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Actually, quiet often I do need help sitting quietly - but that's a tangent I'd rather not get into right now. While meditation is incredibly simple, it is far

Actually, quiet often I do need help sitting quietly - but that's a tangent I'd rather not get into right now. While meditation is incredibly simple, it is far, far more difficult than just sitting quietly. Meditation is observing and (hopefully gently) directing your mental focus. Try it sometime for 10-20 minutes. Sit down someplace quiet, close your eyes, and choose some very simple thought to focus on. Try to keep your mind from flailing about. It's incredibly difficult. There's absolutely no way I could make it through a 10 day exercise like this without guidance. Some people do this for specific purposes such as working out a problem that they're having, or just promoting attentiveness, and sometimes it's just a matter of exercising general discipline so that other discipline will follow outside of meditation. In support of my original comment, this is the easiest place I've found to apply the lens of metaphor. People will talk about meditation in terms of energy, vibrations, and flow. If you just think of these terms in the context of focus - the intensity, oscillation, and well, flow of focus, it gets a lot easier to accept. Edit: To answer your "what types of guidance" question directly, there are all kinds of non leading guidance to be given. Simple examples include "sit someplace comfortable," and "don't feel guilty should your mind start to wander."

fusiongyro 13y ago
I'm not saying it's easy. I'm saying nobody can really help you.
- bloodorange 13y ago
  After reading about meditation recently, I felt inspired and have been trying to meditate for 10 minutes every night before bed. I started this around a week ago. In the last two days I have begun to wonder if I should find a good teacher. I find it _insanely_ hard to hold my focus for that ten minute period. However much I try, I often catch myself thinking about something else - without realising how I got onto that train of thought. I then try to steer my mind back. The other thing I noticed is that I don't know if I made any progress at all over the last week. I don't know if I am trying the right things or whether just sticking to this will some day bring about an improvement. This makes me feel that though no one can be _made_ to learn anything, a good teacher can definitely make one learn faster (and in some cases learn what one may otherwise be unable to figure out by oneself).
  - vidarh 13y ago
    Stick with it. A week is nothing. And try this series of audio recordings which include short guided meditation periods: http://www.audiodharma.org/series/1/talk/1762/ http://www.audiodharma.org/series/1/talk/1762/ (Gil Fronsdal, Introduction to Meditation) They're a good secular introduction to mindfulness meditation. (Gil Fronsdal is a buddhist, but in this series he takes great care to avoid mixing the religious aspects with the meditation teaching, to the extent of jokingly referring to the "b-word") I've also mentioned "Mindfulness in Plain English" elsewhere: http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma4/mpe.html http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma4/mpe.html Both of them address the problems you mention. And actually they're not so much problems as your perception of them are - you get better by practising observing and guiding your attention back to your breath (or whatever other object of focus you choose), and you get that practice by constantly losing focus. Some people will experience it getting much worse after a while, even. After a few weeks I went through a period where I'd get really intense "monkey mind". That is, I'd sit down to meditate, and my mind would go completely crazy. All kinds of things would pop into my head, including totally ridiculous and pointless concerns, and concentration was impossible. Then I had a period where I'd get an intense feeling that I hadn't set my alarm (I was meditating before I had to leave for work, and this feeling indicated that I was running late, and needed to look at the watch immediately). If I looked at my watch, the feeling would still reassert itself a few minutes later. I had to look at my watch several times, and confirm and reconfirm that the alarm was set and the countdown running before I started meditating to weaken the feeling, and then still spent weeks overcoming the desire to look at my watch before it finally subsided. But it all passed, and while I don't meditate as often as I like to, it's gotten a lot easier with time. That is not to say it is easy, and as with pretty much everything else, you can always push further into more advanced practices. But you get to a stage where you feel that you are actually meditating rather than fighting off total chaos in your mind, and that makes it a lot easier to want to sit regularly. Note that I'm not saying you shouldn't find a teacher. By all means. But you can make a good start by yourself, and you can find a lot of good (and free) guidance online as a starting point.
    - bloodorange 13y ago
      Thank you! I feel encouraged to persevere.
- hosh 13y ago
  That belief that it is difficult or that you need help are themselves arising objects. It is helpful to get help -- someone holding space for you can be very helpful -- but ultimately, this is between you and you.
  - fusiongyro 13y ago
    I wasn't saying it was hard either. I was saying it's idiotic to say "it's awfully noisy in my head when I try to meditate, can you quiet it down for me?" If you really think that, then I suggest you've wasted a lot of time pointing at things and calling them arising objects and wasted very little time meditating.
hosh 13y ago
To answer your question: I have done it for 10-20 minutes. I have done it for 30 minutes. And 40. And 45. And 1 hour and half. It is difficult every time. No one said this is easy. Over time, I have learned to be able to observe the ... discomfort and "difficulty" as an arising object, and allow that to pass by. I started from having extreme difficulty sitting for 1 minute. As for "easier to accept" -- that is not acceptance. Acceptance is acceptance. There is no easy or hard about it. Thinking that something is "easier to accept" is a subtle form of aversion. Finally, what you talk about with "focus" and "flow of focus" -- that is concentration, that is samadhi. Vipassana is insight, and while it uses a minimum level of concentration, you're not trying to hold a particular focus. You're observing the fundamental nature of reality.

fusiongyro 13y ago

I'm not saying it's easy. I'm saying nobody can really help you.

bloodorange 13y ago
After reading about meditation recently, I felt inspired and have been trying to meditate for 10 minutes every night before bed. I started this around a week ago. In the last two days I have begun to wonder if I should find a good teacher. I find it _insanely_ hard to hold my focus for that ten minute period. However much I try, I often catch myself thinking about something else - without realising how I got onto that train of thought. I then try to steer my mind back. The other thing I noticed is that I don't know if I made any progress at all over the last week. I don't know if I am trying the right things or whether just sticking to this will some day bring about an improvement. This makes me feel that though no one can be _made_ to learn anything, a good teacher can definitely make one learn faster (and in some cases learn what one may otherwise be unable to figure out by oneself).
- vidarh 13y ago
  Stick with it. A week is nothing. And try this series of audio recordings which include short guided meditation periods: http://www.audiodharma.org/series/1/talk/1762/ http://www.audiodharma.org/series/1/talk/1762/ (Gil Fronsdal, Introduction to Meditation) They're a good secular introduction to mindfulness meditation. (Gil Fronsdal is a buddhist, but in this series he takes great care to avoid mixing the religious aspects with the meditation teaching, to the extent of jokingly referring to the "b-word") I've also mentioned "Mindfulness in Plain English" elsewhere: http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma4/mpe.html http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma4/mpe.html Both of them address the problems you mention. And actually they're not so much problems as your perception of them are - you get better by practising observing and guiding your attention back to your breath (or whatever other object of focus you choose), and you get that practice by constantly losing focus. Some people will experience it getting much worse after a while, even. After a few weeks I went through a period where I'd get really intense "monkey mind". That is, I'd sit down to meditate, and my mind would go completely crazy. All kinds of things would pop into my head, including totally ridiculous and pointless concerns, and concentration was impossible. Then I had a period where I'd get an intense feeling that I hadn't set my alarm (I was meditating before I had to leave for work, and this feeling indicated that I was running late, and needed to look at the watch immediately). If I looked at my watch, the feeling would still reassert itself a few minutes later. I had to look at my watch several times, and confirm and reconfirm that the alarm was set and the countdown running before I started meditating to weaken the feeling, and then still spent weeks overcoming the desire to look at my watch before it finally subsided. But it all passed, and while I don't meditate as often as I like to, it's gotten a lot easier with time. That is not to say it is easy, and as with pretty much everything else, you can always push further into more advanced practices. But you get to a stage where you feel that you are actually meditating rather than fighting off total chaos in your mind, and that makes it a lot easier to want to sit regularly. Note that I'm not saying you shouldn't find a teacher. By all means. But you can make a good start by yourself, and you can find a lot of good (and free) guidance online as a starting point.
  - bloodorange 13y ago
    Thank you! I feel encouraged to persevere.
hosh 13y ago
That belief that it is difficult or that you need help are themselves arising objects. It is helpful to get help -- someone holding space for you can be very helpful -- but ultimately, this is between you and you.
- fusiongyro 13y ago
  I wasn't saying it was hard either. I was saying it's idiotic to say "it's awfully noisy in my head when I try to meditate, can you quiet it down for me?" If you really think that, then I suggest you've wasted a lot of time pointing at things and calling them arising objects and wasted very little time meditating.

hosh 13y ago

To answer your question: I have done it for 10-20 minutes. I have done it for 30 minutes. And 40. And 45. And 1 hour and half. It is difficult every time. No one said this is easy. Over time, I have learned to be able to observe the ... discomfort and "difficulty" as an arising object, and allow that to pass by. I started from having extreme difficulty sitting for 1 minute. As for "easier to accept" -- that is not acceptance. Acceptance is acceptance. There is no easy or hard about it. Thinking that something is "easier to accept" is a subtle form of aversion. Finally, what you talk about with "focus" and "flow of focus" -- that is concentration, that is samadhi. Vipassana is insight, and while it uses a minimum level of concentration, you're not trying to hold a particular focus. You're observing the fundamental nature of reality.