My post today is inspired by the
presentation given by the Gandhi group, the Gandhi chapter in “Creating Minds,”
by Howard Gardner, and the class lecture that took place this evening.
More specifically, I would like to
focus on the role that meditation has on an individual. For Gandhi, meditation
was a vehicle to ground himself.
Growing up, my father went through
a yoga phase and although it was a phase for him, for me it became a weekly
practice.
I believe that in this day and age
it is hard to focus on the present. Everyone has something going on that pulls
their focus away from the present, into their past actions or their future
goals. For me, it is knowing that now that I am a junior I need to take my
dental admission test and apply to dental schools. Lately everything I do, I do
to make sure I have a secure future; whether it is sacrificing time with my
friends to rack up more study hours towards the DAT or forfeiting those few,
extra hours of sleep to make sure
I am not behind on my schoolwork.
Throughout this chaos, meditation
has helped me pull away from my looming future, and into the present moment.
This article, by Orna Ross,
embodies everything that I love about meditation. Although the author of this
post focuses on the benefits of meditation on writers, her thoughts on
meditation can apply to just about anyone. For example,
“The human
mind operates at three levels: Surface (Intellectual/Ego) Mind, Deep
(Emotional/Intuitive) Mind, and Beyond (Imaginative/Inspirational) Mind.
Meditation has benefits with regard to all three, most particularly in how it
allows us to tap the deeper, wiser dimensions of our minds, which tend to speak
in whispers,”
I especially love how she connects
current neuroscience research in her writing,
“Neuroscience
is showing, through brain mapping, how meditation affects brain wave activity.”
I believe Orna Ross captured
meditation perfectly and for those who have never meditated I can sincerely say
that you are missing out on an experience; whether it be a good experience or a
bad one is for you to decide.
I'm curious as to what your definition for meditation is. I completely agree with your assessment of its importance. There are so many people who are very tense all the time and they would definitely be better off with a little relaxation.
ReplyDeleteBack to the question. I wanted to know if you think that there are others ways to meditate outside of the stereotypical method. Can someone meditate by taking swings at the batting cage, quilting, creating a lego structure?
I know that this question wasn't for me, but I would say yes, that you can meditate by doing all sorts of things. I am not by any means derogating more accepted methods of meditation. Whether it be guided, breathing, yoga, or walking related, the more well know meditative techniques are incredible; they are known by laymen for a reason.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I don't think this is all meditation is or can be. In the blog post, Shivani mentioned being in the present. Meditation is simply being in the moment. It is mindfulness. And mindfulness can be achieved in anything, as long as you are fully immersing yourself in doing it. That means that Milap's examples of batting cages, quilting, even using legos, can all be instances of meditation. As long as you cement yourself fully in the activity (on all three levels mentioned in the post) you have achieved meditation.
When I first became interested in meditation, I stumbled upon a collection of Tibetan Buddhist spiels. One simply stated meditation is being mindful. And more importantly, anything can be done mindfully. Anything can be meditation.