Meditation Can Mean Anything Under the Sun

What is meditation?

There are so many and various explanations of this word that it is astounding. Meditation has been described as pondering something, letting imagination guide, watching thoughts, trying to stop the flow of thoughts, mindfulness: meaning the thinking keeping its focus on what it is labeling, prayer, contemplation, moving the body, sensing the body, connecting with angels and spirits, channeling, meta, sending love into the world, connection, gratitude, ho'oponopono, and so much more.

I think we can agree if one says they teach or practice meditation that that could mean just about anything.

At the Awareness School, we teach a class called Practical Awareness 8 week live course in order to learn the subtleties of coming awake from our waking sleep, the power of presence in the now, meditation that supports that and how it leads to our ability to see ourselves more objectively without attachment.

We first make sure that all participants are not blindly following, but verifying what we are talking about through their own experience. If we claim that most everyone is asleep in a way that we generally do not want to admit or believe, they must verify that when they wake up, as well as look at what caused them to wake up, and of what did it consist?

In the type of meditation we teach, there is an emphasis on learning to maintain awareness on the body, the feelings and the thoughts to create integration. We maintain a level of attention that creates the discipline of stillness and self-observation. Only then can we actually see the many I’s within us which have so many preferences, beliefs, likes and dislikes. We cannot do that with the thinking mind which often tricks us into thinking that we are aware just because we can go about our day and do many many meaningful things; things that we think are good and not bad. We cannot see with the very brain that created attachments and false belief systems that create good and bad in the first place.

Our level of attachment to what we think is right and good is the result of being completely asleep, and we can be looking pretty successful, thoughtful, meaningful, etc. in this kind of sleep.

To become awake at any second, we can notice our conditioning, our mechanical reacting self, our sense of identity built on false constructs.

Through meditation, we develop the kind of attention in stillness needed to abide in these particular behaviors in order to see them from a new perspective. We cannot expect to just be able to do it. It starts to happen when we develop and nurture coming awake in presence and observing something within ourselves. This is a very difficult thing to do.

Unfortunately, many think they can already do this without the discipline of meditation and attention, and they then miss the boat altogether. The misfortune of this situation is that they think they are awake and see things about themselves yet life does not change. They find themselves learning the same lessons over and over. They do not have choice in matters and find themselves isolated, unable to connect, full of fear, and having dysfunctional relationships. 

The foundation of transformation is to see in these new ways, allowing us to maintain a refined level of energy that then allows us to wake up and see even more. To be blessed with these new kinds of impressions opens doors to consciousness. 

That word consciousness does not mean our ability to know or think about something. Moments of presence feed the thing in us that lives in Presence. Our thoughts and opinions are not from presence. Our preferences and traumas cannot live in Presence. Presence is rare and it develops consciousness.

With that developed consciousness, we feed our Essence, that which is deeply connected to Spirit and the natural life around us. We are better able to empathize because we have empathized with our own plight. We see our plight in others. We have better boundaries. We see the interconnectedness of all things.

This is the baseline for living a life with choice and connection; free from dysfunction.

So meditation in our school means to practice awareness, to be awake, and aware that that is true. We have exercises to develop stillness and separation from thought. We have exercises that develop a magnetic center to collect energies available when we are awake. We have practices to do out in life to notice when we wake up and what that consists of and what to do next.

Those practices begin to open doors that we may never have thought possible.

The first few sentences on the Awareness School home page reflect the aim of developing this type of awareness:

“Through courses, weekly meetings, and retreats, we offer specific conditions for students to learn self-observation; a state of presence that can recognize conditioned behavior and attachment to belief.

We do not use reprogramming, conjuring of emotional states, or the like. Our aim is to help people discover their true essence. From there, they become the architects of their own destiny, instead of victims of fate, and thus can contribute to the transformation and reciprocal maintenance of the planet.”

At this point, there have been hundreds of people who have passed through the doors of this school, getting a taste of the preciousness of life and their part in it. They come to know something other than separation. Once there’s a taste for that, it is always alive and welcomed within themselves, even if they forget. In other words, something has been activated in them.

We hope you will join the upcoming Practical Awareness course to learn all about what it means to be present and why that is the baseline foundation for your transformation into living life fully and joyfully and without fear.