meditation: March 2008 Archives

Most discussions about empathy are always focused on external stimulus and what is happening to you. As if all you can do as an empath is receive states; that kind of thinking puts you in the position of being a victim. But what about creating, or accessing, your own states of consciousness? How do you do that as easily as you feel the energy of others?

How do you generate your own states of consciousness, states of emotion, states of mind, states of intellect, and states of body at the snap of a finger? The answer is: the ability to focus your awareness with intent. In other words, through "meditation" and anchoring. All of the aforementioned levels have many sub-levels; some say there are thousands, millions, or even an infinite number of sub-levels. The Coming Home Technique is a great place to start learning about these levels.

Empathy is an amazing way to gain access to new states of consciousness; it can be as simple as shaking someone's hand or just being in their presence. If you gain access to a new state be sure to name it and add it to your Hall of Doors, a technique which I describe below. However, meditating on external objects is not going to help you if you are constantly used to being in an expanded state; you need to meditate on your own system, i.e., your own body. This will also help you get more grounded.

A central idea in rolfing and body work is that emotional tension is held in the body and executed as a pattern of muscle holding. If you know a point of tension in your body then meditating on that area will take you down into many levels of different experiences. There are many layers just like when you use empathy. These may not be pleasant. However, the most interesting thing I have noticed about meditation and empathy is that when I access a certain new states of consciousness inside myself I can then feel them from others on the environmental level.

Contemplate that when it comes to states of consciousness read and write access are the same.

Myths:
Contrary to popular belief, blocking out "distractions" is not always a good idea. In some meditations you may benefit from more external noise. Increasing your awareness of that noise duly increases the internal awareness on the next levels of body and mind.

How do you stop your mind from wandering or thinking? Some people call this the "monkey mind." When you play baseball do you think, "oh god I can't have any thoughts that aren't about baseball"? No, you get to business and do the best you can. If you can complete a simple task like making a sandwich then your intent is strong enough to meditate. Set your intent to focus fully and be done with it. Some random thoughts or thoughts about what you feel are fine and are not going to prevent you from having a great experience.

Enlightenment is bullshit. There is no enlightenment. There is enlightening, but no enlightenment. So what the hell are all those gurus talking about? Some of them have permanently expanded their awareness into the void. The void experience is one of the most important experiences you can have; it helps you cut through everything -- to eliminate all the bullshit and all your so called "problems," which you see were never there to begin. I could not have started to experience any of this stuff I am writing about without first having a taste of the void.

But how is it going to help you if that's the only level you explore? Staying only in the void, in this embodied form, is a limitation. Ram Dass says, "He who clings to the void and neglects compassion does not reach the highest stage. But he who practices only compassion does not gain release from the toils of existence. He however how is strong in the practice of both remains neither in samsara nor in nirvana. He neither remains in the void nor in the world." I have seen some "gurus" that look completely blissed out on the heart level -- they are nowhere near grounded. Actually, I am a bit jealous of them!

Where to start?
From the void level there is no meditation, nor is there any meditator. From another perspective you could say that there is no time at which you do not meditate; you are always using "your" awareness which is everywhere at once. The mass mind level is the television and now the internet. You can tap into the same states inside yourself and feel the same way. That is what "mindful meditation" is all about - zoning into the mind level and staying there; if you want to tap into that level then why not just turn on the tv? There are many other levels to explore. The best place to start meditating is to just focus on one part of the body. It could be your stomach, your heart, your tailbone, etc and experience what happens.

Meditating with your eyes closed is good to start since that will definitely increase your focus on your internal awareness. I have been told however, that eventually you will want to have your eyes open so you are not shutting out all that sensory awareness. In other words you want to be able to reach the same level of awareness that you can get with your eyes closed when you are walking down the street with all kinds of distractions.

I met an interesting guy named Marty recently. After talking with the guy for an hour or so my vision gets this weird purple after-effect on every white thing that I look at. He is a very high person; it's great to finally meet someone with a deeper level of awareness that I can learn from. He gave me several new techniques and exercises, all of which are listed below. In addition to these he also recommends Z-health R phase, which is basically a full set of body awareness exercises. I have been reading several books he recommended and will post some reviews later.

What do awareness exercises have to do with meditation? I had a dream one night where I entered the internal space of a martial arts expert. What I saw was many amazing, custom made, almost supernatural looking, tools to shape physical reality. Awareness exercises are necessary tools for you to use and create in order to shape the inner reality.

Meditation Techniques

Hall of doors technique:
Create in your mind a hall of doors. Initially it will have no doors until you add them one by one. Each door has a symbol, color, number, writing, picture, or any combination of these on it. You can use this as a pre or post meditation tool to explore your vast consciousness. The idea is that you name the level of consciousness that you experience as a way to get back to it. Once it is named, pictured, or otherwise identified, then you can always return to that state of consciousness by opening the door. You do not have to be good at visualization to do this technique; you could simply write down your hallway on a piece of paper, but be sure to keep it in your head as well. This technique is a kind of anchoring technique and allows you to go to any state of consciousness in your hall of doors at the snap of a finger. This technique is an indispensable one.

Marty's two point technique:

1. First pick a point in your environment. Focus on that until you feel comfortable. Now focus on the entire environment at once. Now pick another point and focus on that one until you are comfortable with it. Next focus on both points at once. Next focus on both points and the whole environment at once.

2. Now focus on the tip of one of your fingers for several moments. Then focus on the rest of your body. Then focus on both your finger tip and the body all at once. Now expand the focus on both the environment and body levels.

Ping pong goggles:
Take a ping pong ball and cut it in half. Place them over your eyes. Meditate with your eyes open, looking into the white of the balls. Alternatively, you can get some ski goggles and paint the inside white or any other color and use that as well. This exercise is a stepping stone between eyes closed meditation and eyes open meditation. Officially, this is called the Ganzfeld effect; it was discovered by arctic explorers in snow blind conditions. It is a mild form of sensory deprivation.

Awareness Exercises

Finger tracing:
Hold both index fingers pointing away from your body, side by side, about 1 ft from your body at waist level. You want to trace the finger with your eyes, but without moving the head at all. Trace a half circle upward with the right index finger and then back down the way you came. Then trace the other side of the imaginary circle with your left finger and trace it back down the way you came.

Eye compass:

First you want to create a compass like this one somewhere on your wall. You can use a piece of string, tethered to the center, and go around in a circle to make sure all the points are even. I sliced up some cork with a band saw and then stuck them on the wall with earthquake putty; but tacks, tape, or some simple stickers would work fine too.

After creating this compass, the actual exercise is to sit down and move your eyes around the compass. First use the center dot as a reference. So after looking at each dot go back to the center dot. Go clockwise. Then counter-clockwise. Write down what you experience after each set. Try just the bottom three dots; then try the top three. Try left to right and up and down. Try all combinations of dots you can think of with the center dot reference restriction. Later take off the center dot restriction. What do you notice? Write it down. Specifically, write down the sets and dots that give you the most difficulty.

V – K – A detection exercise:
Most people usually speak in one sensory mode: Visual, Kinesthetic, or Audio. The exercise is to identify this “conscious output system” or “how we attempt to communicate our experiences to another” (p. 54, Heller, Steele) by watching videos or holding a conversation with someone. 

Examples:

Visual:
  I wasn’t seeing new people
  It looks clear to me

Kinesthetic:
  Out of hand
  Felt I hadn’t had
  Shake things up
  Interact (3x)
  Feel the wind
  Best feeling
  Comfort

Auditory:
  I hear you
  Sounds good
  I like the rippling sound

Eye Pattern Detection:
First watch someone speaking and identify their conscious output system via their speech. Then identify their unconscious input system, i.e., “the ‘programs’ [people] use to generate their conscious experience” (p. 66, Heller, Steele). Although, it seems that you are not directly identifying a program but rather the sensory mode which that program runs through or on. You recognize this mode via a person’s eye movement. This is for right handed people. For left handed people the following is reversed. For "cross brain dominant" people you just have to ask them questions and determine which primary systems they use by the resulting eye movements.

Up to Left: Past VISUAL
Up to the Right: Constructing VISUAL

Down Left: Internal AUDIO (Internal Dialogue)
Down Right: Past KINESTHETIC

When the person is facing you these movements will, of course, be reversed from your perspective. Your left will be their right. “As a general rule, when someone is experiencing a present kinesthetic experience, s/he will tend to look in the general direction of the listener and make physical contact to their own body.” (p. 68, Heller, Steele)

Additional exercises coming soon...

You can use your dreams every night to acquire information about yourself and others. Dreams can help you explore parts of yourself that may be a bit more hidden from your awareness in your waking life. Dreams can give you direct access to guidance that you would otherwise have to pay lots of money to obtain in the real world. The first thing to do is start keeping a journal of your dreams. Even if you remember your dreams well it is important to record them so you can go back after some time and review, identify patterns, etc. If you don't remember your dreams at all then journaling/recording them immediately after you wake up is best the way to get your mind to start remembering.

Learning more about yourself with these techniques can help you become a better empath by increasing your internal awareness.

Visiting people's internal space:
It is possible to obtain information about other people by using a kind of "dream empathy." Basically what you do is visit their internal space in your dreams.

Your awareness will be more lucid in these places; you will know you are dreaming. You may also receive verifiable information about the waking world. I won't rob you of the opportunity for new discoveries by telling you exactly what you may find, but I will say that if you do the technique successfully there will be no doubt in your mind as to the "realness" of what you experience. Be prepared to be amazed.

Write down your intent of whose space you want to visit in your dream journal. Tell yourself several times before you go to sleep that it is your intent to go there.

Entering into someone's internal dream space usually requires you to find their "hiding place." You may have to climb up a ladder and go through a hidden panel or go in through a back door. The person's personality will give away their hiding place. However, this "transition" phase in the dream may be much different for you.

Be careful because some people's internal space is guarded. Another reason to be extra cautious is that some people's space is in fact very disturbing. Don't "play" around with this technique.

Asking you guides:
You can ask your astral guides a question or for help through your dreams.

Set your intent by doing the following:
1. Write down your question in your dream journal before going to sleep.
2. Write down the location (time is optional) that you will meet your guide at.

I have success using locations that aren't too specific. In other words something like "a house" or "a school" will give your mind ample opportunity to incorporate the setting into your dreams, whereas a more specific setting like "Joe's backyard by the lemon tree" may be too specific. However, you may be different and need to use an exact location. Find out what works for you! Setting the location is very important though; I was told specifically in my dreams that the overall intent should be like making a real appointment you will not miss.

Your lucidity when you arrive at the location or meet your guide will be high.

You will know when you meet your guide(s). All kinds of weird shit usually happens when I do this technique.

Meeting your energy centers:
You can also ask to "meet" your chakras or energy centers of your body. Chakras are a metaphorical way of discussing the endocrine system. You may have varying degrees of lucidity with these dreams. Asking to meet your heart or your root or any other center will give you a lot of information about yourself. You can use this as a way to filter out your previously recorded dreams and dream symbols. Your dreams may make more sense when you direct your mind into a context of a particular body part. If you receive any names be sure to write them down immediately! And never share the names with anyone.

Asking to meet parts of yourself will help clear things up during meditations on those respective parts of yourself. It is a great way to give yourself additional guidance and knowledge about your meditations. It can help you tremendously with directing and prioritizing what part of yourself you may need to work on, strengthen, or meditate with.