Meditation

I go now sleep, when i wake up I tell you how i do selfhypnosis Toadstool :wink:

Jeff

I practise zazen. This is the basic zazen I started with:

Sitting in a half-lotus position, I focus on my breathing. Everytime I get carried away by my thoughts and notice it I get my focus back on breathing.

After you have practised this for a long time you can always focus on your breathing with full potential without being distracted by your thoughts, even if there were passive thinking.

The second “stage” of zazen practise is shikantaza, “just sitting”.

In this practise you literally just sit and let go of all (meaning you don’t focus on anything particular. This way you are aware of everything around you). You notice your thoughts but you don’t try to stop them; just don’t get attached to your thoughts. This way thinking stops naturally.

You sound like me. Sometimes I’m trying to sleep and I’ll suddenly start counting in my head (it’s like my mind is trying to annoy me) I try to stop but the moment you think of not doing something, well you know, it goes on and on…

“Yeah, I made it. I stopped thinking!” (that would be thinking :happy: how confusing )

I think that I think too much, or could it be that I just think to much? :hmmm:

This is a great topic. I’m into meditation. It’s great, I learn so much about myself and it’s the best thing for lucid dreaming. This topic reminded me that I otta do it more often, like everyday for at least a half hour. I also use a combination of meditation and self-hypnosis to induce lucid dreaming.

About 7 months ago, I chanted OM in a LD. Powerful vibrations sucked me to a deeper world. It was so intense.
Now I’m all motivated to meditate right now. I’m going to go lay down on the bedroom floor and concentre on my breath because thoughts ramble through me like beez in a hive.

:mrgreen_hat:
Lucid Dreams for All!!!

I hate to play the prophet of doom but I simply feel compelled to warn practitioners of rythmic breathing to be careful not to over do it. In other words , don’t practice it several times in a single day. Excessive rythmic breathing can cause inflammation of the lungs or pleurisy. Also, profound psychological complications can result as well. In some cases even insanity. The key here is to use moderation to play it safe. Take it slowly. A little practice each day will do the trick.

Miklos

I have not tried it. I think that Jeff and Dm7 were doing meditation and self hypnosis in a LD to enhance and prolong LD ‘s and even had something that was close to a near death experience. I think the topic was advanced lucid dreaming or something like that. I have not read the post in a while.

I know exactally what you mean

You could try using a guided meditation tape/CD at first. I would imagine there are probably free ones you can download. Or you could even make your own.

Meditating in my dream is way more efficency than it does in real life. I also use self-hypnosis to assist with trance.

By the way, it IS natural to breath rythmatically, only if you really know how to use it and use natural instinct with breathing. You cannot force it or it just gets all messed up.

I think I have posted a basic technique of self-hypnosis somewhere in LD4all forum, but it’s not related to meditating and self-hypnosis in order to induce a deeper trance though. Ah, I have found it…

Perhaps Jeff will describe the technique related to meditating. I guess we shall see. It’s getting late here and I’m tired from writing two “essays” today for LD4all forum. :smile: I’m not immortal you know.

Good luck!

For best results get a good book on self hypnosis. Then record the hypnotic routine you like bet to a tape. The book will also explain how to give yourself a suggestion that you can go into hypnosis by counting to 10 or what ever (there are several methods). You don’t have to use a tape(you can just memorize the routines yourself) but, you get faster results with the tape. After a week you should be able to put yourself into a deep trance without a tape. As for what kind of suggestions to give yourself Dm7 summed that up pretty well.

Good luck
Agent11421 said:

I have never heard of such a thing. I have practiced meditation (including rhythmic breathing) and self hypnosis for a long time with no ill effects. Where did you come by that piece of information?
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Milod-Allow me to answer that question. A few years ago I purchased an Eastern Orthodox book called “The way of a Pilgrim”, and in it he instructs the practitioner to breath in and out rythmically to the Jesus prayer. (A hesychast monk prayer of repitition.) That is when one says “Lord Jesus Christ”, (breath in), “Have mercy on me.” (Breath out. ) I practiced this rythmic breathing and shortly ended up with pleurisy and inflammation of my lungs for which I had to receive medical treatment.

Soon afterwards, I purchased the rare books of the Philokalia or the Dobrotolubiye which were written by the early desert Fathers around 300 A.D. in ancient Greek and later translated into Russian and English in 1954. These books are now out of print but I have the entire hard book collection.

In the instructions of the Philokalia, severe warnings are given to the novice practitioners of the dangers of rythmic breathing so much so that they warn of profound physical and psychological conditions which have led many to insanity.

This type of breathing in conjunction with mental prayer or christian meditation )acoording to them, not me), emanates strong psychic powers such as visions, levitation, walking on air, duality, ability to forsee future events and etc. These are not magical books but rather are Christian mystical books and writings.

The books also instruct in detail things such as what to eat, how much to eat, how much to sleep each night, how much time to spend alone, how much time to work, prayer and other things. This is a very cloistered group with very little contact with the outside world.

Please , one more word if I may. I mentioned that these books are now out of print. I am referring to the ENTIRE collection. There are however books containing excerpts from the Philokalia and speratic books such as Bishop Theophanes “The art and practice of prayer”, the summary of the early Desert Fathers, and others.

Here is a simple alert relaxation technique (a sort of meditation) you can use. It works well even for people who are not experienced in meditation. You can usually find similar exercises in any book or tape on relaxation or stress reduction. This will work well for anyone practicing WILD or MILD.

Step 1: lay in bed and get comfortable. Close your eyes. Gently take a long slow deep breath through your nose (you should feel your stomach rise not your lungs.) Count silently to 4 then gently and slowly exhale through your mouth. Do that 2-3 times. Now turn your attention to your right arm. Tighten your right arm and again inhale as above count to 4 and as you exhale release the tension in your right feel it relaxing. Do the same thing with your left arm. Then do the same with both arms and finally do the same thing with your hole body. (Your body may feel heavy and relaxed at this point and may even feel a little tingly)

Step 2: at this point you should ignore your breathing. Let your breath find it’s own pace naturally. Turn your attention to your toes imagine that a wave of blue mental energy is forming at your toes feel the energy relaxing all the muscles in your toes. Then the energy moving up to your ankles and now imagine your feet are relaxing. Now move the energy up to your shins, then thighs, abdomen, and chest. Then imagine the energy moving down your arms all the way to the tips of your fingers. Now imagine the energy will move back up your arms to your shoulders, then to your neck, and the top of your head, finally imagine that the energy is leaving the top of your head taking with it all your tension, fears and anxiety with it. Take a moment and enjoy the relaxation.
Now you should be very relaxed

From here you can use what ever technique you are practicing with MILD or WILD.
Going way back this was how I got some of my first WILD ‘s.

Agent11421

Interesting.

I just tried a short meditation. I sat and relaxed to few minutes and suddenly I saw a green square with a hole in the middle infront of my eyes (they where closed). I watched the square for maybe 10 seconds and when I opened my eyes everything looked greenish. I had to do a RC to be sure that I hadn’t WILDed. I tried relaxing again but no more green or squares.

/edited/ I was sitting and listening to music with my eyes closed and this time I saw something red that almost looked like a circle. But for some reason I couldn’t keep my eyes closed. It felt like they wanted to open up.

I still havn’t been able to achieve meditation.

I ofcourse won’t give up, and some excercises mystic has mentioned have helped me A LOT. I’de recommend them to anyonw who struggles to fight their thoughts.

Question: This question I have asked around everywhere and nobody ever answers… but nobody gives me a reason to the no answer either.
So if you don’t want to answer this, no problem, but can you tlel me why?
I want to know what it is LIKE to be meditating. Is it like having a lucid dream? better? worse? different in what way? What do you see/feel/ etc. ?

-stranger

My meditations have been mostly accidental. When I was younger and was sitting on a couch and watching tv without moving I would get into a sort of trance. It felt like I was being streached out and/or like I was almost flying. And I had this slight tingling all over my body. And if I moved even a little it would go away, so I could hold it for as long as I didn’t move. Otherwise I felt totally normal. I could think normally and so on.

gnofn.org/~aza/zazen.html

That’s a good instruction for zen meditation.

What does it feel like? Zen meditation is just being fully aware of everything and calming your thinking mind so you can see the world as it is, without your thoughts, ego and concepts. You don’t get to a “trance” state in this meditation, you just feel 100% focused and aware. To me it feels even better than a trance.

Practising zazen daily will eventually lead to some level of satori (“awakening”). Satori is experiencing and realizing your “buddha nature” as it is.

Dead: Thanks alot! I have already studied abit of Zen but that site is fantastic.

Thankyou also for your good description…I am going to try some meditation this coming week I hope for the best

Jarod: Thats pretty amazing. What do you believe you’ve achieved with meditation? How often do you do it?

-stranger