Quotes About Meditation

"When you practice in meditation, you come to give yourself to it, and there is a response because your Teachers come to give themselves and that is the touch. That is where you touch each other. I give to you, you give to me and we share our mutual giving."

Quotes About How to Meditate

"Do not think you can go off and meditate all day every day and find your purpose. You must go into the world and have it brought out of you."

"To prepare for stillness, you must practice a certain kind of meditation, you must have a teacher, you must have a method and you must have a community. These are what are necessary."

"In learning how to still the mind, you must have a focus, you must be in a quiet place, you must be sitting comfortably, and you must have a passive attitude. Four things are required here. Your passive attitude means you are not aggressively trying to make something happen, or to solve problems or to engage in other kinds of mental activities. You are just there in a relaxed manner. So to sit in meditation and experience nothing but agitation or frustration, clearly means you are not meeting the requirements of the situation. You have to be relaxed; you cannot be aggressive. You breathe deeply. Let your breath take you deeper. You have to have a focus for the mind: an image, a thought, an incantation, something that does not stimulate a lot of intellectual activity, something that the mind can anchor itself upon so you can slip beneath its surface into a well of silence. Within this well of silence, deep within it, is the power and the presence of Knowledge."

Misunderstandings about Meditation

"If you close your eyes in meditation and you say, 'I want to have contact with the Teachers. I want to have this question answered. I want to have certainty about this issue. I want to have a high experience.... I want, I want, I want,' then of course you don't find anything. So, there is disappointment immediately and then you say, 'Well, maybe if I give up all wants, I will get what I want,' and so it goes on and on.... People often think in meditation that there are all of these realms and levels and all that sort of thing, but you know there is only relationship there. Whatever experience you have, it is because you are joining your mind with another mind in some way. Realms and all that do not matter. Relationship matters; intimacy matters. This is what generates Knowledge."

Quotes About Meditation

“You have not come here to live a normal life under quiescent circumstances. You have not come here to retire, to go into repose or to live a life of quiet meditation. You have come to serve a world whose needs are immense and pressing and whose time has come for a greater encounter with life beyond its borders.”

“Fundamentally, spiritual practice is about bringing your surface mind—your social person mind, the mind that has been formed and created by your social conditioning, by your family, and by your experiences in the world—to bring this mind into contact with the power and the presence of Knowledge within yourself.”

“Why is stillness of mind essential? Its rewards are quite apparent if you think about it. A still mind is a focused mind. It is a mind that is using all of its resources. It is concentrated upon one thing. It is without the vexation of little distractions. You are able to concentrate your greater strength of mind on one area, and this gives you much more profound insight than you would normally have. Because your mind is quiet, you are not trying to give the situation answers or explanations, so you are able to witness things as they truly exist. Simple enough, but very profound.”

“You will be amazed at what taking ten or fifteen minutes a day in silence and inner listening will do for your life, relieving you of stress, allowing your insights to catch up with you, responding to deeper things within yourself. At first, you will need it just to rest, just to recover from the overwhelming stress of the life around you. But beyond this, it begins to open a set of doors within yourself, each revealing something else. If you can practice patiently, not expecting results every day, not expecting miracles, then you begin to build your skills, and you also build your intention, your ability and your confidence. It is like learning anything else of real value.”

“In time you will realize that everything you do is a practice and a reinforcement, that everything you think is a practice and a reinforcement, that you are practicing and reinforcing all the time, whether you are aware of it or not. So here you choose to practice what really needs to be practiced, to utilize the gifts of Knowledge and the great revelations that have been given throughout time, and the great Revelation that is now being given to humanity through a New Message from God.”

“Do not enter meditation with demands and requests. Enter meditation to give yourself to it. It is the temple of the True Spirit within you to which you bring yourself. In your practice periods, then, be present and be still. Allow yourself to bathe in the luxury of emptiness. For the presence of God is first experienced as emptiness because it lacks movement, and then within this emptiness, you begin to feel the Presence that permeates all things and gives all meaning in life.”

“In your deeper meditation practices, once again receive the freedom that comes to you in stillness and receptivity. A mind that is still is a mind that is unfettered and free. It will naturally expand itself, and within this expansion it will naturally express that which is most natural to it. Thus, in your deeper meditations you practice receiving, and in your hourly practices you practice giving.”

“This state of quiet is immensely refreshing. It is refreshing to the mind. That is why you sleep at night – to refresh and to rest your mind. It is refreshing to the mind. It is not about getting things. It is not about shopping and buying. It is not like your constant pursuit at the surface, trying to have things and driven by the fear of not having. Here you are just floating, free from the aggravation, the stress and the turbulence of life at the surface. Now you are going deeper in the ocean of consciousness where things are much more still. Life may be raging at the surface but you are living now in a moment of stillness. Keeping your focus on your word, your sound or your image, you are able to hold this. Your senses begin to open. Your ears begin to open. And as you become used to this state and are able to achieve it more frequently, then you begin to feel there is a deeper consciousness and a deeper conscience within you, that what seemed like emptiness is actually a deeper awareness.”

See also

Stillness

The Mind

Steps to Knowledge

Steps to Knowledge Spiritual Practice Program

Further Study

Steps to Knowledge Spiritual Practice Program

The Night Meditation

The Sacred Life

Greater Community Spirituality: How is Wisdom Achieved in Life?

Greater Community Spirituality: How do You Prepare?

Deepening Your Spiritual Practice (November 1, 2008)