Meditation Handbook : Part Five

How long should I meditate?

The time a person needs to spend in formal meditation sessions to gain maximum benefit depends on ever-changing individual circumstances. If you are meditating with a group you will gain from the group energy and go further with less effort. If you are fortunate enough to be living close to an enlightened teacher you may be able to absorb some of his high energy without any effort at all. If you are meditating alone, without support from others, you will have to do all the heavy lifting yourself.

My general recommendation is that a single one hour long meditation session every day is a minimum effort. Meditation only works for those who are hungry for it and if you cannot spare that small amount of time for meditation, you will probably not gain substantial results. Most people will be helped significantly by meditating just once a day. If you wish to go faster, with clearly recognizable progress, then I suggest two or three formal meditation sessions every day. A specific recommendation for young, physically fit beginners would be to practice Cathartic Dancing Meditation in the morning and one of the quiet sitting meditations at night.

It is of paramount important to practice mindfulness throughout the day. To be of any real value meditation must become a full-time way of living rather than a strictly segregated activity. Choose methods that make you feel more positive. Meditation should be a form of cosmic hedonism, not a penance one must perform as an obligation.

How long does it take to become enlightened?

I have no idea how to answer that question as I am just a fellow student myself. I do not believe the old scriptures nor do I trust the word of pundits and self-proclaimed “masters.” It may take 1 lifetimes or 1,000,000 lifetimes.

Meditation is a pleasure in itself and the healthiest approach is to enjoy the journey without thoughts of gaining a pot of gold at the end of some distant rainbow. Ask yourself who or what will reach that imagined goal? If our petty little minds reach enlightenment, then will we be enlightened at all? Thinking about goals takes us further away from choiceless awareness, relaxation, and ecstasy, and is thus counterproductive. It is best to fully enjoy the journey of meditation without seeking any title, credentials, or an ultimate brass ring that we can selfishly own and brag about to others.

Things to do, things to avoid, and things to consider

* Work in groups when possible as group energy can multiply the energy of an individual many times over.
* Remember that meditation is an escape to reality, not an escape from reality. Avoid any guru or group that asks you to deny truth.
* Don't limit yourself to just one teacher. The single guru approach can lead to cult thinking with its small mindedness and us vs. them syndrome.
* Hatha yoga can make you more energetic and fit for long meditation sessions, but do not take it too seriously or become obsessed with extreme gymnastics. The easy and basic hatha yoga exercises work best. Extreme kundalini yoga exercises that involve fast breathing in bizarre positions may be dangerous and are not recommended. Men should never sit with their heels pressed behind the testicles, as some yogis instruct, as this practice is unhealthful and can cause sterility.
* Having a separate room used exclusively for meditation can be very helpful. It is possible to build up a vibration in a room so that the moment you enter it your mind becomes silent and ready to go deeper.
* Avoid fads and complicated philosophies that give your mind more to think about. Meditation is a step beyond the thought process. No philosophy can adequately describe man's place in the universe. Concentrate on meditation in this moment and not on ancient scriptures. Many old scriptures were written by madmen and fools and have gained respect from society simply because they are so old and dusty.
* It is essential to maintain a nutritionally adequate diet without becoming a food fanatic. Most people find that a semi-vegetarian diet supplemented with dairy products and eggs is generally best for meditation, but not essential. If you have a medical problem like hypoglycemia, you may have to eat meat just to survive. Even the Atkins high fat, high protein diet is perfectly compatible with meditation.
* Food should not be made the fundamental basis of your spiritual practice. Adolf Hitler was a vegetarian yet his diet did not save his soul or make him nonviolent. Most Tibetan lamas and Asian Zen monks eat meat, so obviously meat consumption is not a serious obstacle to cosmic consciousness. There is no scientific evidence to suggest that a vegetarian diet extends lifespan or improves health. To the contrary, nations with the highest longevity rates, such as Japan, Sweden, and Australia, are all populated by avid meat eaters.
Fasting is a waste of time and will weaken you physically. Like taking LSD, fasting creates strangely entertaining short term experiences, but produces no long term benefits and can cause permanent neurological damage. When you fast your body literally feeds upon itself. If your brain needs protein for repair work, your body will be directed to eat away its own own muscles, or worse, your own peripheral nerve cells. People fast because their heads feel cluttered with thoughts and they hope planned starvation will purify their minds. The human body is made of mud, water and dirt, so the idea of a perfect, spiritually purified physical body is misguided. The way to end the cluttered feeling is to change the way your brain and subtle body function, and this can only be accomplished through real meditation techniques.
* I do not recommend solitary meditation retreats of longer than 7 days duration. To maintain health one must eat a balanced diet and get rigorous physical exercise every day. To maintain full brain function one must also get mental exercise through interaction with other human beings and through problem solving. If you meditate in isolation for months or years your body and brain will become deconditioned and atrophy. You may develop strange hallucinations and delusions and come back physically weaker, with a measurably lower IQ.
* Avoid drugs and alcohol. Carlos Castaneda was a talented fiction writer who misled many people. Drugs are not an effective path to enlightenment, but they are a quick path to misery and insanity.
* Have sex when you wish and do not force celibacy upon yourself in the hopes it will lead to enlightenment. To meditate one must be in a very natural and relaxed state of mind without repression or tension. Celibacy can only be of value if it occurs spontaneously without effort or thought. The majority of famous Eastern gurus who have claimed celibacy publicly have practiced intercourse privately. Why make sex a big secret and why have two faces? Many fully enlightened humans have had sexual relations even after enlightenment. There is no direct relationship between abstinence and spirituality.
* Do practice choiceless awareness (one object vision, mindfulness etc.) throughout the day. Meditation must become as continuous and spontaneous as breathing.
* Don't make meditation a competition and drop any hidden agenda you may have to use it to control others. Legitimate motives for meditation are the desire for tranquility and ecstasy, freedom from suffering, and the pure adventure of self-exploration.
* Don't turn your meditation into a business. People who make a profit from intercourse have turned something beautiful into something ugly. Those who make money from meditation have transformed a noble path into a sordid back alley. Whether you are a sexual prostitute or a spiritual prostitute, the fundamental quality of your mind is the same.
* Be completely honest and have just one face, not two.
* Meditation methods put direct pressure on the false self, the ego. If you continue patient practice at some point that false self will implode under the pressure, without warning and without apparent and obvious method. 99.99% of people who drop methods stop far too soon, thus bringing their progress to an early end.
* For every action there is a reaction, not just in theoretical physics but in ordinary human life as well. When you create positive actions you will eventually reap positive reactions for yourself and for others. In this way what we call ethics and morality are woven into the very fabric of the universe right down to the subatomic level.

Enlightenment

The fastest meditation method is to live in the company of an enlightened human being. Enlightened teachers can expand your consciousness without the slightest effort on your part. All you need to do is to be open to the spontaneous transfer of energy. Fully enlightened human are very rare. There may have been as few as seven fully enlightened teachers in the now past 20th century. I do not know of any fully enlightened teachers still living today, but that does not mean they do not exist. More enlightened souls will be coming in the future and it is your challenge to find them while avoiding the many fakes.

When it comes to teachers, even fully enlightened teachers, take the best and leave the rest. No human being has ever been perfect and without major flaws and limitations. Only myths can give the illusion of perfection and that is why most of society continues to worship invented myths rather than accepting reality as it is, warts and all. Enlightened humans are vastly expanded human beings, not perfect human beings.

It is my educated opinion that the traditional guru-disciple relationship is now passé and inappropriate for Western students of meditation. The East has always had an imperial and authoritarian model for the teacher-student relationship. The West must develop its own Jeffersonian model based on science and fact, not on myth and tradition. Be a devoted disciple, but make your ultimate guru the total cosmos itself, not just a single human teacher. Use human teachers as temporary tools on your path to self-realization, but do not allow yourself to become the captive servant of one fallible human mind.

* Definition: kundalini (k¢n´de-lê´nê) noun of Hindu origin. Physical and sexual energy that lies dormant at the base of the spine is activated through esoteric kundalini practice. This energy is directed through the kundalini channel in the etheric body upward to the top of the head.

~ Christopher Calder

Source: http://www.inspirationzone.cjb.net