How Is Instinctive Meditation Different From Other Approaches?

You don’t have to sit still.

Nothing in this universe is ever still. Physics teaches us that everything in the universe exists as a wave: light, sound, atoms that make our body. Don’t force yourself to sit still - move if you need to. Be refreshed by the flow of energy (pranashakti) in your body.

You don’t have to make your mind blank. Or quiet your mind. Or get rid of your thoughts.

Your mind is a mystery, a brilliant network of billions of neurons working together seamlessly to allow you to experience life.

In meditation, we can allow our mind to expand into the vastness of the universe. Melt into the space where all thoughts come from. Learn to be so immersed in meditation that thoughts fade away on their own.

Do I need to be detached to meditate?

No. Detachment can be harmful for people with families, jobs, lives.

Instead, meditation can lead you to discovering that everything in the world is connected. Meditation gives you the state of fullness, where you feel in touch with your Soul and the Soul of the world. Meditation is about connection.

Do I need to suppress or kill my ego?

“Ego” is the sense of “I am”, the sense of individuality. There is no need to kill your individuality in order to meditate. Celebrate your unique self. Dare to be your unique self. Let your meditation match who you are.

No need to sit cross-legged either.

Very few people can sit cross-legged for prolonged periods of time. The rest damage their knees. Be kind to your body. Give yourself the freedom to choose the position that allows you to be comfortable and give into rest and release.

Do I Have to Make My Mind Blank?

No, nor do you have to "empty your mind." This is a myth. There are moments of inner quiet, but thinking is a major part of meditation. You ride thoughts like surfers ride waves. The more you accept all thoughts, the more inner repose you will get.

Because the brain does a lot of sorting and housecleaning during meditation, it is often tremendously busy. The more your mind wanders during meditation, the more able it is to pay attention after meditation, because it has done its tuning-up.

Also, since you are relaxed during meditation, you learn to stay relaxed while thinking of things in your life that used to make you tense. You should expect your mind to be noisy part of the time in meditation. You won’t care very much, though, because you will still be very relaxed. After meditation is when your mind will be quieter. And because your mind is quieter, those little thoughts you need to know can catch up with you. Your intuition, your gut feelings, your strategic overview, your hunches will emerge with greater clarity.

Take your time to get used to meditation gradually. Doing even the simplest of techniques, the body goes into a deep state of rest. According to 30 years of research at Harvard Medical School, during meditation the body tends to enter a state of restfulness much deeper than deep sleep. During meditation this often happens in about 5 minutes, whereas during sleep the body gradually gets more and more restful over the course of hours.

What Will Happen When I Meditate?

The main thing you will experience is rhythm, the continuous ebb and flow of many intersecting rhythms, because that is what life is. Your body and mind are composed of complex symphonies of rhythms.

The sensuous texture of meditation is infinitely varied: there are all kinds of subtle sensations, internal imagery, and sound effects. Experience changes moment-to-moment and is always sort of a surprise, like a good movie. One moment you will be in the bliss of an inner vacation, then suddenly you will be thinking of your laundry list. You will never have exactly the same experience twice.

In general, your experience will probably move among the following:

• Relaxation and relief.

• Sorting through thoughts about your daily life.

• Reviewing the emotions you felt during the day and giving them a chance to resolve.

• Brief moments of deep quiet and inner peace.

• Near-sleep and dreamlike images.

• Healing: reexperiencing and then letting go of old hurts.

• Tuning up: your nervous system fine-tuning itself to the optimal level of alertness.

Every thirty seconds or so, you will probably find your body shifting from one to another of these moods or modes.

You may feel relaxed during all these phases, but the aim of meditation is not relaxation. Meditation is an evolutionary instinct that works to make you more alert and capable of adapting after meditation.

Excerpt from Meditation Made Easy book by Dr. Lorin Roche.

Do I Have to Sit Still?

What’s stillness got to do with it? Move all you want in meditation. You only sit still in meditation to better follow the movement of life. It is a natural repose, not something forced.

When you are deeply absorbed in something—conversing, reading a book, listening to a piece of music—you will sometimes be very still. You become poised in order to better follow the flow of the conversation, the arc of the plot in the story, or the movement of the music. That is the way to be in meditation as well. So stillness of posture happens spontaneously; it is not something you focus on or make a rule out of.

Life is movement, an infinite dance on every level—atoms move and vibrate, cells undulate, blood pulses, breath flows, electrochemical impulses charge through your nerve pathways. If you are sitting while reading this book, your postural muscles are making lots of tiny little corrections to keep you upright, and the muscles in the diaphragm and ribs are moving with the gentle rhythm of respiration. Each of these little movements is part of the meditation experience.

The dance of life changes its pace according to whether we are walking, sitting very still, or lying down, but there is always a dance, always the hum and undulation of life.

Excerpt from Meditation Made Easy book by Dr. Lorin Roche.

When Should I Meditate?

You can meditate when you want to, or when you decide you should, or whenever you can sneak it in. It is up to you. The basic principle is to meditate before periods of activity, so that your ability to work and play and socialize can be enhanced by the relaxed alertness in which you are learning to function. The standard approach is to meditate soon after arising in the morning and then again before the evening meal. This works well for a lot of people, and it creates a beautiful feeling of rhythm to a day.

Other options are to meditate once a day in the afternoon or to have several mini-meditations throughout the day. If you meditate before sleep, keep it short and select meditations that are soothing.

Excerpt from Meditation Made Easy book by Dr. Lorin Roche.

How Long Should My Meditation Session Last?

Start with five minutes in the morning or in the evening. If that does not seem like enough time, then meditate for five minutes in the morning and again for five minutes in the evening. Later, when that does not seem like enough, increase your time little by little.

For the first month, the most important thing is to develop a sense of being at ease with yourself and having a good time. In the beginning, meditate less than you want to, so that you are always looking forward to the next session.

After a month, if ten minutes seems too short, then you can let yourself go a little longer. But do not meditate more than twenty minutes in the morning and in the evening until you have been at it for several years. It takes a long time to get used to being relaxed while in action, which is one of the main effects of meditation. There is a lot to learn about handling relaxation.

If you are really busy, even a few minutes of meditation is beneficial.

Excerpt from Meditation Made Easy book by Dr. Lorin Roche.

Where Did Meditation Come From?

Meditation was probably discovered independently by hunters, singers, dancers, drummers, lovers and hermits, each in their own way. People tend to encounter meditative states whenever they throw themselves with total intensity into life’s callings. The knowledge of how to intentionally cultivate meditative states is a kind of craft knowledge -- those handy tips people pass on to each other. Meditation does not come from India or Tibet -- those are just places the knowledge rested for awhile, and the hermits in those wrote it all down. Bless them.

Human beings have been using tools for hundreds of thousands of years, according to the archaeologists. I consider it very likely they have been using sophisticated mental tools for tens of thousands of years.

Hunters, for example, sometimes have to make themselves still for hours. They have to merge with the forest and not even think, lest they scare the prey away. Then they leap into action with total precision at a moment’s notice -- that’s Zen in a nutshell. Hunters teach each other these skills, through verbal instruction and example.

Singers and dancers often enter meditative states through their passionate expression. Singers work with breath awareness in ways far more sophisticated than yoga. Lovers are often in a state of heightened appreciation which borders closely on meditation. Hermits are the ones we have heard the most from, because they kept the best notes. That is why we always think of yogis and bearded guys in the Himalayas when we think of meditation. But their way is only one small subset of the many different gateways into meditation.

Meditation comes from the human heart and is a way of warming your hands and your life at the fire always pulsing there in your core. It comes from the depths of your instinctive wisdom. Human beings are always wondering and inquiring, and meditation is a natural emergence of that adventure.

On the other hand, cats obviously meditate. That’s what it looks like to me, anyway. So it may be a genetically encoded, instinctive talent in mammals. Cats don’t need to be taught to meditate, but humans need a little coaching.

Excerpt from Meditation Made Easy book by Dr. Lorin Roche.