Basic Meditation: Establishing a Practice
>>Meditation is defined as the ability to stop ones thoughts. Concentration is defined as the ability to focus on just one point.
The principal purpose of this course is to teach the student how to set up a daily concentration practice. The goal is for the student to be concentrating consistently for about 15 to 30 minutes each day. This is prelude to developing a meditation practice. The final goal is to remove the point of concentration and stop thoughts all together.
The principal reason one would take this workshop is to make their mind stronger, to be able to control their attention and ultimately to be able experience that which is beyond thought.
There is also the goal of teaching the student some basic principles of psychology and how we create the world through our perceptions. The mechanics of how we create our personal reality is studied.
There are three basic assumptions that underlie our methodology:
1. We are conducting a workshop rather than a traditional class. Students learn in the same way they would learn either martial or fine arts, through practice. The student is taught a particular exercise. The mechanics and reasoning supporting the exercise is also taught. The student then practices the exercise.
2. We do not teach religion and while all the great religions use meditation, a student's religious viewpoints, or lack thereof, is a personal matter and not the subject of the workshop. The course material is designed to be useful to individuals of any religious background or denomination.
3. There is no method or individual exercise that is best for everyone. Consequently the workshop is designed to present the student with a number of different approaches and exercises. The student then adopts the ones that work best for him or her. This is similar to the approach utilized in our martial arts program. Different students win using different techniques. It is the responsibility of the student to explore different techniques to determine which works best. It is the responsibility of the teacher to explain and present the exercises and to provide feedback on the student's experience.
Structure of Workshops It is important for students to share their experiences as well as doing the exercises. Consequently the workshop is limited to 10 students. The workshop is conducted with students sitting in a circle. Students are encouraged to describe their experiences. For workshop exercises, meditation music is provided as background. The workshops last for 90 minutes and there is a minimum of two 15-minute practice sessions per workshop. The course includes eight classes and a field trip.
Basic Meditation: Establishing a Practice Course Syllabus
Class 1: Overview Of Things To Come. Starting your Personal Practice
Why should I meditate and what's in it for me?
Meditation and Concentration: Seeing beyond words
Posture, Place and Practice: Developing the meditation habit
Stopping the world we create with words - Identity and social conditioning
The creative power of thought
Practice Journal: The importance of charting your experiences
Concentration Technique: Focus on the Breath.
Homework: Written Report - Stopping my Practice: Obstacles that appeared this week.
Class 2: The Human Biocomputer and the Matrix.
What is really there - classic decomposition exercise
A model for understanding what we are - the Bio-Computer
The Matrix - projecting reality and common sense
The function of thoughts and words in creating reality
Who are you - a quick exercise to look at where 'you' come fromHow the programming works, social conditioning, institutional racism and esthetics
Taking control of the programming and personal responsibility.
Consciousness Exercise: Who am I
Homework: Three part energy survey
Class 3: Yantra, Manadalas and the Art of Gazing
What are yantras? Where do they come from? How do they work?
What is a mandala? Where do they come from? How do they work?
What is Sanskrit? Why are we using Sanskrit terms?
The mechanics of creating the visual matrix
Concentration Technique: Focus on a Yantra.
Homework: Purchase an individual yantra for your meditation table
Class 4: Time is of the essence? Or is it
The nature of time and reality
Memory, the Moment, and the Future - what is actually happening
Hard time or easy time - we are all doing time
The mechanics of doing easy time. The function of self consciousness
The ego, the witness and how we use time to make the Matrix work.
Homework Written report on the shortest hour and the longest hour experienced during the coming week.
Class 5: Meditation in Action: Mindfulness
Focusing in the moment - the mechanics of mindfulness
Living large - experiencing wealth and poverty - the function of time
Is it possible to experience fear if you don't allow future thought?
The mechanics of pleasure - the reconciliation of opposites
Eating an orange - testing the concept
Concentration Technique: Focus on an immediate activity.
Homework: Report on three meals using the 'orange' focusing exercise.
Class 6: The Power of Sound: Chanting
Eastern and western creation myths - the function of the drum
Modern physics, the vibration of energy and the creation of the world
The tradition of concentrating on sound
What is a mantra? What are affirmations?
Experience the chanting of OM
Concentration Technique: Chanting OM
Homework: Purchase a CD of a chant that you like. Practice it for five to ten minutes each day for the next week
Class 7: Visualization; a variation on the theme
What is directed meditation?
Creating an inner refuge
Experiencing the journey to an island of peace
The power of words in reprogramming
The function of affirmations. How they work. How to use them.
Concentration Technique: Focus on creating a directed world
Homework: Develop three affirmations for personal use
Urban Warrior Field Trip
This is a Saturday afternoon field trip to the Metropolitan Museum. The class will meet at the Met with a portable CD player and a meditation CD. The exercise consists of spending 45 minutes viewing the Egyptian collection at the Met while listening to the meditation music and not talking or reading. The exercise is to totally focus on the objects without filtering the experience through words or concepts. At the end of the exercise the class meets and discusses their experiences over coffee at the Met café. One of the purposes of the exercise is to teach the student how to experience different city phenomena while protected from typical urban distractions and noise. Basically we are practicing mindfulness in the community.
Class 8: Recapitulation and Review
Experience of urban warrior field trip -
Advice on protecting and expanding the practice
Lessons learned - what worked and what didn't
Going beyond - "to make an end is to make a beginning"
Presentation of Graduation Certificates
Suggested Music: (Available for purchase through the school)
Canyons of Light: Zazen
Enlightenment: Zazen
Ecologie: Joaquin Lievano
Suggested Readings:
Snowboarding to Nirvana and Surfing the Himalayas by Frederick Lenz
Zen Mind, Beginners Mind by Shunryu Suzuki
Yantra by Mandhu Khanna