Meditation Class - Week 2

In this week's class, we tried two new meditations and also touched upon what we, as people, can and can't control and how we treat other people.

Our teacher made a very good point to start off with. Meditation is all about relaxing and controlling our own minds. Rather than trying to control the world around us, it is much easier to control our own perceptions of the world. As an example, would we look to lay carpet over the whole world so that we have a nice soft surface to walk on. Or would it be easier for us to just put on a pair of comfortable shoes?

The very reason that I chose to do these meditation classes is to get more control over my thoughts and feelings. Some of the ideas raised made me wonder just how much better we would do at school (and early on in life), and how much more productive and accepting we would be as people, if we learned some methods of controlling our minds, and learned how to appreciate others, early on in life.

Our first meditation involved us getting into a relaxed state and then picturing all of the parts of our body bunched together. Then, one by one, we visualised each body part dissolving away into brilliant light. By the end, we were imagining that we had the outer shell of our body, full of brilliant white light inside - full of positive energy. At first, I found this visualisation quite difficult, but then I began to relax into it and it worked quite well for me. I need to practice these meditation techniques a lot more in order to learn to stop little thoughts coming through to interrupt (as they invariably do when you start off).

The second meditation was a lot harder, and was about us finding our heart chakra - the centre from which love emanates from us. This is located somewhere around the middle of the chest. We had to think about this area, and imagine there was a deep hole there (and focus on it). I was told afterwards that this is one of the trickiest meditations to get the hang of, so I'm guessing we might be trying that one again next week.

After the meditations, the teacher made a very interesting point that I have always believed and try to do myself. So, it is a very apt way to end this blog post. The world would be a much friendlier place if we all learn to focus on the good points that people have. As we get to know people more and more, it becomes natural to start seeing people's faults and to focus on those and become blind to the good parts of their personality. Instead, we should realise that everyone has their faults (that is part of what makes us unique), but the positive elements are far more important!

read about last week's meditation class