["Donal's introduction to meditation - Pauline will send on more"] Pauline Maguire & Donal Quirke -------------------------------------------- Pauline ---------- Introduction to preliminary practice Yoga position Lying on back Placing space between ending one thing and commencing next - meditating Donal -------- What is meditation? The Sanskrit, or perhaps Pali, for meditation is Bhavana. _Bhavana_. So bhavana means cultivation, or development. When we meditate we are consciously engaging in the development of mental states. Not just any mental states, but skilful, or rather positive mental states. So we may define meditation as the systematic development of positive mental states, or better again, of positive emotion Pauling and I will be taking you through two traditional Buddhist meditation practices, the Sati Bhavana, which is the cultivation of stillness, calm, awareness, the ability to attend to one thing at a time. And also the Metta Bhavana, which is the cultivation of positive emotion, good will, loving kindness, ultimately cosmic oneness. Pauline will speak on this a little more later. Why do it? Meditation is a tool for change. A tool for personal change and development. In meditation, we in a way lift the bonnet on our mind and get more familiar with the types of mental behaviour that we normally do, and begin to work with them. A meditation practice could be thought of in a way as going to a gym daily and developing something in particular. Only instead of developing one's biceps (for example) one is working on calm, awareness, positive emotion, loving kindness, compassion, etc. When we develop an awareness of our mind we can opt for responding creatively to our world, instead of doing our habitual reactions to it, which may not always get us what we want. We can choose to be different. Meditation as we all know is associated with well-being. People earlier spoke about burn-out, the effects of one's activity on one's family, etc. Well, in meditation we give time to ourselves. We put aside time for personal maintenance, release of stress, reconnection with that special quality called life that flows through us etc. One is also giving time to one's relationships, one's relationship with ourself, others, the world. This will be more apparent from Pauline's presentation. Also Buddhism, or rather the Buddha Dharma, is traditionally taught as a threefold, or three component path of meditation, ethics and wisdom. Basically, in dependence on meditation and an ethical life, wisdom arises. One sees through the artificial self-other dichotomy which is at the core of spiritual ignorance and the cause of so much suffering, exploitation etc. in the world. The Buddhist tradition has given us the concept of the Bodhisattva. A being who dedicates their life to the alleviation of the suffering of others. So by meditating one is setting up the conditions for the arising of spiritual wisdom, for the arising of the Bodhisattva principle in the world, which is the expression of compassion in the world. So anyhow, back to meditation! A traditional metaphor for what happens in meditation is a glass containing muddy water. What happens when you place a glass of muddy water down? The sediment sinks to the bottom and the water becomes clear, still. So too with the mind. And what happens when the mind is stilled? Well, quite pleasant and healing mental states actually. One begins to access the Jhanas, or higher states of consciousness, in which one experiences joy, rapture, bliss etc. However, it's probably fair to say that for the majority of us, the majority of time, this is not our experience. Rather, we are doing what traditionally are referred to as the hindrances, states of anxiety, illwill, sense-desire, etc. which typically lead to unsatisfactory experiences & exchanges. So particularly in the early days of one's meditation practice, and perhaps for quite a long time after, this is the area in which we are working, with forays into higher states. So let's do some! I'll take you through two states of the Sati and then Pauline will introduce you to the Metta Bhavana. * Posture * Sati - We avail of the breath entering & leaving the body * Part 1 - Become aware of the breath. & introduce count. At 10 recommence. - 3 minutes - Mind wander? - Hindrances: * ill will * sense desire * sloth and torpor * anxiety * doubt and indecision * Part 2 - N.A.T. - N - [notice] - A - appreciate - attitude of patience, understanding, good will - T - [take action] - return to breath