What’s the best position for meditating?

What’s the best position for meditating?

Concentrative, Contemplative, Meditation, Mindfulness, Spirit, Women & Gender

The full answer may be longer than you wanted. 

There are at least four different basic answers—and then there’s all the rest of it. 

One basic answer is, “Whatever position gives you the best signal that your mind has gone away from awareness-in-the-moment into either drifty mind or washing-machine mind,

A second is, “a classical cross-legged or chair position with a mudra of your choice.”

A third is, “Any position that you can physically manage and maintain for some time.”

A fourth is, “Any position in which you’re willing to meditate, in contrast to other supposedly correct positions that cause you to avoid meditating when you think about them.

Any one of these answers might be best for you. You can judge that for yourself after reading about each.  

The first answer contains the key insight that the mental effort required to stay aware of your posture in the present instant is itself a powerful aid to maintaining a focused meditative state. Sitting straight upright on either a cushion or chair, with your eyes focused slightly downward anywhere from about six feet ahead to the far horizon, and your hands forming a perfect (i.e. non-drooping) mudra is best of all if you can manage it. (Yes, that’s the second answer above.) Why? Because your mind will inevitably have a tendency to drift here or there, and if you’re sitting in such a position with the intention to maintain it, then as soon as you notice that you’re slumping just a bit, or that in your Zen mudra your thumbs are pointing downward rather than forming an egg than a round ball, or that your jnana mudra is similarly droopy, you can straighten up your back, reform your mudra, breathe deeply, and continue your classical meditative posture. Maintaining it requires mindful attention to keeping some of your mind in the present. 

If, of course, you’re doing an extended meditation—especially in a group—in which you’re supposed to remain motionless, after a time your body will be experiencing physical pain just from maintaining the fixed position and you will have no alternative but to be aware of your physical position and sensations.  When you see a picture of a group of people meditating, all sitting in the very same or almost the very same posture, that’s probably what’s happening. There’s a special kind of psycho-somatic learning that’s occurring just by maintaining that position. (In many meditation groups, after such a period of sitting there’s a period of walking meditation that gives your body a chance to move. 

With the second answer above, a full-lotus meditation is favored by some practitioners. That’s a cross-legged position with each leg crossed above the other and the soles facing upward. (See the link below.) Some yogis maintain the ability to sit full-lotus, or in even more demanding and in some cases amazing positions, into old age. Those who do usually sit (or in some cases stand) in such positions every day. When I was in my twenties and thirties I used to sit full lotus. Toward the end of my thirties a doctor told me, “There seems to be some evidence that full lotus is bad for your ankles, at least for some people.) After that I moved to a half-lotus position in which the legs are crossed only one is pulled up through the other. Less demanding yet is a simple cross-legged position. Your body will probably tell you which cross-legged position can work for you. 

In any position on the floor or ground it helps to raise your butt about four inches off the floor so that there’s a downward tilt from your butt to your knees. Every meditation center has cushions that do this. It’s best to sit on the forward edge of the cushion rather than in the middle of it. The downward slope makes it much easier to keep your spine straight and sit up straight. And it’s more comfortable than sitting flat on the floor or ground. Most pillows doubled once will do nicely as a substitute for a meditation cushion—but if you want the real thing you can find them in shops that have meditation accessories and online. When i’ve had neither cushion nor pillow, I’ve found that turning one clean sandal or shoe upside down, placing it on top of the other, and using the two as a cushion usually does the job. Outdoors you might find a small slope or bump somewhere nearby that’s about the right size to raise your butt enough for comfortable sitting and a straight spine, 

There is also kneeling meditation, kneeling with your legs together and back straight up. Many people who favor that position find that a cushion or pillow (or even a folded jacket or sweater) between butt and legs is useful. 

In meditation halls I sometimes noticed some of people sitting up straight in chairs rather than on the ground or a cushion in a cross-legged position. In most places there were a few chairs somewhere in the room, mostly occupied by elderly meditators. An older friend and I sometimes led workshops together and he always sat in a chair. “My knees just won’t go into a cross-legged position,” he said.  Now I’m older myself, with arthritis in my joints. At some point I moved from usually sitting cross-legged to preferring the chair. Still with a straight spine, looking slightly downward, keeping my mudra in its proper position, but my legs said “Thank you for not making us sit cross-legged on the ground any more.” My chair position is sometimes with my legs straight down and sometimes with them cross-legged beneath me on the chair.

All that involves sitting. Some years ago when I was doing a weekly class I asked the students to keep a meditation journal. To write down just a few sentences about what happened during their meditation period each day.  One young woman consistently wrote that she just didn’t feel called to sit up during her meditation but preferred to lie down. She did, however, keep one of the most detailed and best journals of her meditation experience, and said it was almost always valuable in helping her feel better. As you probably know, lying down tends to predispose people more toward a hypnogogic, dreamlike state and less toward a mindful, moment-by-moment awareness state. Her meditations were a kind of combination of both. And very interesting, especially in their contemplative excursions. That was what worked for her. It was a clear case of meditating in her own way or not at all. So that becomes my final statement. Lying down meditation is not a position I suggest, but better than none. There are, after all, statues of reclining Buddhas scattered all over Southeast Asia. And it just might be what you need at a given moment. Assess your needs and learn to trust yourself. 

If you want to meditate standing up, such as while waiting for a bus, I recommend a moving meditation rather than standing motionless. An online search for <standing moving meditations> will bring up a number of YouTube videos of such movement patterns. The ultimate expression of this is Tai Chi. 

When properly performed, hatha yoga is also a meditation. Attention to your breathing in a meditative manner while performing your asanas, and to fully experiencing the sensations of your body as you move and the rest of your field of awareness make your yoga session into a transformation in consciousness that’s quite different than it is if you go through the motions with an athletic mindset. This can be structured pranayama or simply bare attention as described just above, 

For photos of eight sitting meditation positions see Melissa Eisler’s <https://mindfulminutes.com/how-to-sit-for-meditation/>.

INDIA NAMES, CHINA COUNTS: OF MANTRAS AND COUNTING MEDITATIONS

INDIA NAMES, CHINA COUNTS: OF MANTRAS AND COUNTING MEDITATIONS

Concentrative, Cultures, Meditation, Mindfulness

INDIA NAMES, CHINA COUNTS: OF MANTRAS AND COUNTING MEDITATIONS

Most of the effective ways to meditate include some way to maintain a focus on your breathing. Why? Because it’s a way to stay aware of what you’re thinking, feeling, sensing, and/or doing rather than being completely identified with your action or experience. And that’s part of the essence of meditation—being aware, moment by moment, of what you’re doing rather than being completely caught up in it.

The two most popular ways to stay aware of your breathing—which in turn helps you stay aware of whatever else you’re doing—are mantras and breath counting. A mantra is most effectively used when silently repeated in rhythm with your breathing. For example, silently speaking the mantra on your inhalation and noticing whatever else you’re aware of during that in-breath and then emptying both the mantra and everything else out of your mind on the outbreath.

Breath counting is similar. Count one number on the in-breath and notice whatever else you’ve become aware of (thinking, feeling, sensing, and/or doing if you’re not sitting silently while you meditate. Then empty the number and everything else out of your mind on the outbreath.

There’s more to it than just described with both mantras and breath-counting, and we’ll come back to that “other” in just a minute. But first, an adventurous little journey to India and China. In India we find that people name the days and months just as in most of the West. “Sunday, Monday (think Moon Day), Tuesday,  . . . etc.”  Likewise with months of the year: January, February, etc.. Just like in the rest of the Indo-European language family.  Now let’s jump over to China. Those names are nowhere to be found! Instead the days and months are counted. The days of the week are called Day One, Day Two, Day Three—and so on. And the months? Well of course, they’re Month One, Month Two, Month Three—right on up to Month Twelve. (Could that constant counting in everyday conversation have something to do with why many Chinese seem to be so good at math? Or maybe it’s the other way around—that mathematical aptitude is why they count the days and months instead of naming them. All just guesses.

In Japan, just for the record, the days are named after elements rather than planets as in the West. Except Monday, which is the day of the moon there too. Tuesday is the day of fire, Wednesday of water, Thursday of wood, and Friday of—yes–gold! Saturday is the day of earth. As for the months—well, there it gets a little complicated. In modern Japanese they’re counted, just as in China. But in the old days they had names. Sometimes the old names are still used in poems and novels.

At this point your inquisitive mind probably wonders, “What about Southeast Asia, which is sort of between India and China?”

Moving your token to Thailand, you’ll find that the days of the week are named after astrological signs from India and Sanskrit. But in Vietnam, closer to China, they count them.

But if you really want everything turned on its head, in English we count the years but in China they have names for them. As the Japanese would say, “Ah, so!”

Now, back to the question, “What does all that have to do with meditation?”

The short answer is that breath counting is more popular in China and Japan while mantra meditation is more popular in India. Almost all are derived from the ancient Sanskrit language, which intriguingly enough has a far more extensive vocabulary for diverse personal qualities, states of consciousness, and “higher” states of consciousness than any contemporary language. (Does that suggest highly developed ancient civilizations, such as the “mythical” Atlantis and Lemuria? How else would such a language come into being?) A mantra has the advantage that anyone can learn it. And each mantra has some specific meaning that can influence a person’s attitude and outlook when repeated over and over again for a long period. If there’s a particular quality you want to develop, that feature of mantras can be useful. Some gurus and traditions assign mantras to those who come to them for meditation instruction—and in some cases, that’s your mantra forever! Other traditions allow people to choose their own mantra and to change it when they want to work on developing a new and different personal quality. Kooch N. Daniels and I offer a page of useful mantras in Matrix Meditations (available either in paperback or as an e-book.) If that’s not enough for you to choose from or you don’t want to shell out $13.99 for our amazing and wonderful book you can do an online search for “Sanskrit words” and you’ll find many different sites that offer such terms absolutely free! (but some—not all—will try to sell you all sorts of other things.)

It’s a little easier to maintain your mindful presence and with breath-counting than mantra meditation, but it doesn’t have the same feature of mentally reinforcing some particular quality. Nonetheless, some advanced yogic traditions in India, such as Kriya yoga, favor breath counting. There are beginning breath-counting methods that are almost as easy to do as mantra meditation and advanced methods that require great attentiveness and can develop a high degree of mental discipline. 

The one thing that the most effective mantra meditations and both beginning and advanced breath counting meditations have in common is a focus on breathing. Each adds something extra to the most basic breathing meditation of all, which is to do no more than notice and sense as you breathe in and breathe out. In that most basic practice, as soon as you realize that your mind has drifted off to thinking about something—anything—else, then just bring your attention back to noticing breathing in, breathing out, breathing in, breathing out, and no more.

What can be simpler? Or easier? Sound like child’s play, doesn’t it? Why bother with anything else?

Because actually it’s incredibly difficult to keep your attention focused on your breathing and nothing else. (If you don’t believe it, try it for two minutes right now. See?)  The washing machine of our mind craves to swish all the zillions of thoughts it contains back and forth and all around—and what was that about breathing? I forget. . . “

That’s why even a basic mantra or breath count with your breathing is useful. It gives you something to hang onto when the storm winds of your mind or emotions want to blow your attention away. More about each of them in exciting future blogs. 

How simple or how complex a practice suits you depends on the character of your own everyday ordinary waking consciousness. Some people who have a stoic temperament find that a fairly simple and basic practice is perfect for them. Others who have more of a “monkey mind” that tends to jump all over the place find that a more complex and demanding practice does a better job of helping them focus and stay present, paradoxical as that may sound. More –much more– about both simpler and more complex ways to meditate in other blogs. (Or get them all at one time in one place in the convenient, well organized, beautifully written book mentioned above. )

In the meantime, if you do nothing else, at least tune into your sensations of breathing in, breathing out, breathing in, breathing out —like a swinging door—when you have nothing else to do!

Ciao Bello. Or Ciao Bella, as the case may be.  Victor

MEDITATION III – Mindfulness or Witness Consciousness

MEDITATION III – Mindfulness or Witness Consciousness

Meditation, Mindfulness, Psychology, Spirit

“Mindfulness” has become a catch-word in some circles in recent years. Some of those who use the term understand it and some don’t. It’s a Buddhist term that is differs very little from the Yogic term “witness consciousness.” Both involve noticing, moment-by-moment, what your mind is doing.

Many who try to meditate with witness consciousness or mindfulness get stuck because they have overlooked the previous step, concentration. Only when you have the ability to notice your mind in action and focus it where you want to does real mindfulness actually become possible. Its essence is the ability to, in a sense, “stand behind” your mind and notice what it is doing. Most of us most of the time are caught up in our thoughts that are darting here and there like clothes that are caught up inside a washing machine, going this way and that as the washer spins or agitates them.  In other words, we are identified with our thoughts. As a result, we have little choice about what we think  and feel. Our thoughts run in old patterns, like an old fashioned record player’s needle stuck in the same old groove, replaying the same thought pattern over and over again. A problem with this is that we see and think only what we already think we know. When new information comes along, we tend to reject it, in order to be able to think that we were “right” all along. Sometimes it’s an ego thing to protect our self-esteem. Other times it’s just easier for our neural impulses to follow their usual paths (see the blog on Tolman’s cognitive maps.)

By contrast, with witness consciousness or mindfulness, at each moment we notice what our mind is doing (whether it is focused on a thought, feeling, physical sensation, or event outside ourselves, which includes other peoples’ actions, opinions, and attitudes). In a sense, I detail one small part of my mind to watch / listen to / witness / be mindful of / what the rest  is doing. (This is called “two-pointed attention” in the Zen tradition.)  When I am actually aware of what my mind is doing, I can choose whether to let it keep on doing that in the same way,  or examine it and what lies beneath it more deeply, or do something else. This is useful both when I am with myself and in conversations with others. The reason people often sit in a particular position without moving for a period of time while meditating is because that makes it easier to watch the mind. Watching it  (or if you prefer, listening to it) opens many windows on the world that I didn’t know were there.  It makes it possible to move from being a denier (of everything I didn’t already believe) to being an inquirer (who’s interested in finding out what’s actually going on, inside or outside himself or herself.

So just sit. Balance, then breathe, then release unneeded tension. Then count your breaths or recite your mantra until you feel as centered and focused as you sense that you’re likely to get right then. Then do nothing but observe and listen. You’ll probably want something like a flower or candle flame six feet or more in front of you to bring your attention back to when it drifts off. Notice what you think, feel, and sense.  When you notice your body drooping instead of sitting straight up, it’s a signal that you’re no longer witnessing or being mindful.  Regain your centered sitting position and bring your gaze back to the physical object in front of you (unless you’re using an eyes-closed meditative practice.)  If you do this for more than ten or fifteen minutes, your body may start to feel painful and uncomfortable. That’s good. It makes it hard to think about anything else. Just notice the pain — where and how you experience it. Continue in this way until the end of your session, “just noticing” everything that occurs inside you or outside you.   Then again count ten breaths as you did during the starting sequence, moving your eyes to a different object with each breath, as you make the transition back to everyday consciousness.

Once you become quite skilled at this, you may be able to do it in the midst of some of your everyday activities. Also, when you can do it fairly reliably, you will be ready to put your concentration and mindfulness or witness consciousness together and move into a contemplative meditation.  (If you try contemplative meditation without having first developed these abilities, your mind is likely to use all kinds of clever avoidance tactics when you feel uncomfortable.  Concentration and mindfulness give you a method to notice and release that avoidance.)

And remember two points. First, often it’s at least as more important to notice your emotions and physical sensations as your thoughts. Second, a runner in training will have days when everything seems easy and to go well and days when everything seems difficult. Meditation is the same way.  Whether a session seems “good” or “bad” is not important. Each moment of each session is just how it is. It’s all training. It’s all useful.

For much greater depth and detail about all this, our book Matrix Meditations 

Cover Image of Matrix Meditations

Matrix Meditations

 

Cognitive Maps and Edward Chace Tolman

Cognitive Maps and Edward Chace Tolman

Psychology

Who would have thought that studying white rats in mazes could really tell us much about human behavior? For decades in the mid-twentieth century it was all the rage, and a lot of that work turned out to be up blind alleys. But one of those investigators came to some keen insights.  Today, however, few even know his name. That’s rather odd, because in todays “cognitive behavioral psychology,” which is highly influential in the USA, we find the strange phenomenon that Edward Chace Tolman (1886-1959) is seldom mentioned, even though the whole cognitive-behavioral approach has been built largely on the foundation of his ideas. When the classical behaviorism of the mid-20th century ran out of new ideas, blending it with Tolman’s insights about cognition added a new dimension.

        Tolman said essentially, “rats think, just as people think.” But in his behaviorism-dominated era, he went on to say, “And to ensure that we are objective scientists, we will discover what and how they think by studying their observable behavior.”

         Rats and people, he said, live in worlds of paths and tools, obstacles and by-paths. In most matters both rats and people prefer short or easy means to a goal over long or difficult ones. And any description of goal-directed behavior is always about getting toward something or getting away from something. That includes what the person or rat is doing, what he, she, or it is trying to do, and where it is going.

But to me, none of that was as intriguing as his statement that rats, people, and other creatures form what he called cognitive maps of the physical and social environments within which they live, think, and navigate. A cognitive map describes the mental and physical routes a person takes, and what rewards and punishments exist along various physical or mental corridors. In retrospect, it’s obvious. Sitting here at my computer, there are some routes (sets of procedures to make the computer behave in specified ways) that I know very well, some that I sort of know, and many others that I don’t know at all. This desktop computer has the capacity  to do thousands of things that I don’t know how to tell it to do. It does only what falls within the compass of my cognitive map of it.

        In almost every area of life the same is true. We live within the confines of our cognitive maps (a concept that has much in common with what gestalt psychologist and field theorist Kurt Lewin called the “Life space.”)

       When the expectations that are defined by our cognitive maps are not fulfilled, we can get quite upset.  A psychologist named Tinklepaugh hid a piece of banana under a cup, allowing a monkey to see him do it.  At that point the monkey’s cognitive map included “there is banana under that cup.” But Tinklepaugh, the sly devil, secretly substituted a piece of lettuce, a less–preferred item. When the monkey lifted the cup and found the lettuce, it threw a tantrum.

       Human beings often do likewise. We expect things to be a certain way and blow our cool when they’re not.  I like to use the terms “inquirers” and “deniers”  for two different kinds of responses when something is not as we expect it to be. An inquirer responds to new evidence that shows that his or her belief or attitude about something is wrong by exploring other possibilities and trying to find out what’s really so.  A denier redoubles his or her attachment to the mistaken belief or attitude or habit and seeks to get others to confirm that the wrong is right.  That’s where a lot of our problems come from.

       “Very interesting,” you may say. “But what’s the practical payoff of all this?”

       Very simply, You can become an observer of  your own cognitive maps. Notice where your mind goes and what it does, and where and what it does not go and do. This is an kind everyday awareness practice that is related to meditation.  As you try it, you are likely to start making fewer dumb mistakes, and to more often act in ways that are helpful both to you and to others.  In a sense, this is ongoing mindfulness (Buddhist term) or witness consciousness (Yogic term) carried on in the midst of everyday life.

       And you can also begin to see other people’s cognitive maps.  A few questions can tell you a lot about where a person’s mental and emotional energy flows and where it doesn’t.

       As a result of seeing or hearing where your cognitive maps fit reality and where they don’t, you’ll see when and where and how you need to change them. This is important in our daily lives and our larger cultural narratives. If you don’t ever stand back and look at your own cognitive map, you probably end up imprisoned in the “dominant narrative” of your culture, which is the story that the power elite who controls much of what happens wants you to believe.

       If all this intrigues you and you’d like to know more about some very contemporary ancient history in psychology, read Tolman’s Behavior and Psychological Man. If you and want just  a little more, you can look at my old lecture notes on Tolman at:

An Introduction to Purposive Behaviorism

                  Doing any  of those three things will enlarge your own cognitive map at least a bit.

MEDITATION: THE ESSENCE II – Concentration & Focus

MEDITATION: THE ESSENCE II – Concentration & Focus

Concentrative, Meditation, Spirit


MEDITATION — THE ESSENCE

Basic Meditation Instructions, Part II

CONCENTRATIVE MEDITATION

Concentrative meditation develops your ability to know what you are doing with your attention at any given moment and to focus your attention (and often that of others with whom you are conversing) where you wish.  This ability has been shown to be useful in diverse areas of life.  It is also essential to witness consciousness or mindfulness meditation, which will be described in Part III. Two different forms are described here, and you can choose the one you prefer or use them both at different times.

Counting style.  Choose any object to focus your eyes on. As you did just above, count from one to ten.  This time silently count one number on each incoming breath, from one to ten. Then count the same number ten times on each outgoing breath.  Like this: 1-1, 2-1, 3-1, etc. up to 10-1.  Then take a single  breath in which you do not count.  Then count a second sequence of ten, like this:  1-2, 2-2, 3-2, etc. up to 10-2.  Another empty breath, then ten breaths with the number 3 on your exhalation, etc.  Ideally you will do this for 110 breaths, up to 10-10.  Then do ten more snapshot breaths to end your session.  Whenever you lose count, continue from the last pair of numbers you can remember clearly. If you don’t have time or don’t want to count up to 10-10, stop whenever you wish and end your session with ten snapshot breaths.

On each outbreath, notice all the chatter and images that have formed themselves in your mind and imagine them flowing out of you and away as you exhale, leaving your mind calmer and clearer. Whenever you notice that you have forgotten your counting or you are no longer looking at the object you chose for your visual focus, first notice where your mind has gone in case it’s to something important you need to remember (you might want to keep a pad and pen to jot down a word or two as a reminder when things occur to you.) Then gently move your mind back to your counting. Don’t try to keep things out of your mind – just bring your mind back to your counting, again and again if needed.

Mantra style.  Select a mantra that feels agreeable and useful to you.  You can find one by looking at the index at this link, or by doing a web search for “Sanskrit words” or “mantras.” Or even choose a word or phrase in your native language that refers to a quality you want to cultivate. Just as with the counting above, choose an object for your visual focus. On each inhalation, silently repeat your mantra to yourself.  On each exhalation, you can either (1) count the same number for ten numbers as described just above, and then move to a second number for the next set of ten breaths,  or (2) just repeat the mantra on your inhalation and let your mind go silent on the exhalation, allowing the thoughts that have formed themselves to flow away.  When you notice that you are no longer repeating your mantra, return your thoughts to it. DO NOT, however, use repetition of the mantra to try to “push” other thoughts, feelings, or sensations out of your mind. You could end up pushing out things you very much need to notice or hear. Just notice where your mind has gone, jot down a reminder of that if it’s important and you wish to, then bring your attention back to your mantra. Here too, ten snapshot breaths are a good way to end your session.

 OR, you can regard the starting sequence and a period of concentrative meditation as the first two stages of your sitting, and then go on to mindfulness / witness consciousness meditation or to a contemplative meditation.

Part I of this series of five mini-articles offered an introduction to what meditation can do for you and presented a useful meditation “starting sequence.”

Part II describes concentrative meditation.

Part III will describe witness consciousness (yogic term) and  mindfulness meditation (Buddhist term) and They overlap considerably but not totally.

 Part IV will describe contemplative meditation. (not yet posted)

 Part V will be on everyday awareness practices. (not yet posted)

All this is just “the essence.” If you’d like this and many advanced practices all in one handy place, you will enjoy Matrix Meditations, by Victor Daniels and Kooch N. Daniels. Click on the cover to go to the book’s home page. You can get the e-book for under $13.99, and used copies online for little more than postage. Of course, a brand-new  paperback copy (from your local bookstore or another online vendor) is a treasure. 

cover of Matrix Meditations

Matrix Meditations