Meditation Skills 13-18

Purpose:

• To learn how to open to all experience with the expansion of each natural in-breath.
• To learn how to soften into all experience with the deflation of each out-breath. 
• To understand what it means to soften into stillness through abandoning and decondition habitual tendencies within the mind though this abandonment.

Benefits:

This mindfulness training develops the ability to mindfully observe natural whole body-breathing. It also develops your sensitivity to the stimulation of the six sense fields with your mind, the feeling that arises dependent on this and the stillness that arises through abandonment of participation. This mindfulness training weakens the habitual entanglement with the natural functions of the mind and the feeling of the need to control them. Observing in this way also weakens entanglement with thinking and develops wisdom into the habitual and impersonal nature of the heart / mind. 

Summary:

In this meditation you bring the softening skills that you developed earlier in MIDL 1–3, into your mindfulness of breathing. As your breath draws in and your body expands outwards you allow yourself to open to what you are experiencing now, in alignment with that in-breath. As your breath goes out and your body deflates, you than borrow the relaxation of that deflation, to soften / relax into your relationship to whatever you are experiencing now. In-breath: open, out-breath: soften.

 Instruction:

Step 1: Create Your Foundation

Take a seated meditation posture and gradually bring awareness to your whole body as in MIDL 4. In a general way start to become aware of the experience of warmth or coolness, of points of touch. Start to notice the natural flow of breathing within your body. Be aware of the length of each breath as it comes in, and as it goes out. 

Step 2: Aware of Your Whole-Body Breathing

Bring your awareness to the area of your shoulders, chest and upper back and experience the expansion and deflation of your breathing here. Gradually open your awareness to your whole body as it naturally breathes. Align your awareness with the expansion of each in-breath and open to your all your senses. Align awareness with the deflation of each out-breath and soften along the length of the breath.

Step 3: Soften Along the Length of each Out-breath

Align awareness with the length of the expansion of the body with the in-breath. Align awareness with the length of the deflation of the body with the out-breath. Abandon all physical and mental effort with the natural deflation of each out-breath. Soften your minds relationship towards the six senses by borrowing the natural relaxation of the deflation of your body with each out-breath.

Investigation:

Play with what it means to align your awareness with the length of the deflation of each natural out-breath. Be curious of how to abandon all participation through deeply relaxing along the length of the deflation. Observe the interaction with your mind on the in-breath and natural abandonment with relaxation on the out-breath.

Purpose:

• To learn to mindfully soften into stillness through abandoning with each natural out-breath. 
• To develop the skill of observing the minds habitual interaction with the six senses (seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching, mind) without awareness becoming entangled within them. 
• To learn how to decondition habitual tendencies within the mind through abandoning participation.

Benefits:

This mindfulness training develops sensitivity to the stimulation of the six sense fields and the feeling that arises dependent on this. It also weakens the minds habitual entanglement with the six senses and develops a depth of stillness within the mind.

Summary:

After creating your meditation foundation as in the earlier training. Align your awareness with the expansion of each in-breath and open to your all your senses. Align awareness with the deflation of each out-breath and soften along the length of the breath. 

Abandon all physical and mental effort with the natural deflation of each out-breath and sit in and expand the gap between breaths until breathing disappears and awareness expands. As stillness develops, observe your minds habitual interaction with your six senses and soften any desire to engage with them.

Instruction:

Step 1: Create Your Foundation

Take a seated meditation posture and in a general way become aware of the experience of warmth or coolness, of points of touch. Start to notice the natural flow of breathing within your body. Be aware of the length of each breath as it comes in, and as it goes out.

 
Step 2: Aware of Your Whole Body Breathing

Gradually open your awareness to your whole body as it naturally breathes. Align your awareness with the expansion of each in-breath and open to all your senses. Align awareness with the deflation of each out-breath and soften along the length of the breath.

Step 3: Soften Along the Length of Each Out-breath

Align awareness with the length of the expansion of the body with the in-breath. Align awareness with the length of the deflation of the body with the out-breath. Abandon all physical and mental effort by softening with the natural deflation of each out-breath.

Step 4: Develop Stillness in the Gap Between Breaths

As you soften inward you will come to the end of the out-breath. There is a pause here before the breath autonomously draws back in again. Sit within this gap. Your mind will become very still. Out-breath - breath ends – gap – stillness - in-breath begins. Soften any participation of awareness with the six senses, observe and relax the habitual movements of the mind towards all sensory experience.

Investigation:

Investigate what it means to abandon into stillness with the deflation of each out-breath. Play with your ability to relax in the gap between breaths and to observe what it means for the breath draw in, by itself, without any control from the habitual mind.

Purpose:

To increase mindfulness of your body and immersion of awareness within it. To develop the ability to meditate regardless of physical posture and transfer mindfulness meditation into your daily life.

Benefits:

This training aligns and strengthens the body keeping it healthy. It also immerses awareness within the body throughout the day. 

Summary:

In this meditation, it is now time to transition from seated meditation to standing in order to learn how to meditate within your daily life. The key to standing meditation is to develop mindfulness of your body by developing sensitivity to balance. Learning how to use gravity to balance your body not only develops sensitivity to posture and movement, but also sensitivity to your relationship towards experiences within your life. 

Gravity is predictable and is always pulling you straight down. If you are not aligned with gravity then your muscles will tighten and you will become tired. If you are aligned with gravity then not only will your muscles relax but also the inside of your body as well. Once your body is balanced and relaxed, mindfulness of breathing patterns can be practiced while standing and throughout the day.

Instruction:

Step 1: Align Your Body with Gravity

Meditation is practiced in a standing position, aligning your feet parallel with each other. Bring awareness to your body as it stands, developing sensitivity of the alignment of your body with gravity. Play with this alignment by gently folding your body. Gently bending your knees, then hips. Adjust your shoulders by bringing them forward, up, back and then dropping them down again. Stretch your spine up, align it and let it rest in your pelvis. Tuck your chin under slightly and balance your head on your neck. Aligning your body like a folding spring until gravity is balancing your body. 

Step 2: Become Aware of Your Balance

Develop sensitivity to what it feels like to balance. Notice that when alignment is found the inside of your body relaxes and when alignment is out, different parts of your body tense. Once aligned allow your body to sink into itself so that your legs feel like springs. 

Step 3: Become Aware of Your Body Breathing

Once balanced, bring awareness to the experience of your whole body as it breathes. Become aware of the full length of the expansion of your body with each in-breath and the deflation of your body with each out-breath. Start by standing in meditation for short periods of time, 5 minutes in the beginning and gradually lengthen it.

Investigation:

Play with the alignment of your body and its relationship with gravity and physical tension / effort. Observe that when alignment is found, the inside of your body relaxes and your whole body sinks into itself. Your legs feel like springs. Learn to soften your awareness into your body. Becoming present from your body.

Purpose:

To increase mindfulness of your body and the immersion of awareness within it. To develop the ability to meditate regardless of posture in order to transfer mindfulness meditation into daily life.

Benefits:

This training will align and strengthen your body keeping it healthy. It will also immerse awareness within your body so that you are able to carry mindful presence throughout the day. It removes the belief that meditation is about seated posture and develops the ability to carry a meditation posture of within the mind.

Summary:

In this meditation, it is time for you to develop full awareness of the transitions in-between physical postures in order to transfer meditation into your daily life. This is trained by observing the experience of the transitions of your body between lying, sitting, standing and walking you will develop a continuity of mindfulness within your seated meditation and daily life.

To develop mindfulness of movement it is helpful to move slowly and deliberately. Your attention should be placed on two things: remembering that you are moving and the flow of changing sensations within the movement. This is the key. The remembering itself is created by maintaining your mental meditation posture of curiosity, mindfulness, momentary concentration and awareness. 

Instruction:

Step 1: Mindfulness of Standing

Start meditating in a standing position, aligning your feet parallel with each other. Bring awareness to your body as it stands, developing sensitivity to the alignment of your body with gravity. Become aware of the full length of the expansion of your body with each in-breath and the deflation of your body with each out-breath.
Step 2: Mindfully move from Standing to Sitting

Mindfully transfer from standing meditation to seated meditation. Mentally feel the movement. Be mindfully of slowly adjusting your body as you prepare to sit in meditation.

Step 3: Seated Mindfulness of Breathing

Mindfully close over your eyelids and bring awareness to your whole body as it sits, warmth or coolness, points of touch. Start to notice the natural flow of breathing within your body. Be aware of each breath as it comes in, and as it goes out again.

Step 4: Mindfully move from Sitting to Standing Meditation

Slowly open your eyes and mindfully transfer from sitting meditation to standing meditation. Bring awareness to your body as it stands, developing sensitivity to the alignment of your body.

Investigation:

Play with movement between different postures by slightly pausing at the beginning and seeing if you can observe the intention / desire to move. Follow the intention and allow your body to move, notice how it does this by itself. Mentally feel the different sensations within each movement, their flow. Play with the speed of the movement until you find the balance between speed and awareness of the flow of the movement.

Purpose:

To develop your sensitivity to the individual elemental qualities that can be experienced within your body, heart and mind. To learn the skill of breaking conceptual experiences into elemental qualities in order to weaken the identification that leads to habitual defensive patterns of behaviour.

Benefits:

This mindfulness training develops the ability to separate pleasant and unpleasant feeling tone from the experience of emotions within your body, weakening identification and allowing you to decondition habitual defensive patterns through mindful softening.

Summary:

In this meditation, you intentionally develop sensitivity to the four elemental qualities of experience. Each elemental quality appears during meditation as a range of experience. Like a sliding scale of experience. Earth Element is experienced as a range of soft to hard, Fire Element as a range of cool to hot, Water Element as a range of dry to wet and Wind Element as a range of contraction to expansion (movement). 

These four elemental qualities are the building blocks of all experience appearing before perception and the proliferation of the mind. By developing sensitivity to these elemental qualities all experience breaks up and identification with experience ceases.

Instruction:

Step 1: Ground Awareness within Your Body

Sit down in your meditation posture and bring awareness to the experience of your body as it sits. Mentally feeling your whole body. Warmth, coolness, heaviness. Your whole body as one. Once your mind has settled, gradually relax awareness into your body.

 Step 2: Bring Your Awareness to Different Sensations

Intentionally bring awareness to each of the below qualities within your body and gently rub it against it. If any of these elemental qualities are not currently present, that is ok. Just experience what is present to you. 

See if you can experience warmth as a general feeling within your body, then observe coolness if it is present. Bring awareness to the touch of your hands and experience pressure. To the touch of your buttocks / legs and experience hardness then softness. Bring awareness to your mouth to experience wetness and lips for dryness.  

Finally, open to your breathing to experience movement as it flows within your body. Observe what other sensations you can experience within your natural breathing. To train your focus it is helpful to use a simple silent, mental label such as “soft, soft”, “hard, hard” etc, gently rubbing your awareness on the actual experience.

How Often?

Practice daily for 1 week by bringing your awareness to the experience of your whole body as it sits. Bring one elemental quality to mind at a time and intentionally bring your awareness to it if you notice it within your body. If an elemental quality is not obvious to you do not go searching for it but rather observe what is present to you.

Investigation:

Be playful with these elements and where you experience them. See if you can observe where two elemental qualities are close together like soft & hard or warm & cool. Are they stationary or is there a flowing changing border? Is your body the only place that these elemental qualities can be experienced? Can they be found within emotions? Can elements be found with different states of mind such as frustration, boredom, irritation, love, empathy etc. 

Purpose:

To clarify the experience of the individual elements. To increase sensitivity to the individual elemental qualities of the body and mind. To see through the layers of mind created perception and to develop understanding of how our reality is created.

Benefits:

This mindfulness training weakens the minds identification with the experience of our body, feelings and mind. It also weakens the minds habitual entanglement with emotions and develops wisdom.

Summary:

In this meditation, you further develop your perception of the four elemental qualities within your body. As this perception strengthens you then intentionally bring your awareness to the borders of your body and the world around you. Such as one of your hands touching the other, or your body pressing against the chair or floor as you sit.

As you focus on the elemental qualities at these points of touch, the mind created borders of perception start to dissolve, and you can experience reality free from separation. It is important to play with this and be creative by bringing your awareness to specific points of contact between your body and something else. An example would be to focus on the experience of pressure or hardness as your body touches the floor, rather than the idea of sitting on the floor.

 Instruction:

Step 1: Ground Awareness within Your Body

Sit down in your meditation posture and bring awareness to the experience of your body as it sits. Mentally feeling your whole body. Warmth, coolness, heaviness. Your whole body as one. Once your mind has settled, gradually relax awareness into your body.

Step 2: Bring Your Awareness to Different Sensations

Intentionally bring awareness to each of the below qualities within your body and gently rub it against it. If any of these elemental qualities are not currently present, that is ok. Just experience what is present to you. 

Step 3: Bring Awareness to the Borders Between Things

Move awareness towards borders of your body and very closely experience the individual elemental qualities that are present. Notice that when you do this, the border of your body and the experience of what it is touching starts to fade. Observe the illusionary nature of perceptions, over-layed by your mind, and notice how they find a foundation on the four elemental qualities.

How Often?

Practice daily for 1 week by bringing your awareness to the experience of your whole body as it sits. Bring one elemental quality to mind at a time and intentionally bring your awareness to it if you notice it within your body. If an elemental quality is not obvious to you do not go searching for it but rather observe what is present to you. 

Investigation:

Be playful with these elements and where you experience them. See if you can observe the border between things like your hands as they touch each other. The pressure of your buttocks against the chair or the floor. The touch of your feet.

Be curious about the solidity of the feeling of borders around your body. Notice that when they are observed they come and go. Take interest in what happens if you try to feel the chair or the floor beneath you. Notice how real and solid the separation of your body if you focus in on the sensations of touch the borders will fade.