Meditation for Thursday 22 June 2023
Some meditation teachers describe their practice as ‘complete meditation.’
What they are referring to is that meditation cannot be contained to a set timeframe but rather as a way-of-life. Certainly the formal times of meditation are essential but those formal practices are there to assist us to live a total, all-of-life experience of meditation. A total immersion into meditation, contemplation or mindfulness is the goal of many meditators but for others it scary, so very counter-cultural as to be ‘dangerous’ and therefore a stretch too far.
To live a meditative or mindful life you don’t have to give up your work, desert your family or abandon your hobbies. However you do have to practice mindfulness at every opportunity. At first this is a conscious, deliberate matter but in time it becomes part of who you are. I’m sure that those of us that practice ‘occasional’ meditation, even if that is twice each day know that this regular practice gives us a taste for ‘complete meditation’ or the desire to live a meditative or mindful life.
Most of us don’t give meditation a chance to work its transformative power. Content with our ‘occasional’ practice we baulk at the idea of seizing prospective mindful occasions whether they present themselves at work or at leisure. It is all a matter of living in the present just as we seek to do during our formal moments of meditation.
Living each day, each hour, each moment in the present is to be awake.
It takes imagination and dedication to even believe that such a way of life is possible.
Start by doing simple mindfulness exercises throughout the day. Beginning with breakfast and maintaining the momentum find ways with every activity to sustain the goal of living in the moment.
Meditation
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