midl meditation 1 - 6

In MIDL Mindfulness Meditation Training 1/52 you develop your initial skill in grounding your awareness by bringing it to the sensate quality of your body as it sits in meditation. By systematically opening up to the general sensate quality of your body, awareness naturally immerses within it. This creates a reference point from which you develop the skill of observing habitual shifts of your attention away from your body towards thoughts, sounds etc. strengthening mindfulness.

In MIDL Mindfulness Meditation Training 2/52 you develop the skill of one-pointed and open awareness by precise movement of awareness through your body. The three points that you cycle awareness through to train its focus are: Your body sitting, the touch of your fingers and then the experience of your five senses. while observing any habitual shifts of attention away from it. Awareness has the function of being able to zoom in on one experience or to open to the experience of all six senses,  It is important as an MIDL meditator to develop the ability to focus this zoom function through systematic training.

In MIDL Mindfulness Meditation Training 3/52 you retrain any habitual stress based breathing patterns to lower anxiety and as a basis for the development of mindfulness of breathing. Autonomous diaphragm breathing is essential to the development of mindfulness meditation as it affects the arising of the Five Hindrances to Meditation and the ability to use breathing as a meditation object. Sensitivity to diaphragmatic breathing is also used as a basis to reflect the mind to decondition habitual patterns of reaction. It can be considered the first of the softening skills developed within MIDL.

In MIDL Mindfulness Meditation Training 4/52 you develop skill in softening your relationship towards all experience. Your skill in softening is then brought into mindfulness of breathing and your daily life as a way of bringing about mindful non-participation. This creates the basis for deconditioning habitual patterns within your mind. Softening is an abandonment skill that refers to turning the experience of mental hardness associated with resistance into the experience of mental softness associated with acceptance. The foundation for the MIDL Softening skill is trained in MIDL 3/52. 

In MIDL Mindfulness Meditation Training 5/52 you refine your softening skill to bring deep relaxation within your mind through mindful non-participation. You do this initially by borrowing the natural abandoning that occurs with the deflation of each out-breath and allowing yourself to mentally ‘sink’ and relax. The abandonment of mental participation is enhanced by slowly extending the breath out through your nose with each out-breath. At first this skill still rests on the physicality of breathing but with practice it gradually changes into a deep relaxation of the mind that arises due to an abandoning of all mental effort.  

In MIDL Mindfulness Meditation Training 6/52 you begin mindfulness of breathing by creating the conditions to observe habitual control within the breathing itself. Breathing makes a wonderful meditation object for observing control because it can be intentionally controlled or happen autonomously. To decondition habitual control in this training you simply breathe out, relax and wait for the breath to draw in by itself. Whenever you notice the tightness of control within the breathing you simply repeat this training until you can mindfully observe breathing free from any habitual control of your mind.