The top ten myths about meditation
Contributed by: BodhipaksaMyth #5. In meditation you sit there saying “OM”
Mantra meditation is only one kind of meditation, and “OM” is only one mantra (or part of a mantra). ‘Nuff said.
Myth #4. Meditation is a religious activity
Although meditation comes from various spiritual or religious traditions, it’s not in itself necessarily a religious practice. The most common forms of meditation practice, for example, involve observing the sensations of the breath. What’s religious about that? Sure, there are some forms of meditation that involve using religious words of phrases as objects of concentration (e.g. Transcendental Meditation, Buddhist Mantra meditation, etc.) but many of the most common meditation practices have no religious overtones — which is probably one of the reasons they’re so common.
Myth #3. Meditation is somehow “Eastern”
A lot of people (usually Christians) have told me that they think Buddhist practice is “foreign” because it comes from an Eastern context. Hmm, where does Christianity come from again? Oh yes, the Middle East. But as with Myth #4 (”Meditation is a religious activity”) there’s nothing inherently Eastern, Southern, or Northern about counting your breath or wishing people well. Some Tibetan practices do involve visualizing rather bizarre (to Western eyes) figures, and mantra meditation usually involves repeating Sanskrit words or phrases — but those constitute a minority of meditation practices. Oh, all right, it’s a large minority — but what’s wrong with a little exoticism?
Myth #2. Meditation is escapist
To some people, meditation is “running away from problems,” “navel gazing,” “lotus eating,” or “disregarding the world.” Actually, running around being busy and never having time to experience yourself deeply is escapism. When you meditate you’re brought face-to-face in a very direct way with your own anger, delusion, craving, pain, and selfishness. There’s nothing to do in meditation but to experience and work with these things. Also, some forms of meditation — such as lovingkindness and compassion meditation — involve us working at transforming our relationship with the world by cultivating love and empathy for others. Perhaps that’s why so many meditators are involved in social work, psychotherapy, nursing, bereavement counseling, prison work, etc.
Myth #1 Meditation is about letting your mind go blank
Here it is, the all-time number one meditation myth — that meditation is about “making your mind go blank.” Sure, in meditation we aim to reduce the amount of thinking that goes on. Sure, just sit there for a few minutes watching all those pointless and even downright unhelpful thoughts bubbling up nonstop in the mind and you’d start to think that a blank mind would be preferable! But what would it be like to have a blank mind? Would you even be awake? Would you have any consciousness at all? Would you be able to know that your mind was blank? The confusion arises because we identify so much with our verbal thoughts (our inner self-talk) that we think that that’s all our experience is. And if we reduce or even stop our thinking (and that can happen) we assume that the mind must be blank. But a blank mind simply isn’t possible.
No, in meditation we aim to develop mindfulness — that’s mind-full-ness. When we’re mindful the mind is very much not blank. Rather, we’re aware of physical sensations, emotions, thoughts — and of how all those things interact with each other. The mind is so full of our present-moment experience that there’s less room for it to be full of useless thoughts, and instead we’re aware of the incredible richness of our experience — a richness that we overlook entirely when we spend our whole lives lost in thinking.
Comments
Comment from socratease
Time: December 5, 2007, 3:17 pm
meditation is all about finding a way to think properly, so to speak. some thoughts are more benevolent than others, and the effort mentioned in the article should go towards a “pleasent-ification” of the thoughts and inner dialogue. the ultimate goal is nothing more than thinking straight, that is, with reason and calmness. you should know what im talking about. (even though some people rarely find themselves thinking positive for more than a couple of minutes at a time, its all about effort)
who says you have to think about negative things? what actions performed by others demand a negative inner response? this is the field of effort, and the goal, as proclaimed by the original buddha, is to via effort (over aeons) become independent of negativity. in fact, negativity never carries its own reality, so by means of willpower, the buddha is said to have managed to conquer negativity, or mara.
enlightenment has nothing to do with light, willed-conciousness nor willed-awareness but a steady transformation into a positive way of thinking. this might involve several aspects in your life, where a dose of positivity is desperately needed. the goal is a warm hearted way of being wich will fulfill a need to help and to give, actions and intents that are solely benificial to all. this will be more satisfying to our mind (than being cruel, wich shuts us off from a non-afflictive way of being/thinking).
the key is noticing afflictive emotions, and how they rise. this might reveal that they also dissipate within, and that in fact, no afflictive thinking/emotion was needed. present, sure, but needed, no. through will of intent, the buddha said that cessation is possible. so is it? i think we can all agree that less affliction is better than more, thus this goal seems reasonable. but is it attainable? well that depends on what ur goal actually is, if you one day find urself satisfied with your mind and outlook on life, is that enough? if you want to become enlightened (after having read some heavy british propaganda or spiritual quackery) youll never be satisfied. imagine the thought and desire of becoming enlightened reveals itself to have an afflictive effect on your self. is then the goal to become enlightened? yes, but if the search (upon investigation) itself is afflictive, how can this goal lead to a non-afflicted mind? the wise men say that willpower and positive thinking/effort through years of practice may lead to an enlightened mind, but when is this goal reached?
easily, the mind, when under right circumstances works perfectly. this in turn affects the body/organism in a benign way and thus genuine content may arise yet again. this state can be perfected through will power and various ways of thinking, and in the end, pure positivity is said to be possible.
so, enlightenment, if sought out as a mean to solve some dilemma or problem, it might turn out to be a negative influence or afflictive way of being, it all comes down to personal experience. enlightenment may mean happiness and contentedness to some, and loss and meaninglessness to others. the truth is that inner negativity (afflictive thinking, action, intent) is a personal “enemy”. no advice could ever fix that for you. the clue is effort, as the writer points out in the text.
meditation is a shortcut to get rid of negativity, as soon as the meditative practice is over, negativity arises, so what has happened here? well, a new depth in your perception has occured and is being built upon a firm ground of positivity. its organically imperative to be without pain, but how to maintain a non-afflictive way of percieving daily life? well, the peace felt by even a beginner of meditative practices should be understood as a “taste” of how the fully funtioning mind is meant to work.
a functioning mind is bound to have a positive impact on whatever aspect of life you might be occupied with. be it math or relationships. with this, no one can disagree.
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