"The most effective meditations I find require pre-planning. I suggest you find a beautiful natural spot where you won't be disturbed- for example a mountain, a cave, by a river, a cliff, a beach or of course, beneath a tree. The time doesn't matter really, though I have heard that the Dalai Lama prefers to meditate at Dawn.
Wear loose, comfortable clothes, drink only water for the days before and during and the less you eat, the better (so long as you don't totally starve yourself)- especially avoid meat. Just before you prepare to start, have a cool shower or something first, go to the toilet, blow your nose, and turn off that phone!
Make sure you are mentally ready, not tired or feeling excessive emotion/excitement, as these can be big obsticles to your session.
Begin by burning a stick of incense and saying a prayer to the Buddhas and innumerable Bodhisattvas, requesting for the meditation to be fruitful, and for all positive karma to be dedicated to the attainment of enlightenment for the benefit of all beings.
Find a position which is comfortable for you- I find that half-lotus is best for beginners and full lotus for the advanced, place your upright hands softly on your lap, right hand above the left, and join your thumbs, which forms a beautiful lotus shape (your spirit is preparing to rise from the muddy depths and flower into its full potential).
Move about for a while until you find your most comfortable, settled position, then straighten your back as upright as you can (without stress/force)- this will keep your mind alert and awake: it's important that you maintain a good posture, and you should check it every now and then. Raise your head as though you were balancing a book on top of it, and pull your chin slightly in and down towards your neck. Put your tongue to the roof of your mouth.
Now prepare your breath- breathe in deep through your nose so it goes right down to your stomach, and then breathe out through your mouth, this will slow your breath (at a pace that suits you). Allow your eyelids to lower almost all the way and start counting your breathes like so:
"Breathing in...1...Breathing out...2...Breathing in...3...Breathing out...4..." and so on until you reach 10, and then start over. It is natural to become distracted, so when distracting thoughts come, become aware of them, let them go and start over again from 1. I suggest you do this for around 20-30 minutes before you begin the actual meditation (this may seem like meditation, but it isn't).
Then stop counting your breathes, just focus on the natural sensation, like so:
"Breathing in...I know I am breathing in....Breathing out...I know I am breathing out...."
"Breathing in deeper... I know I am breathing in...Breathing out slower...I know I am breathing out...."
I must emphacise that you shouldn't be controlling or forcing your breaths, they should be naturally occuring.
If you continue this for another 30-60 minutes you will feel very calm and focused.
When the time is right, stop thinking...
Focus on the sole sensation of the air moving inside and outside of you. Your breath may even seem to stop altogether when you get deep into this point.
If you continue this practice, hopefully you will attain your first Dhyana in time. It is not easy, and if you do not right away- please don't feel disheartened, keep practicing. I promise you it will be worth it, the first Dhyana is not unlike a beautiful calm wave of euphoria which lasts for hours, if not days, and it brings other benefits which will certainly transcend the meditation session- such as the wisdom of discernment.
When you finish, be very gentle with yourself and move very slowly, have a light stretch and don't try standing up right away. It's likely that you will have lost most of the sensations in your body.
I strongly recommend that you read up on the 4 Dhyanas so you will know what to expect when they are attained:
* The first dhyana level which is accomplished in this way has five features: conception, discernment, joy, physical wellbeing and samadhi.
* The second dhyana, which is even more peaceful, has four features: the perfect clarity in which conception and discernment have been relinquished, joy, physical wellbeing and samadhi.
* The third dhyana, which is more peaceful still, has five features: equanimity in which the concept of joy has been abandoned, mindfulness, watchful awareness, physical wellbeing and samadhi.
* The fourth dhyana, which is called the ultimate dhyana because it is yet more peaceful, has four features: the neutral sensation in which the sensation of physical wellbeing has been abandoned, mindfulness, the mental formation of equanimity, and samadhi.
This is everything you need to know- I pray it serves you and others well."
I hope this helps your dad, meditation is fantastic for this sort of thing, if done correctly.
Namaste.Yoga can be a real effective way to heal stress. Breathing exercises are the best way to bring mind and body into peace. You can help him to do the easiest, simplest and most efficient breathing exercise yoga of all - Pranayama.quit being a bitch and let the man smoke his potThere are many kinds of meditation; some are more effective than others. Some are only a means to escape, similar to smoking pot, and some actually help you to understand the nature of stress and addiction in order to overcome both. The best would be for you to start meditating yourself, if you thought that might be a useful means to overcome stress; your own clarity of mind is probably the best gift you can give to your father; once you understand how the mind works, you will be able to give really useful advice, instead of perhaps increasing his stress, as is generally the case in untrained family relationships...
You are welcome, of course, to try to encourage him to meditate, I think meditation is the best way to deal with stress, but it is never sure whether other people will take our suggestions seriously - I do send free DVDs on meditation to anyone who asks, you are welcome to request one from http://www.sirimangalo.org/contact, or watch the videos on YouTube at http://www.youtube.com/yuttadhammo
Kundalini Yoga to Detox and Destress with Maya Fiennes
yoga for stress relief - click on the image below for more information.
""To be in her presence, and to feel her spirit, her energy, and her teaching is an extraordinary experience"" Deepak Chopra. Musician and yoga teacher Maya Fiennes combines her talents to create a stunningly beautiful Kundalini practice focused on fortifying the bodys stress defenses. Maya uses movement, breath, mantra, and chantsall set to her own exhilarating musicto awaken the spirit, energize the body, and relax the mind. These movement sequences are designed to detoxify and strengthen kidn
Kundalini Yoga to Detox and Destress with Maya Fiennes
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Yoga For Stress Relief
Article by John Furnem
Yoga is a science. That is something to grasp. Yoga is a science, and not a vague, dreamy drifting or imagining. While it is true the west has been familiar with the practice of yoga for a relatively short time, yoga is not a new discipline, and it has been studied and practiced in many countries during the last century. Yoga is an applied science, a systematized collection of laws applied to bring about a definite end.
It takes up the laws of psychology, applicable to the unfolding of the whole consciousness of man on every plane, in every world, and applies those rationally in a particular case. This rational application of the laws of unfolding consciousness acts exactly on the same principles that you see applied around you every day in other departments of science. Yoga uses many of the techniques that are used in more modern and lately developed psychological or even medial physical exercise disciplines.
As one ages he learns that by looking at the world around you, how enormously the intelligence of man, co-operating with nature, may quicken "natural" processes, and the working of intelligence is as "natural" as anything else. The yoga way not only combines this feeling of "cosmos" but also works beneath the surface to strengthen the unity of man with the universe. We make this distinction, and practically it is a real one, between "rational" and "natural" growth, because human intelligence can guide the working of natural laws; and when we come to deal with Yoga, we are in the same department of applied science as, let us say, is the scientific farmer or gardener, when he applies the natural laws of selection to breeding. The farmer or gardener cannot transcend the laws of nature, nor can he work against them. He has no other laws of nature to work with save universal laws by which nature is evolving forms around us, and yet he does in a few years what nature takes, perhaps, hundreds of thousands of years to do.
This can b done by applying human intelligence to choose the laws that serve him and to neutralize the laws that have a negative effect on the goal of the farmer. The farmer brings the divine intelligence in man to utilize the divine powers in nature that are working for general rather than for particular ends.
Yoga is something that can make a real change in peoples lives, we have seen this many times, from the physical practice of yoga to the philosophical implications, through the knowledge of the science of yoga, all that is yoga combines into a bigger, complete discipline that is beneficial for humanity. For some calling yoga is a way to allow this to pass as a acceptable means of physical development, for others it seems like it contradicts the very spiritual nature of yoga, the different faces of yoga, as its different uses sometime creates the illusion of one single use.
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