Meditation: What it is !!!

An ordinary person may consider meditation as a worship or prayer. But it is not so. Meditation means awareness. Whatever you do with awareness is meditation. "Watching your breath" is meditation; As long as these activities are free from any other distraction to the mind, it is effective meditation.

Meditation is not a technique but a way of life. Meditation means 'a cessation of the thought process' . It describes a state of consciousness, when the mind is free of scattered thoughts and various patterns . The observer (one who is doing meditation) realizes that all the activity of the mind is reduced to one.

          I will try to explain, from Buddhist point of view, mindfulness and its development. When we think of mindfulness, first of all we must understand what is  unmindfulness . There are so many things which are on the opposite side of mindfulness: luck of attention, carelessness, absent –mindedness, forgetfulness, negligence and neglect. So , in this way, we have to understand the harm that unmindfulness might bring to us, to our spiritual life as well, as to our daily life. From this way we can understand, little by little , the value of mindfulness.

MEDITATION

The word meditation is a very poor substitute for the original term bhavana, which means mental  culture or mental development. It aims at cleaning the mind of impurities and disturbances, worries and restlessness, skeptical doubts, cultivating such qualities as concentration, awareness. Intelligence, will, energy, the analytical faculty, confidence, joy, tranquility, leading finally to the attainment of highest wisdom which sees the nature of things as they are, and realizes the Ultimate Truth, Nibbana.

There are two forms of meditation. One is the development of mental concentration, of one-pointedness of mind. Other is the realize of the truth as they are, by various methods prescribed in the original texts. The first meditation is nothing to do with Reality, Truth, Nibbana. This form of meditation existed before the Buddha. Hence it is not purely Buddhist, but it is not excluded from the field of Buddhist meditation. However it is not essential for the realization of Nibbana. The Buddha himself, before his Enlightenment. Buddha studied these practice under different teachers and attained to the highest mystic states; but he was not satisfied with them, because they did not give complete liberation, they did not give insight into the Ultimate Reality. He considered these mystic states only as “happy living in this existence” and nothing more.

He discovered the other form of meditation know as vipassana. It means ‘insight’ into the nature of things, leading to the complete liberation of mind, to the realization of the Ultimate Truth, Nibbana. This is essentially Buddhist meditation, Buddhist mental culture. It is an analytical method based on mindfulness, awareness, vigilance, observation. The most important discourse ever given by the Buddha on mental development is called the Satipatthana-sutta. The ways of ‘meditation’ given in this discourse are not cut off  from life, nor do they avoid life.  On the contrary, they are all connected with our life, our daily activities, our sorrows  and  joys, our words and thoughts, our moral and intellectual occupations.

The discourse is divided into four main sections as follows.

The first section deals with our body ( kayanupassana).

The second section with our feeling (vedananupassana).

The third with mind (cittanupassana).The fourth with various moral and intellectual subjects (dhammanupassana).

One of the most well- known, popular and practical examples of ‘meditation’ connected with the body is called “The mindfulness or Awareness of breath in and out. According to the Pali text, it is for this meditation, you may sit, stand, walk, and lie down, as you like. But, for cultivating mindfulness of in and out breathing.

According to the text, one should sit, cross-legged, keeping the body erect and mindfulness alert. It is very necessary for this exercise that the mediator should sit erect, but not stiff; his hands place comfortable on his lap. After sitting , you may close your eyes and you may focus at the tip of your nose, as it may be convenient to you.

This exercise of mindfulness of breathing, which is one of the simplest and easiest practices, is meant to develop concentration leading up to very high mystic attainments. You should be fully aware and mindful of the act you perform at the moment. That is to say, that you live in the present moment, the present action. This does not mean that you should not think of the past or the future at all. On the contrary, you think of them in relation to the present moment, the present action, when and where it is relevant.

At the time, you will realize that everything is impermanent, changing. You  comprehend that analyze the suffering, discard  the root of suffering which is thirst, realize Nibbana which is free from suffering, and increase  the noble eightfold path jointly.

 Now a day, people face many kinds of suffering. So they want to be peaceful, free from suffering. One who wants to free from defilement, to live happiness, should practice meditation as the teaching of the Buddha. If we are practicing meditation, we can control our mind from being desire, hatred, illusion and we can face and solve whatever we meet problem of life.