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If You're Too Busy to Meditate, Read This

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Re: If You're Too Busy to Meditate, Read This

#41

Post by vikas5678 »

webwanderings wrote: post #2

The misconception about meditation is that it requires one to give up everything and sit silently. This is not true in its entirety as it depends on how one interprets the word "meditation". The meditation does not necessarily require you to give up one thing for the sake of another. The goal of the meditation is to "be in awareness" and you can achieve this same goal by being alert and aware with any activity your f…

"Meditation in action" is usually supported by "sitting meditation" like the author in the link above suggests.

In my own practice, I've noticed that when I skip sitting meditations, my attempts at staying aware through out the daily activities is harder than usual.

Re: If You're Too Busy to Meditate, Read This

#42

Post by webwanderings »

prawks wrote: post #25
zoul wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s better to let yourself to be swallowed whole by your current activity (be it just doing the dishes) than to continue in the endless chatter of your mind. Doing the dishes can be fun if you pay attention to the textures, temperatures, smells and sounds. You can plan your future later, giving it full attention again. That’s the idea.

Doing the dishes can be fun if you pay attention to the textures, temperatures, smells and sounds. I can't wait to do the dishes when I get home today.

Try the same when taking shower, or brushing teeth, or anything else that we do mundanely on daily basis. It is indeed easier said than done but the point is that life provides several opportunities to stay-in-present but the mind has been trained for ages to wander in past or future.

Re: If You're Too Busy to Meditate, Read This

#43

Post by muraiki »

stephth wrote: post #4

Focus on your breath going in and out. Every time you have a thought or an urge, notice it and bring yourself back to your breath. From what I've heard so far, meditation is based on focusing on your body in order to quiet your mind. Are there other schools/techniques?

When I was in college at the University of Pittsburgh, I took a fascinating class called "Mysticism: East and East" that compared the contemplative traditions of Yoga and Orthodox Christian hesychast prayer. As a practicing Buddhist at the time, it was an eye-opening class.

I don't really know how to present a concise summary of the class, but I did find this paper by my teacher which sets forth an overview: http://www.doiserbia.nb.rs/ft.aspx?id=0350-08610802171B

Now of course Orthodox hesychasm is about communion with a person, whereas eastern meditation is typically not (Pure Land schools of Buddhism are more in line with Judeo-Christian concepts of prayer, though). But I think that there is some common ground for dialogue, and perhaps this paper may be of interest to you or others who enjoyed the original article and are interested in other practices.

Re: If You're Too Busy to Meditate, Read This

#44

Post by corysama »

7rurl wrote: post #32
prawks wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doing the dishes can be fun if you pay attention to the textures, temperatures, smells and sounds. I can't wait to do the dishes when I get home today.

It's harder than it sounds. Your subconscious will continually try to interrupt your mindfulness of the dish washing. The main trick of meditation is to be able to gently push those idle thoughts away and refocus on the dish washing (or whatever it is you are meditating on). Even if you don't end up enjoying dish washing more, meditating like this is an excellent workout for your focus and concentration and can be a…

It can get frustrating when you really try and yet constantly fail to maintain focus. It helps to remember that the purpose of the exercise is not to succeed in maintaining a laser-like focus, but instead to practice noticing your failures. That is how you level up your self-awareness into a skill that carries over into activities beyond dishwashing.

Re: If You're Too Busy to Meditate, Read This

#46

Post by KirinDave »

adorton wrote: post #14
KirinDave wrote: post #8

Wait. Wait wait wait. > Research shows that an ability to resist urges will improve your relationships, increase your dependability, and raise your performance... Great. Yes. Impulse control is key. Delayed gratification is part of how we define higher intelligence. Meditation has what do with this, exactly? > How [does meditation help]? By increasing your capacity to resist distracting urges. This entire article is…

Meditation is the focused practice of resisting distraction. Have you ever tried sitting still for 15-30 minutes, doing nothing but breathing? Distractions come easily in this state. Sometimes it's your thoughts. Other times, it's very hard to resist the urge to get up and start moving. In order to successfully meditate, you need to deal with a wide variety of distractions and other obstacles.

> Meditation is the focused practice of resisting distraction.

Are we defining it this way? Because this does not jive with my experience of meditation, focusing, or resisting distraction.

> Have you ever tried sitting still for 15-30 minutes, doing nothing but breathing?

Yes. As a matter of fact, meditation was part of a martial arts practice I participated in for 2 years. In all that time I tried very hard to do this, but never found much value in it. Eventually I settled on quietly and methodically reflecting on the day, which is something that seemed to have a lot more value than chasing a vague notion of emptiness.

And honestly I'm not convinced this is _any different_ from the "benefits" of meditation.

Re: If You're Too Busy to Meditate, Read This

#47

Post by aashay »

webwanderings wrote: post #39
aashay wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "you become one with the reality, or you transcend that favorite activity by merging your self into it. That moment of transcendence is meditation" I think this is a really interesting takeaway. I'd like to propose another type of activity which I think most people probably wouldn't group together with meditation: video games. If you're an avid gamer, you'll know where I'm coming from. Whether you're playing an MMO…

That's it. You are in meditation when you're playing video games. I believe you should just find more of those same opportunities when you are not playing video games (because you can't really play video games 24x7).

Of course. My primary meditation activity tends to be playing my guitar. I was just reminded of my explanation about gaming.

To be "present" 24/7 is a very difficult achievement, but it's a great goal to keep in mind.

Edit: grammar

Re: If You're Too Busy to Meditate, Read This

#48

Post by webwanderings »

jamesli wrote: post #33
webwanderings wrote: post #2

The misconception about meditation is that it requires one to give up everything and sit silently. This is not true in its entirety as it depends on how one interprets the word "meditation". The meditation does not necessarily require you to give up one thing for the sake of another. The goal of the meditation is to "be in awareness" and you can achieve this same goal by being alert and aware with any activity your f…

Excellent point! Be-in-present is the essence of some sects of Zen, especially in Japanese Zen. Sweeping the yard is not only to clean the yard. It is a practice, a meditation, to sweep the distracted thought of one's brain. Same as arranging flowers, etc. In this sense, it is the same as any other everyday manual work, like washing dishes, walking, etc.

Yes, indeed. But when you add the phenomena of activity humans love to do and excel in, you can see that those transcendent moment occur when the mind is in here-now.

If you are into watching movies and when you watch an exceptionally good movie, you are most likely staying in present in that moment where the mind is not there to distract. It could be a great scene or it could be the whole movie, the experience one gets out of watching good movie, is as same as the experience one gets out of being-in-present. But obviously the moment passes leaving the taste in your mouth, but the point is ... that one can find and cultivate those moments further in life in other situations.

Re: If You're Too Busy to Meditate, Read This

#49

Post by KirinDave »

acgourley wrote: post #13
KirinDave wrote: post #8

Wait. Wait wait wait. > Research shows that an ability to resist urges will improve your relationships, increase your dependability, and raise your performance... Great. Yes. Impulse control is key. Delayed gratification is part of how we define higher intelligence. Meditation has what do with this, exactly? > How [does meditation help]? By increasing your capacity to resist distracting urges. This entire article is…

You're right he doesn't back up the claim, but that's just because it's so well accepted by people who study this he didn't even think he had to.

I'd like to actually see some evidence that Meditation helps people sustain that state of mind. Because I hear people trot it out a lot but I've never seen it backed up by hard data.

I think meditation may have benefits, but the idea that it helps you "build up willpower" has always been one I thought we could actually measure, and yet I've never seen a good study of it.

Re: If You're Too Busy to Meditate, Read This

#50

Post by tylee78 »

Happens to me all the time. I am working on a piece of code in the afternoon, and can't move forward or looking to identify a bug or optimizing some algorithm - wasting hours. After a meditation session I walk back to the computer screen, take a seat, and my hand clicks around the tabs, my fingers scroll around, my eye catches one obscure line of code which is EXACTLY where the problem sits. I had this happen so many times, it's a given by now. The article (and I am sure all who do meditate) shares the same kind of experience.
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