free concious that evade the evil mind that invaded us. And, as you do more, you will find that you are more relax, smile often, less sickness, control anger, make better decision in life, in another words, you controlled back your mind.
However, as our brain resist us to go into pure concious thinking, some of us may end up worst in mediation, so it is better to read and understand meditation or get a teacher to teach you the way. Then once you get your grab on it, you can meditate as and when you like, free. And whenever you come into a situation whereby getting angry, do meditation and you will be blessed. The way each individual meditate is different ya.
Meditation is not a religion, it is you, yourself against your mind. From within, you can produce the best in you just as the flower (lotus) blosom from within it root, leaves and stalk.
My dear friend, within we remain.
2007-09-21 15:02:20 · answer #4 · answered by butterfly 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
From a phsycial perspective, meditation helps us learn to calm down and focus. We get less stressed when we learn to quiet all that noise chatter in the mind. It also helps reduce anxiety.
From a spiritual perspective, it helps us connect more with the higher realm. We also learn to connect and listen to ourselves. We learn to hear messages more clearly from those around us and you really truly learn your connect to the higher realms. You can also have visions.
2007-09-21 08:20:42 · answer #5 · answered by xxamethystnightxx 3 · 2⤊ 0⤋
Meditation opens the latent powers of one's consciousness to go beyond the body and the mind. When this expansion takes place, then the power to interact with material energy awakens. You get a real sense of the Transcendent.
2007-09-25 02:41:31 · answer #6 · answered by World Vision 4 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Because there is no conflict in quiet. Your mind, once stilled, gets to deeply rest with absolutely no stress. The spirit is rejuvenated by this listening as the body is by sleep.
2007-09-21 13:27:29 · answer #7 · answered by Valerie C 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Relieves stress which can help with many physical ailments such as reducing the risk of heart attacks.
2007-09-21 08:16:08 · answer #8 · answered by Keltasia 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
concentrate on the Spirit of the most High God..
concentrate on truth, in your life for God is truth
concentrate on your righteousness you do to others
2007-09-21 08:28:44 · answer #9 · answered by john 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
it helps you maintain a stable mind
2007-09-21 23:41:49 · answer #10 · answered by Perfectionist 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
"The Kingdom of Heaven "IS" Within."
2007-09-21 08:20:33 · answer #11 · answered by Premaholic 7 · 0⤊ 2⤋