I've told this story many times over the years, but it seems I never posted it anywhere. I want to post it now, to make it easier to share with others.
In my Jung SuWon martial arts practice, I used to meditate every day. Some days would be just spectacular. I'd be floating. Knowing "just how to do it", I would do the exact same thing the next day. And... Nothing. Nothing whatever. It was like I hadn't done anything at all.
The story repeated itself half a dozen times or more. I'd have a peak experience in my meditation, followed by weeks of slogging through my practice, with seemingly nothing to show for it. Every time I thought I had it, it turned out that I didn't have anything at all!
At my wits end, I finally decided that the peak enlightenment experiences were not the result of anything I did, really. Rather, they were a gift. A gift of grace, as it were.
That state of grace was the enlightenment experience I sought after. So, when it came, I was immensely grateful for it.
Eventually, it occurred to me that in addition to being grateful for events I had already experienced, I could be grateful for forthcoming experiences, as well.
(As I have written elsewhere, gratitude is a powerful enlightenment practice—quite possible the most powerful practice of all. So being grateful more often can only be a good thing!)
And what do you know? That Advance Gratitude for the Gift of Grace turned out to be the key to experiencing enlightened states with much greater regularity! (Of course, I could also stop myself in a dozen emotional ways. But as the issues were cleared away, the frequency of peak experiences increased!)
So here I am, having found the wonderful Unity organization. If you define yourself as "spiritual, not religious", it just may be your cup of tea. It's a worldwide organization with communities all over the place. They aren't wedded to any one set of spiritual practices. They welcome anyone, no matter what spiritual path you are on, no matter where you are on that path! (They were founded in 1880, no less! Where have I been this whole time?)
Intrigued by this organization (intrigued enough to have joined the choir!) I am reading on of their foundation volumes, The Five Principles: A Guide to Practical Spirituality. Lo and behold! Can you guess what I read?
Go ahead. Guess. I'll wait.
Ahhhh... I can't wait! I've got to share. Get this!
Bottom line: Advance Gratitude is the key to Manifesting Your Dreams, as well! (Who knew??? :__)
]]>Finding your life's true purpose starts with inspiration. Inspiration comes from connection to a higher power, and connection comes from meditation. So meditation is one good way to find and begin living your true purpose!
Insights and ideas come at the strangest times. They generally occur when you're relaxed, or when occupied with tasks you can do on autopilot. As your mind wanders, ideas come for whatever happens to be on your mind. Key times include:
Of these, perhaps the most powerful source of inspiration is meditation. The reason, undoubtedly, is that meditation leads to connection—a deep, inner connection to the higher power that guides our lives (when we're listening!).
From that connection come insights and ideas of the highest order—the ones that serve our deepest and highest purpose. So Meditation --> Connection, and Connection --> Inspiration.
Meditation --> Inner Connection --> Inspiration
The next stage is to act, to manifest the ideas and insights. Coming "out of the blue", they're a gift—but a gift that is generally meant to be shared! And the first step in manifesting the gift is to record the inspirations.
As Deborah Pena writes in her great Meditation Journal article, "the longer we go without capturing and/or acting upon those (insights, ideas, etc.), the more they may slip away from our memory".
True words! I started journaling back in High School, when dinosaurs roamed the earth. So doing something like that is second nature to me. I keep a notepad in my pocket. And one in the car. And another by my bed. And one more on the small table next to my meditation station. Wherever I am, I generally have paper and a writing implement nearby.
Of course, I don't want to interrupt a great meditation/connection by writing things down every time something comes to me, so I generally use the "short notes" a technique I developed when I was practicing Dream Recall.
Short Notes & Dream Recall:
Waking from a dream, I would lie in the position I was in when the dream was occuring. (It helps to stimulate recall--a clear indication that "mind" takes place in the whole body, not just the brain.) I would then run through the dream. I'd start with the part I remember, near the end. Running it through, I would generally recall an earlier bit. I'd run it through starting from that bit, and continue the process until there were no more earlier bits.
That process moved the dream from subconscious awareness to short term memory. Then I would encapsulate the dream with a short word or phrase, and repeat it a couple of times to cement that anchor in my memory.
After waking from the next dream, I would repeat the process. Then repeat the anchor for the previous dream(s), followed by the anchor for the latest one.
By the time I was ready to get up, I might have a set of 5 or 6 short anchor phrases memorized as a sequence. When I did I get up, the very first thing would be to write down that sequence.
Then I could begin writing. Taking each anchor phrase in turn, I made a quick bullet list of things that occurred in that dream--again, single words or small short phrases. When I was done, I had an outline of the dreams I had experienced and what had happened in them.
I would then flesh out the outline. Taking each dream and each bullet point in turn, I'd write a detailed description of that point. When the writing spurred additional recollections, it became another a quick note in the outline, so I could get back to what I was writing as quickly as possible.
If memory stalled, I would lie down again and find the position that stimulated recall. It worked a charm, even hours after the dream had originally occurred. I got so good at it that some days I was spending as many as 4 hours writing up my dreams.
(I can't say that any great growth occurred as a result, so I discontinued the practice. But I got awfully good at creating short phrases, recalling details, and fleshing out an outline!)
I generally use the "words and short phrases as anchors" technique in the car, in the shower, and other times when it is difficult to write. The only exception is when the insight has produced the exact wording I need for something I'm writing. In that case, I write down the wording verbatim, just as soon as it is practical. But most of the time, I create a series of anchors.
When ideas strike in meditation then, the first step is encapsulate them in a short word or phrase to make an anchor. I'll repeat it in my head a couple of times, and continue meditating.
The next time an idea comes, I'll do it again, and go over the sequence of anchors, putting the new one at the end. Then I'll go back to meditating.
When it becomes difficult to recall the first anchor or two, it's time to write down the list! So I do that, and go back to meditating.
Of course, not every meditation leads to ideas and insights. But most of them do. The trick is to not be too attached to having them. The goal, after all, is the connection. So that comes first. But it seems to me that the connection produces a pipeline of insights and ideas that are intended to be manifested in the world! So when I do that, it feels to me that I am fulfilling my higher purpose. In a way, I am literally living my dream.
And when I am manifesting, I reconnect to the meditation that produced the inspiration, reconnect to the source of it all, and re-experience the great inner sensations of joy and positivity that accompany the connection! So acting on those inspirations feels as though I am accepting the guidance of a higher, inner power, and living my life's purpose. (Yay!)
So the first step in the manifestation stage is to capture the details encapsulated by the anchor. Each one is like a puddle. When you step in it, it may be shallow, or it could be several feet deep! So when I start writing up the details, it might take me one minute, or 10, or an hour. Some days, an inspiration will turn out to be tip of an iceberg, and once again I find myself writing for hours!
An inspiration might wind up in this blog, or a book I have in progress, or one of my other blogs, or my business plan, or production plan, or a design I'm working on. In short, the write ups from the notes go to wherever they make sense, to be published &/or acted on.
Of course, not everything gets written up in a timely fashion. As a result, my desk is littered with notes! That cluttered desk is a sign of an active, creative mind. I'm sure of it. Yes. It most certainly is. (That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.)
]]>In a recent Thanksgiving message Shakti Padmini shared a wonderful saying:
It isn't happiness that creates gratitude,
But gratitude that creates happiness!
Truer words have rarely been spoken. The first time I experienced what can only be described as full-blown enlightenment, I was doing an all-day, every-day "gratitude meditation" as I went about my daily life.
I did it at the direction of none other than Grandmaster Dr. Tae Yun Kim (my Jung SuWon martial arts master). She instructed us to "express gratitude in your heart, every waking moment". I did. It triggered an explosion of insights and a cascade of joy.
The first couple of days were good. The next couple were stellar. And the remaining week and half was nothing more than spectacular. Just thinking about it, I recall the blissful sensation, and am brought back to the goodness that is gratitude!
Be grateful for everything you can think of. Everything! It will be easy at first. But then you'll start repeating yourself. And soon, you'll get bored of the repetition. To keep the practice going, you'll need to go deeper—to everything that lies behind the things you're grateful for, and to the entire history of events that led up to them.
It's a spectacular meditation that brings a lot of joy. Give it a try!
And do let me know how it goes…
:__)
Note:
To see how "Advance Gratitude" can lead to enlightenment, check out this post: Meditation 2.0)
eric Armstrong
MeditateBetter.com
author of Bench Yoga (available at Amazon)
The "value proposition" was interesting:
That is a most intriguing proposition, so I signed up for it. I'll put a review in another post. This one tells why I signed up.
You see, my first peak enlightenment experience was about 26 years ago. It was the gratitude meditation I wrote about recently, prompted by Grandmaster Dr. Tae Yun Kim.
It lasted 2 weeks. In the years that followed, I had a few more peak enlightenment experiences, each lasting about week (one from a forgiveness meditation, another from a connection-with-love meditation).
At the end of my martial arts training, I reached a deep epiphany that had me crying for 2 days, feeling totally empty for 3, and then bathed in love for a week. (All solo, mind you. There was no group contact during that time. A lot of "internal processing" was going on!)
Then came Ipsalu Tantra, and a connection with Babaji Nagaraj that had me kneeling on the floor, crying, grateful for the power, love, and majesty of the connection.
That time, I couldn't sleep for three days. Every time I laid down, a new burst of insights occurred. I had to leap up and write them down, to preserve them and share them with others! In the end, I had to ask the connection to be reduced. I needed the sleep! It was a like a 200 amp circuit going into a 10 amp fuse. There was only so much I could manage!
After that, there was wonderful emotional clearing of early life traumas in a Sexual Wholeness workshop taught by Lexi Fisher and Kip Moore in Palm Springs, followed by an incredible opening to God!
Then came the wonderful experience of pranayama and Kriya Yoga techniques taught by Swamiji Asanganand Saraswati. More peak moments.
Finally, there was the Ananda Raja Program. In addition to the awesome atmosphere and the techniques they taught, I came to understand the technique I dubbed the "Orbital Lift" (available as an article on this site).
Thanks to the Orbital Lift, I am in a more-or-less constant state of "semi-enlightenment". Things get me down at times, but I bounce back up rapidly. And it doesn't take much to lift me up into something closer to a peak state!
So for me, it has taken some 30 years, counting from when I started the spiritual growth process in my martial arts training, to achieve something close to full-time enlightenment.
But despite all the growth, many questions remain:
I don't all the answers to come from one webinar. And I confess to wondering what the sales pitch must be at the end of it. (Surely they are selling something.)
But at the same time, I'm certain I will learn something. Something valuable. Something that may help me personally, or something I can use to help others achieve that blissful inner state of enlightenment without taking 30 years to get there!
Either way, I think it will be worth the time I spend on it.
:__)
eric Armstrong
MeditateBetter.com
author of Bench Yoga (available at Amazon)
Here is an excerpt:
The Orbital Lift is a subtle, internal muscle movement that is a powerful energy activator. Although it is a small movement, it is nevertheless the key to regarding life with amusement, and staying positive. It lifts your spirits, keeps you joyous, and produces radiant magnetism! It is a direct path to inner joy. This is the most powerful technique I know...
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