Learning to Not Pay Attention to the Mind
Just like a mother or father that is surrounded by a crying baby, but is still able to watch a 2 hour movie without missing a word. So, the practice of meditation is like being completely calm and relaxed with a mind filled with chatter. The key to meditation is learning to not pay attention.
The mind does not want you to meditate. It does not want you to sit still. It does not want you to be calm and balanced. It wants you to go back and forth between the past and present. It wants you to be anxious, worried, and sad. It wants to have a purpose in your life. Therefore, the mind will do whatever it can to keep you from meditating.
Deep down though, you want to taste the higher consciousness and bliss that you know is within you, but you don't know how to get there. Bliss and Self-Realization can be only a moment away if you are able to learn how to be still. Learning how to be still is a step towards real meditation.
The Taste of Inner Stillness
Inner Stillness is when you are able to be completely centered, calm, relaxed, and be like a stone. Stillness comes from self-discipline and control. Like water in a clear container, if you shake it up and down, the container is filled with bubbles. You cannot see through it. But once the water calms down, you can see right through. We need to learn to incorporate inner stillness into our meditation practices.
Inner Stillness, from my personal experience, is the immersion into Soul's silence. It's absolutely beautiful, peaceful, ever-expanding, and limitless. Even in a matter of seconds, glimpses to the soul can happen. After practice, communing with the soul for longer periods of time.
3 Ways to Begin Experiencing Inner Stillness
1. Body Movement Control. One practical way to experience Inner Stillness is to sit in one place and not move. Do not move a finger, a toe, an arm, or twitch. Become like a stone. While in such body movement control, become instantly aware of everything that is moving (although your intention is to not move, you will). The only thing that should be naturally happening is your breathing.
Become so focused of every little movement that happens in your body. From your eyes moving, your right hand wanting to adjust, from your left arm that has become itchy, or your left pinky toe that is starting to fall asleep. Become so immersed in focus and control of your body movement and habits and you will learn to be in body awareness. This exercise can help you be in concentration, focus, and stillness.
Discipline of the Body and its Habits is necessary in learning how to meditate.
2. Focus on the Body's Sounds. One way I personally like to center and silence myself before meditation is listening to my heartbeat. This takes practice to learn how to not pay attention to any thought and be completely silent within to hear the sounds of your beating heart. By continuing to focus and listen to your heart beat you might experience a few seconds of "going beyond" and being in stillness with your soul. This is meditation. I know you might be thinking that it is impossible to listen to your heartbeat with so much going on around you, but with focus and practice it can happen. Try it.
3. Practice Meditation in the Nosiest of Places. Another way to experience stillness is practicing your meditation where it is completely noisy, loud, or distracting. The purpose of this exercise is learning how to increase concentration, centeredness, and focus within yourself despite everything going on around you. Once you learn how to be calm, relaxed, and meditate when surrounded by distraction, when you are finally by yourself, it will be easy for you to go right into inner stillness.
Life is Busy, Be Still
Although we work, go to school, are parents to active children, or just completely super busy, every moment is a chance to learn, taste the soul, and be inwardly silent. You can be silent daily even though you are cleaning your home. Are you caught up in your mind? Or, are you in stillness with soul? Sitting down for meditation is not a requirement. Meditation can happen anywhere and at anytime. Therefore learn how to meditate in every moment, in every action, and in all places. By learning how to go beyond distraction and noise in any place and at any time, you will learn how to bring inner stillness into your daily life.
