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Mind Centered Meditations
Meditation has been used for centuries for relaxation purposes. It is the intentional practice of focusing your mind on one thing at a time. It is not so much that object that matters but learning to focus and concentrate that is the goal. Over time you are feel more calm, capable of making new choices, and less likely to be reactionary and engage in negative behaviors. Meditation has been proven to treat many physical and emotional problems and is considered one of the most effective stratagems for a happy life. You can use meditation to dwell on truth, reorient yourself, gain new perspective, slow-down and relax.
Below are some very different types of meditations originating from various world views from Christianity, to Hinduism, to New Age.
Preparation
To prepare for meditation, find a comfortable sitting position. Most meditations are best done sitting on the floor or ground in lotus, Japanese, or tailor positions, but you may sit in a chair or lay down for some meditations. Don’t cross your arms but have them down by your sides, or resting gently on your lap. You may want to calm your body down by doing some diaphragmatic breathing. See breathing exercises.
Biblical Meditation
Chakra Meditation
Mantra Meditation
Self-Hypnosis
Visualization
Biblical Meditation
Many times in the Bible we are commanded “selah” meaning meditate on these things. Dwell on them and let the truth permeate into your soul. We are commanded to meditate on biblical truths and to meditate on the character of God. The following is a very basic scripture meditation.
Choose a passage from scripture to read. Open your heart and ask God to reveal truth to you. Thank God for giving his word to you. Try to clear your mind from any preconceived notions about what this passage means. Because scripture is living word, what truth speaks to you may change each time you read it.
Read the passage quietly to yourself. Read the passage again out loud. Hear with your ears and your heart.
Whatever thoughts, feelings and meanings come up, let them arise organically and unforced. Consider them without self judgment. What truths about God’s character are being revealed in this passage? What truths about human nature are being revealed? What truths about you are being revealed? Let your mind explore these truths. How do you feel about these truths? Explore why you feel this way. Do you agree or disagree with these truths? Why or why not? Know that God’s truths are always good and always for your good. You may not always agree with God, and it may not be easy to accept some truth, but don’t deny the truth.
Summarize these truths into the simplest forms you can put them into one sentence.
Repeat these truths to yourself. Repeating the truth will help you develop patterns of true thinking.
Write these truths down. Ask God for understanding. Ask God to help you accept the truths that are hard. Thank God for what he has revealed to you.
Chakra Meditation
Originating in Hinduism, Chakras are energy pools where you can most easily feel and measure our body's energy outflow / inflow with your hands. Chakras are located along the spine along transverse fiber bundles of fascia, where most of our energy is produced and converted. Our energy flow can be restricted by physical restrictions and thoughts and emotions. If nothing else were around our energy might flow nice and clear, but life is messy. The idea of chakra meditation is to clear emotional and mental blockages to restore a more balanced healthy energy flow.
Each chakra is associated with a certain color, element, and emotional forces.
• Root Chakra- color red, earth, feelings of safety, survival and sense of identity. This chakra is blocked by fear.
• Sacral Chakra- color orange, water, feelings of pleasure, excitement, and creativity. It is blocked by guilt (the emotional reaction you feel when you have done something wrong).
• Solar Plexus- color yellow, fire, feelings of empowerment, will, and sense of purpose. It is blocked by shame (the feeling that you are a bad person & unworthy of love).
• Heart Chakra- color green, air, feelings of love, hope, and connection. It is blocked by grief.
• Throat Chakra- color blue, air, feelings of worth, truth and self expression. It is blocked by lies.
• Inner Eye- color dark blue purple, light & ether, feelings of understanding and intuition. It is blocked by illusion.
• Crown Chakra- color violet or white, cosmos or ether, feelings of aliveness, transcendence, and connection to God. It is blocked by control and attachments to things and people of this world.
a. Opening the Root Chakra
Focus on your root chakra located at the base of your spine and extending down into the earth. Imagine the energy there. Is it alive or stagnant? What are you most afraid of? Let these become clear to you. Identify them but do not dwell on them. Know that these visions are not real. You are concerned for your own survival. Let them go. Surrender. Know that you are not in control of your own survival. Death and life are outside of your control. Surrender. Let your fears flow down the creek. Surrender your fears and say the mantra “I am safe”.
b. Opening the Sacral Chakra
Focus on your sacral chakra. The sacrum is the triangular bone at the back of your pelvis. Imagine the energy there. What do you feel guilty about? What evil things have you done that you have not forgiven yourself for? Identify them but do not dwell on them. Accept the reality that these things happened. Ask God for forgiveness. Ask yourself for forgiveness. If you have done wrong to another person, make a commitment to ask that person for forgiveness as well. Let your guilt flow down the creek. Surrender. Surrender your guilt and say the mantra “I am free”.
c. Opening the Solar Plexus
Focus on your solar plexus located at the bottom of your ribs to your belly button. Imagine the energy there. What are your biggest disappointments in yourself? What character flaws in yourself make you believe you are a bad person unworthy of love. When has someone else made you feel this way that you have not let go of? Accept that you are not perfect. Know that God accepts you and makes you new. Surrender your shame and say the mantra “I am accepted” know that you are able to make good choices, say “I will”.
d. Opening the Heart Chakra
Focus on your heart chakra located in your chest. Imagine the energy there. What losses have you experienced? You have indeed suffered great loss. Life is full of meetings and partings. That is the way of it. Know that love is a form of energy swirling all around us. God’s love for you has not left this world. Your lost love has not disappeared. It is still living inside your heart and is reborn every moment in the form of new love. Love is meant to be given away. Surrender your grief and say the mantra “I am loved”.
e. Opening the Throat Chakra
Focus on the throat chakra located in your throat. Imagine the energy there. What lies have you accepted about yourself? Who told you these lies? What lies have you been telling about yourself? You cannot lie about your own nature. You must accept who you are- both the good and the bad. Surrender your lies and say the mantra “I am true”.
f. Opening the Inner Eye
Focus on your inner eye located on your forehead in between your brows. Imagine the energy there. What illusions have you believed about God? Ask God to reveal truth to you. God has not left this world alone. He is powerful and loving. God restores balance. God heals our brokenness and brings us back into connection. What illusions have you believed about this world? We are all connected to God, to our earth and to each other. Isolation is an illusion. Surrender your illusions and say the mantra “I see clearly”.
g. Opening the Crown Chakra
Focus on your crown chakra located at the top of your head. Imagine the energy there. What attaches you to this world? What things, people, or purposes do you hold on to and cannot let go of. What do you try to control? Surrender. Know that you are not in control of this world, nor this life, nor the life and death of anyone else. God is. Let go. Give these attachments back to God. Let your fear of chaos flow down the creek. Surrender your attachments and say the mantra “I surrender”.
Mantra Meditation
Some meditation practices are essentially the opposite of the definition of “meditation”, ones in which you empty your mind of all thoughts & feelings. Its main purpose is peace from yourself. It doesn't bring you truth or enlightenment unless God chooses to speak to you in the silence, but it gets you outside of yourself, and allows you to regain an open and clear perspective. When we slow down we let go of our attachments - attachments to outcome, agendas, judgments, pain, fear, & ego. It arises out of a state of non-doing or wu-wei. It is abiding. It is stillness. In our ability to simply “be” we create the space for whatever wants to surface organically.
Emptying is generally excruciating work to begin learning. Most people find it nearly impossible. With time and diligence it becomes easier.
To begin, I recommend that you focus on a simple mantra. If you need to play music or hear the mantra out loud to help you clear and focus, do it. Eventually, even this defeats the purpose of complete emptiness, but it is a good way to start. Focus on this and nothing else until your mind goes completely blank. Be still. Sit in the stillness.
Every time your mind wanders, notice the thought without judgment and then let it float away. Choose not to engage it. It may be helpful to label each as they enter your head. Label “thought” “feeling” “sensation” or “worry” “planning” “memory” “longing” etc. Keep it simple. Labeling them helps you be objective and not get caught up in them. Return to your mantra.
Mantra meditations may also be done to breathing, or something you see like a candle flame, other noises like birds chirping, bells and bowls ringing, etc. Whatever you find relaxing. They may also be done to movement like walking or jogging. The point is to focus on this one thing until your mind goes blank to everything else and you are filled with a sense of stillness.
Self Hypnosis
Hypnosis is derived from the Greek word for sleep. It is a narrowing of consciousness accompanied by inertia and passivity. The main difference is that you never completely lose awareness during hypnosis. The idea of Hypnosis became popular during the New Age Movement but really it's been around for centuries. Hypnosis allows you to experience your thoughts and inner images as real. You willingly suspend belief just like when you become absorbed in a compelling fantasy or play. Daydreaming & being absorbed in thought are hypnotic states. Driving and other routine activities can cause hypnosis (even causing short term amnesia).
Please don't self induce hypnosis while driving or doing anything where dissociation could endanger you.
Self induction-
- Choose a key phrase that is the opposite of your problem and the essence of your goal. Repeat this word while you relax.
- Take several deep breaths. Relax your muscles and think “heavier and heavier, more and more relaxed.”
- Count stairs down to a safe refuge, or count backwards slowly from 10 to 0. Relax deeper and deeper with each count.
- Enter your imaginary safe refuge (see visualization exercises below).
- Deepen hypnosis through compelling suggestions such as “Drift deeper and deeper”, “Feel more and more drowsy, peaceful and calm”, “drift down into total relaxation”.
- Once you spend time relaxing in your refuge, you may wish to give yourself a “post hypnotic suggestion”.
- When it’s time to come out of the trance, count upward from zero to ten telling yourself to become "more and more alert, aware, and awake".
Audio record an induction script for yourself. Speak in monotone with slow tempo. Pause between each sentence.
Try abbreviated inductions with the help of a pendulum, or candle flame, or some other eye fixation.
Hypnotic Suggestions- These are thoughts and images that influence your subjective experience. Be direct, positive, & permissive (allowing yourself to be calm, rather than demanding).
Make the suggestions about the immediate future rather than the present (saying “soon I will feel relaxed.
Repeat your suggestions at least 3 times. Represent the suggestion in a visual image.
Write your suggestions out in advance.
If you are using hypnosis for a specific goal- Define your problem and goal, eliminate external factors that contribute to your problem, take note of the negative thoughts that contribute to your problem and refute them.
Visualization
Visualization, aka imaginative meditation, or positive thinking, was popularized by French pharmacist, Emil Coue, who believed it is difficult to “will” yourself to relax but easy to visualize yourself in a safe refuge. He believed your thoughts can change your reality.
You can get guided visualizations, but I think that images that you create yourself are more powerful. Visualization can be as simple as imagining a single image, or as complex as creating your own safe refuge, complete with sound, smell, color, taste, & feel. You can use the images to rest, answer questions, or imagine solutions.
- Receptive Visualization is where you imagine yourself in a safe refuge and then ask a question and wait for a response, such as asking “Why can’t I relax?” then wait for a response to emerge. You're waiting for your own consciousness, intuition, or feelings to respond. This can also be done with an imaginary guide (a character from your mind that can help clarify your tension and help you find solutions). You can visualize this character interacting with you in your refuge.
- Programmed Visualization is where you imagine a positive outcome to a goal, healing, or solution you want to attain. Studies have shown that people who imagine themselves healthy are actually healthier than those who do not (probably because they have less tension, lower heart rates, etc).
A couple of simple visualizations exercises are written below. Once you have visualized your safe refuge and begun to relax, you can progress to the purposes listed above- ask questions, or visualize outcomes.
To begin, I recommend that you lie down or find a comfortable sitting position, and do a breathing preparation. See breathing exercises.
Metaphors
Using Metaphorical images may help you begin to relax. The best images are the ones you create yourself. Think of a metaphorical image of tension (e.g. siren, glaring light, jackhammer, a taut cable, high shoulders, large crowd, dark tunnel, etc). Then replace that image with an image of relaxation. Image the tension image softening into something calm, (e.g. a siren softens into a whisper of wind, the glaring light softens into the warm glow of sun, the cable goes slack, shoulders descend, you pass through the crowd into an open meadow, the dark tunnel opens out to a quiet beach).
Creating a safe refuge
When structuring your refuge, follow these simple guidelines: allow a private entry, make it peaceful, comfortable, & safe. Fill it with sensuous details (the more details the better). Visualize foreground, middle ground, & background. Allow room for expansion and revision. It can be indoors or outdoors. It might be easily accessible, or require a short journey (nothing too complex or strenuous). Imagine all the details. Imagine yourself unloading your tensions there, and becoming at ease, healthy, & vibrant. Examples of safe refuges: a country kitchen with a view of waving wheat outside the window, a horse trail taking you to forest meadow with quiet stream, or a private sunny beach with warm white sand. Wherever you find peaceful.
Creating a place of healing
This is similar to a safe refuge but it doesn't necessarily have to be "safe". it can be a place where you go to learn and face hard truths about yourself or your situation and can be sometimes uncomfortable or challenging.
For example, imagine yourself outside of a medicine wheel. There are four directions- north, east, south, west. There are four elements- fire, air, water, earth. There are four aspects to ourselves- spirit, mind, heart, body. Fill each quadrant with whatever is a useful representation. Now enter inside the medicine wheel. Where are you within it? Off to one side or other? In the center? What do you see in each direction? Walk around and explore each quadrant. Are there places you fear to go? Directions you fear to face? Can you feel the balance in the middle? Can you lean in to the hard places?
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