How to Meditate :
How to Meditate :
So many textbooks are available on meditation nowadays that everyone has some idea of what it is all about. In brief, meditation is the most wonderful adventure: ‘Discovery of self’. Meditation enables us to enjoy consciously the peace, happiness and revitalisation that we unconsciously have in sleep. Meditation lifts us above the cares and anxieties of our daily life, it enables us to overcome our moral weaknesses and evil habits and thus transform our very life. By dispelling ignorance, meditation removes all our morbid and childish fears and leads us to the hall of divine light, where we perceive our self as the immortal essence of all existence, where we realise that we are at once linked in a bond of eternal love with all creation. By enabling us to get in tune with this cosmic substratum and so with others, meditation gives us supernatural powers. Unless these powers (of whose existence we are not conscious and which we shall not deliberately use) become natural to us, they should be shunned as distractions.
‘An ounce of practice is better than tons of theory’. The following simple procedure will in due course enable you to enjoy deep meditation.
1. Select a calm, quiet, clean and secluded spot or a room or corner of a room in your house reserved for this purpose. Sit there (preferably facing east—the sun rises in the east—or north—there is a great power in the north pole), with a symbol of God or a lighted lamp or candle, placed at eye-level. The best posture is, of course, the lotus posture; if you cannot do this, sit in any comfortable posture with your body erect. The yogi wants you to keep the back straight. All sorts of interesting reasons have been given, and one might be of interest to you. If the small of the back is held in, your back is naturally straighter than before. It seems to promote alertness of the mind. The moment you slouch and the small of the back shoots backwards and the spine curves forward your alertness is gone. The best time to meditate is from 4 to 6 a.m., but if this is not possible do this as soon as you wake up. It is good to have a quick bath; if this is not possible (without loss of the good morning hour), have a quick wash of hands, feet and face.
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