secularmeditation

The speaker talks about different ways of practicing meditation and focuses on a secular approach for beginners. They emphasize the importance of finding a way to still oneself and suggest sitting in a comfortable but alert position. They mention the Egyptian pose as a good option. They also discuss the idea of having a central focus or theme for meditation, whether it's a question or a mantra. They emphasize the importance of returning to this focus repeatedly during the meditation practice. Hi everyone, I've just had my breakfast, had a walk, done some meditation, all the usual stuff that's necessary to keep the body going, and I thought I'd talk a little bit about, I've done this before, but we'll do it again, the different ways of practicing meditation, contemplation, focus, mindfulness, different ways of describing it, and I thought I'd start off for those people who are absolute beginners and not interested in any form of religious connotation or aspect in their practice, so let's start with that, and we will look at the idea of focus on a particular theme, if you like. So, the first thing you need to do in this form of meditation is find some way of stilling yourself, so you need to sit still, you can sit on a chair, a stool on the floor, a deck chair if you want, I mean deck chair meditation is quite acceptable, this is what a lot of people do, they go on the beach and they open their, you know, they lean back in the deck chair, hands there, you know, the sun's there, they've got their sun cream on, and they just think about life, the universe and everything, they just think about things, mull things over if you like, this is really a form of contemplation and thinking on a theme, and it's very much a free form of, a relaxed free form of thinking, if you like, but we have to go sometimes beyond that, because we need to, this is one of the useful things, is we need to learn some form of focus, so, again, in a secular approach, we can do the relaxation, there's not much point in relaxing so much that we fall asleep, if you fall asleep, you're asleep, and we're trying to wake people up to their potential, so, again, sitting somewhere comfortably, maybe somewhere a bit more, not difficult, but somewhere where you, if you fall asleep, you're basically going to fall off your chair, so this is why sometimes what's known as the Egyptian pose, which is sitting in a straight-backed chair is good, because you're keeping your back straight, and it's very difficult to fall asleep if your back is straight, you can do it, I've done it, and people do it, you just nod off, so it's possible, but if you're in a position of alertness, or focus, or concentration, you're less likely to fall asleep, so you adopt that pose, and then you present yourself with something that you're trying to solve, in other words, you have a focus, you have a focus, and you have a guiding theme, something that you want to resolve in some way, and people do this, again, in different ways, they just may have a very simple question, for me, should I do this, should I do this, or should I, you know, they may do something such as, what am I, or what is thought, or, you know, is there something beyond binary thinking, is there, whatever it is, it doesn't really matter, the important thing is to have that central focus, and to keep returning to that, you know, in a lot of traditions, there's a, or traditional forms of meditation, there is a focus on the breath, and you keep returning to the breath, but that's something more advanced, so let's just start with the idea of focusing on a central idea, so what would that idea be, well, you may have heard of, you know, things like mantras, or specific questions that you can ask, if you have a religious bent, you will move to that, you know, what is Jesus, what is Buddha, or something like that, but if you don't have that, you have to find something within your own experience, and your own understanding, which becomes the central point of focus, and you just go, you go through the process, what does it mean, and you keep coming back to it, asking the question again, and again, and again, so this is how you return to a central, a central theme. Anyway, that's all from me for today. Bye now.