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Introduction
to meditation.
Therefore, as we see, there is plenty of reasons to meditate. Although
it is a quality inherent to the human being, not for that reason its benefits
are easy to use and optimize. For this, as for any discipline (sporting,
artistic, professional, etc.) it is necessary for
certain preparation and learning; although, in this practice as in any
other, there are people with better innate aptitudes than others. Thus, as many
people do not need to practice a sport in order to be athletic, or studying
music to have a good musical ear, there are some who have a great capacity for
meditation and comprehension beyond the logic, and use it as a tool before the
difficulties and mysteries their
existence offers them, from the moment they begin to have use of reason and
throughout all their life. Even so, in the same way as a person who is not
athletic can get himself noticeably fitter by means of a correct practice,
sporting, nutritional and habits in general, and somebody athletic can be able
to improve his performance by means of those practices, all of us, in general,
can benefit exercising and perfecting ourselves in the practice of meditation,
and use the abilities this practice offers to us to improve the different areas
of our life in which we want to use it. A correct practice will always lead us
to a calm life, with less fears and anxieties, and more happiness. It will give
us knowledge, and will help us to behave more suitably to our condition as human
beings. But I
would not like the reader to get a deluded idea of what meditation is and the
way in which it is used before anxiety and desire, because a lot of people can
think, wrongly, that thanks to it they will be able to free themselves of their
anxiety without much effort, but... nothing is further from reality. The
first thing we have to know about meditation and the different techniques of
this one, is that there is not any specific technique that it is going to be
useful for us to relax ourselves and to transform an elevated state of anxiety,
panic or other states that, not being so extreme, involve an anxiety level that
seems unbearable, to another one of calm and joy, as many of us have deluded
ourselves to think on some occasion. There exist, on the contrary, a good number
of this type of techniques that, combined with what we could define as a certain
philosophy of life, allows us to pass from some stages to others. The
election of some or other techniques is based on the personality of the
individual, on the environment in which one lives and on one´s possibilities,
since people with very much anxiety, in principle, can hardly be concentrated
even for a moment on a given object; or, the type of practice that a shop
assistant in a big city can carry out daily, can be different from the one of a
farmer in a village, although the suffering of both can be similar. Also, there
are people whose intelligence allows them to pick certain techniques and
learnings better than those who are not; although, it does not mean the way is
going to be necessarily easier for that kind of people, since, often, a vast
intelligence has generated a framework of ill-fated cognition far more
complicated to solve than that of those who use a not so elaborated thought.
Health also plays an important role in the election of the type of techniques;
it is the doctor who in many cases must advise, or not, the possibility of
performing a certain activity given the circumstances of the individual. Thus,
then, as we see there are a number of factors to consider; however, the
following general guidelines will be exposed so that they can be adapted for
every kind of people in general. Another
very important consideration to keep in mind is that in order to be able to
control our emotions and sensations through our own potential, it is necessary
to experience them fully, clearly and attentively. What does this imply? We will
have to find the courage to expose ourselves to our anxiety, to the mental
object of our suffering, as many times as it is necessary, so that our anxiety,
our great desire, disappears thanks to comprehension. I
suppose that, universally, the “stuff” people are made of is the same in one
and another place. Where I live, and for many kilometers around, people dream of
finding a solution to their suffering that would come in the form of a medical
prescription, even of surgery and, of some exotic eastern technique, fast, easy
and effective, either cheap or expensive. Anything but sensation the sensations
of their fears on their skin and the rest of their being. In spite of the
numerous attempts carried out by all kinds of investigators, the control of the
anxiety, in a conscious way and without losing aptitudes in other areas (to
which in some cases the ingestion of certain medicines and drugs in general can
lead to), goes through the experience of anxiety in order to learn how to handle
it. But,
do not think this one is a “mission impossible” because our mind has a great
potential for comprehension of the experience, knowledge and adaptation, which I
suppose is another aspect in our evolution. This great potential bears direct
relation to our awareness; thus, the bigger our awareness on the object we
choose to observe is (in this case ourselves), and more particularly on the
processes and phenomena that arise in our mind, the greater our deep and inner
comprehension of the same is. Although our inner comprehension is not contrary
to our intellect, it goes beyond this, because it needs the attentive
observation of the experience, without valuations, fights or avoidance, although
logic and analysis are required. It is in
this way that our mind learns and comprehends better and quicker our
experiences, and, since what one is afraid of is the unknown, once our mind
knows and comprehends interiorly the sensations and objects of its fears, one
gets to the conclusion, in an intuitive way, that there is no reason to feel
fear before the appearance of these. When we
fight interiorly with our fury so that our sensations and the terrible things
that make us suffer do not exist, the more they torment and scare us, because
our imagination has been showing us a monster fed by our own ignorance. However,
whenever we decide to consciously assume the consequences of our situation,
confronting them not with resignation, but with decision, the fears that in
principle these situations produced in us, start diminishing and reducing, even
if we do not use any type of technique as such.
Becoming
aware that our sensations and emotions are based on what we think the moment we
experience them, can be the first step. Learning that if we take an event as
positive we feel well and that if we take it negatively we feel bad, although
now it is not yet within our reach to be able to take it as we would like, it is
a more than important step, because, with that comprehension we will be able to
direct our walk in a suitable form and, as the poet said: "Walker there is no path, the path is made walking” It is also very important to become aware of the
amount of moments in the day of which in a habitual way we feel overwhelmed and
show wrath, not only unnecessarily but to our own detriment; because, the more
eager and angry actions we carry out, the greater is our load of anxiety and bad
karma, and more solid and reinforced are our bad cognitions,
being that our cognitions are the pillars of our personality; and on the
contrary, the calmer and kinder the actions we carry out, the better karma we
accumulate, and more solid are the pillars of our well-being. But, outside these
sufficient reasons, the more happy moments we live in a day, the better, and any
moment that is not unpleasant will be pleasant, even more if we are conscious of
it. Therefore, and even if it does not seem to be so in principle,
here we have a very long and sufficient task to start with that will need
much tenacity and decisiveness to be put into practice. That
task, although could seem very small to the inexperienced one, is as important
as the laying of good foundations when building a house; in principle it is not
showy, but it will support the weight of the same. Learning to observe and value
our actions and their result in our person, we will then be able to decide if we
really want or not to change our passive attitude to another more committed and
active, and carry this out if we decide to. Already
from the first moment it is advisable to remember time and again, that it is not
so important to obtain an ecstatic and spectacular result; each small
achievement, each apparent, insignificant overcoming, every moment lived with
full awareness, will be worthy of praise and of being lived fully and with
contentment within ourselves. Sensations. The
best way I know for carrying out this task, and in the future the others ones,
is learning to observe, first, our sensations. At home or at work, driving or
walking, talking, laughing or crying, they will always tell us about our mood,
and through them we will be able to observe what we really think whenever we
feel, or, more precisely, what we feel whenever we think. In
principle, the sensations that will be easier for us to identify, will be those
that cause us suffering. Outside the physical pain, and including also this,
whenever we experience anxiety, anguish, or we feel lost, done for and
depressed, we will be able to observe that, along with this sensation or set of
sensations, in our mind has appeared a thought that foresees either a danger, in
case we experience the typical sensations of anxiety, or that nothing is worth
the trouble, in case the one we experience is a loss and depression sensation;
or both simultaneously, which happens on most occasions, since normally we do
not experience a single emotion, but several altogether or continuously,
although, some make themselves notice more than others. It
is very important learning to pay attention to our sensations and the thoughts
that trigger them; learning to observe them and to observe our behaviour before
their presence, so it can be modified in a suitable way. The objective is
comprehending our sensations and learning to tolerate them in all their
amplitude, learning not to flee or fight against them when they appear before
our mind. For this it is fundamental learning to observe the thoughts that cause
them, because being attentive in the moment when they appear we will be able to
observe, that those sensations arise from a thought that alerts us, however
subtle this is. If that thought arises because of a justified warning, as there
could be the risk of an accident, of aggression, etc. we will be able to better
comprehend our sensations and not reject them for that reason. If, on the
contrary, we got scared only because we have thought we were in danger before
the presence of our sensations, or if we think having anxiety is not good and it
causes us greater anxiety, we will be able to observe that our sensations
manifest themselves with greater intensity only because we think they are
dangerous for us. Then, we will have to observe those sensations with awareness
without trying to flee nor fight against them, accepting them in us, because we
know, through our logic even if we have not comprehended it interiorly, that
those sensations are not dangerous for us even if it seems so. We will observe,
then, how they are and how they act in us based on what we think, and when we
know them in depth they will stop scaring us and we will stop rejecting them. Thus,
seeing how the nature of desire is and understanding how our sensations and
emotions manifest themselves, and how we experience our thoughts, it will get
easier to begin to direct ourselves. Referring to evolution
As we
said previously, it seems to be true that throughout our history our anxiety
(running at the precise moment or fighting if it is appropriate) has played a
more than decisive role in order to get us where we are; but it does not mean
that we must run around the clock longing to finish whatever we are doing so we
can begin another task, which we will wish to finish so we can take care of
another, and thus finish a day to initiate another the same, in which haste,
stress, anxiety, or any other name we want to give it would prevent us from
remaining calm and enjoying the
moment, which will not be repeated. Accepting the anxiety
Yet, and
I will not get tired of repeating it, what we must do to overcome our anxiety is
to accept it; and for that, it is good to try to understand the role of this in
our evolution and survival. For
example, if somebody chases us with bad intentions, our undesired anxiety is
helpful for us, because thanks to it we receive from our body adrenaline,
noradrenalin and other chemical substances appropriate for the occasion, that
will give us better reflexes than in normal conditions, a greater blood supply
for our muscles (frequently we notice how our heart beats faster when we
suddenly experience anxiety for one or another reason), a greater awareness to
everything happening to us in respect to what alarms us, and, in short, of a set
of elements we have used throughout our history to surpass many of the
difficulties our survival has entailed, in the same way as it can happen to a
zebra before the threat of a lion, or to a chimpanzee faced with the presence of
a poisonous snake, or to a lamb on its way to the slaughter house. Once we start becoming conscious of how we experience our sensations and emotions depending on our thoughts, on what we think about that we perceive, it will be helpful training ourselves suitably in the following technique, which will help us to develop our skill and capacity to handle this art, and also to learn to relate ourselves to our sensations and to tolerate them better.
From
the book "Practical meditation, here and now", by Joaquín Carrizosa
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