Aids to Meditation (I)

by Joelle Marlow

The one certainty about meditation is that our ‘monkey mind’ will try its best to distract us. This is the case for beginners and experienced meditators alike. Here we look at specific methods to help focus our concentration when developing our practice. This part covers posture, mindful activity, the body and breath. Part II covers nature; mantras; audio material. None of these is intended to be taken in isolation - they overlap and are outlined here so you can experiment to see which are most useful to you. These articles were written with M.E specifically in mind, but many of the ideas will also apply to other chronic illnesses.

Posture

Posture is important, but doesn’t need to be punishment - especially if you spend much of your life already in pain or discomfort. There are ideal postures explained in most meditation instruction literature, but here we will assume that special conditions apply.

Having the spine straight is advised for meditators who are physically fit enough to manage it, as this has beneficial effects on the whole physiology. Even in good health, Westerners attempting long periods of unsupported sitting can end up with joint and muscle pain however. Some gentle exercise can help [but is recommended only with a qualified instructor and your GP’s consent]. Gentle yoga is recommended for those who want to build strength in their musculature and flexibility in the spine, whilst tai chi and chi kung movement aids the management of core energy within the body. Both of these methods have some exercises that can be done whilst lying down.

However, being realistic, people with weak musculature, a high level of fatigue, or severe ME (which medical research has established makes it hard to maintain an upright position) - should experiment to find a suitable position. “I never attempt to sit up to meditate,” says Dido, who has been practising Buddhist meditation with ME for 25 years and run an ME meditation group. Sheila wrote: “if I attend a meditation group, I ask for a seat with a back or I sit up against the wall with cushions keeping me upright.”

If you lie down to meditate it is suggested that you find a location that is not the one you usually take to sleep at night. This helps to make the practice in some way set apart from the ordinary, to aid your concentration. Strategies can be as simple as moving the pillows where your feet would be and lying the opposite end to the bed to normal. Ideally however, find a surface softer than the floor and harder than a mattress. A full length thin foam mattress or the cushioned part that comes with some sun loungers can be useful. If lying on your back you might want to place cushions under your knees to prevent lower backache, and use a neck cushion pillow under your head.

Observing the posture can be a simple aid to concentration: we can carefully bring our conciousness to how we are sitting or lying, how our muscles and joints feel, how our clothing, as well as the seat or floor feels against us. As or minds wander, we return over and over again to our position, and the nuances of the body’s relation to its environment. It can be particularly relaxing to imagine the surface we’re resting on holding us as we sit/lie passively on it.

Mindful activity

Enlightening chores?

Although most people think of meditation as sitting still, your practice can be directly nourished by activity. By perceiving ordinary activity as special and worthy of total attention, we can transform our experience of it. Some who are housebound discover a surprising freedom in having a life pared down to the bare essentials.
“The biggest hurdles of an average day with ME are washing, and eating.” Tina says. “It varies depending on what care is available to me and my level of illness. Sometimes I’m able to wash dishes or prepare food whilst sitting on a stool. They then have to be my daily aims and I focus on them completely. It’s like climbing Everest for a healthy person. I have to be careful not to risk the relapse that comes if I go beyond my available energy. But I have found that sometimes, if I do the tasks really slowly and mindfully, chores are less tiring. They become almost a meditation. I can find a strange pleasure in just staying with the task, doing it with all my attention.”

Zen practice: 'every minute meditation'

"I would like to share with you… a practice common to many schools of Buddhism known variously as 'working meditation' or 'every-minute meditation'. The method can be summarised in five steps:

1. Do one thing at a time.
2. Pay attention to what you are doing.
3. When your mind wanders to something else, bring it back.
4. Repeat step number three a few hundred thousand times.
5. But, if your mind keeps wandering to the same thing over and over, stop for a minute; maybe it is trying to tell you something important."

by Rev. Daizui MacPhillamy (excerpt from An Introduction to the Tradition of Serene Reflection meditation, [out of print].

Crafts and concentration

Crafts and mindfulness seem go hand in hand. Many people notice a calm centredness when they work in a garden, bake bread, or use their hands in some kind of craft activity. The process harnesses our ‘busy’ mind, and brings us closer to the place where thought stops taking over. The act of creating requires concentration as we use our skills and our senses. We need to concentrate just enough, but not think too much. “When I’m at the wheel, I have no choice but to be in the present.” says Clara, a potter. “If I try to follow a line of thought, even something simple like deciding where to go for lunch, I just have to stop as my work starts to suffer!” For Marion, knitting is as integral to her life as her Buddhist meditation practice, since each influences the other. “The concentration required seems to be very similar”, she notices, “as you notice thoughts but don’t allow them to take over. It has definitely helped my practice.”

The body

'The more consciousness you bring into the body, the stronger the immune system becomes. It is as if every cell awakens and rejoices. The body love your attention. It is also a potent form of self-healing. Most illnesses creep in when yo are not present in the body.'   Eckhart Tolle

The body offers us a wonderful tool when beginning to meditate. The best known technique is to scan the body part by part from head to toe - or toe to head, noticing which muscles are tense, and noticing sensations as the meditation proceeds until the whole body has been surveyed.

Another way is to focus your attention on the hara/tantien, the place just below the belly button. It can help to place your hand lightly on the area. If the mind wanders you simply return to this place with your awareness. One member described a meditation exercise that involved imagining a flame in the hara, and warmth coming from it which then radiates to the rest of the body.

An further method still is to spend your meditation period taking the cue from the body: search for where any the sensations are, and use them as a focus in practice. Notice them without judgement. When distractions come, return to the body. If you struggle with an analytical, busy mind it can help to employ a ‘right brain’ approach that is more abstract. Rather than labelling, naming or explaining what you feel, (eg this is tension/pain in my leg because xyz happened and I am taking xyz medicine) which acts to close down our intuition with a full stop, you might ask in open way… ‘in which part of my body does the sensation reside? What quality does the sensation have?’ Bring felt sensations into your consciousness rather than names. eg. you might sense the feeling as hot, cold, hard, soft, give it a texture or a colour. When your attention rests on it, if the sensation changes, try watching that too in the same way with imagery rather than labels or explanations.

Body Scan resources: There are free guided audio body scan meditations from Wildmind, Dan Darnell (both online only) and Insight Meditation Center (online or download). Note that these meditations assume a sitting posture, but it's easy to practice them lying down too. There's a written meditation at abc-of-mediation.com.

Breath

‘The breath is a very good one-point for concentration, because it’s fresh every second; it helps us bring the mind into the present moment,’ wrote Bo Lozoff, in We’re all Doing Time, the excellent resource he produced to accompany his project bringing meditation to prisoners. ‘And the present moment is the only place that true meditation every happens (in fact, it’s the only place anything ever happens).’ Using the breath as a focus for meditation practice is to be distinguished from breathing exercises, such as those used in Yoga, which seek to change the pattern of the breath in some way, in other words use it actively. In meditation we observe the breath without judgement.

Walpola Sri Rahula teaches how to begin awareness of breathing meditation. “You breathe in and out all day and night, but you are never mindful of it, you never for a second concentrate your mind on it. Now you are going to do just this. Breathe in and out as usual, without any effort or strain. Now, bring your mind to concentrate on your breathing-in and breathing-out; let your mind watch and observe your breathing in and out.”

There are a variety of additional methods of using the breath. A commonly taught technique to beginners of Buddhist meditation is the Mindfulness of breathing: observe the breath without changing it, and count the breaths. ‘In, out, one; in out, two,’ etc. Count to ten, and start again. Resume at the start if you lose your focus completely (as most people do when they start!).

The aim is to observe the breath from within the body, not the mind. So you can also try focusing on relevant parts of the body as you breathe. There are two well known methods. In the first, one concentrates on the exact part of the nostril where the air enters and leaves. It can take a while to establish exactly where this is depending on the person’s physiognomy. Once you have found the spot, this is where your attentions rests with each in and out breath. Alternatively, bring awareness to the lower abdomen as it gently rises and falls with each breath. The area of the second chakra, also known as the Hara or Tantien, is a powerful area for healing the mind/body connection.

Why is it so hard to meditate on my breath?

The bad news is, however, that for many people with ME, the breath just doesn’t feel like a friend in our meditation - nor is the counting helpful. Our feedback usually has been that it’s the opposite. Margaret was exasperated with her experience of breathing meditation practice. “My breathing has got so rapid in recent years (but still abdominal) that just watching it is exhausting and v stressful!” She was not alone. In her ME meditation group, Dido Dunlop recalled that “working with breathing in meditation has been such a problem that we have had to avoid it most of the time and do other things. It has produced tension, distress, and even near panic - because as soon as they watch their breathing they get in touch with how shallow, or hyperventilated, or fast, and uncomfortable it is.” These difficulties arise as a result of the predominance of hyperventilation in ME/CFS. Some health commentators feel that hyperventilation is epidemic in Western society - see the treatment section (find page at top of left hand side bar) for suggestions for tackling hyperventilation.

Using imagery

If counting finds you too stuck in your analytical, left-brain mode, it’s possible images and a more flexible awareness will enhance your meditation on the breath. Gary recalls his Soto Zen teacher’s imagery was most effective for him for meditation on the breath: “we used the image of a gate swinging open and closed with each breath in and out.” Stella, who has practised for some years, emailed, “I do recognise what you say about the counting. I found it unhelpful and it kicked into all sorts of obsessional anxiety stuff. Nowadays I tend to just drop in words as a way to encourage my focus and occupy the ‘wordy’ part of my mind with something helpful to the meditation. I tend to use words like - stillness or depth or space of aliveness or whatever seems helpful at the time. I also use images to integrate more of my faculties with the breath watching - a rising and falling waves image works well for me.”

Dido found using an abstract, imaginative approach enabled a breakthrough with breath- related anxiety. “Just by chance we found that for at least one person, it began to be possible when we were meditating on the air element. We were being aware of the air all around us, in the room and outside, the breezes and winds... and how that air was flowing in and out of our lungs. - then she felt there was at last enough air to breathe and was able to be relaxed enough with it.”

Exercise:

 “Let yourself be breathed. This exercise is best done while lying on your back ... close the eyes, let your arms rest alongside your body and focus attention on the breath without trying to influence it. Now imagine that with each inhalation the universe is blowing breath into you and with each exhalation withdrawing it. You are the passive recipient of breath... As the universe breathes into you, let yourself feel the breath penetrating to every part of your body, even to the tips of your fingers and toes.” Excerpt from Andrew Weil, Spontaneous Healing, p205.

::next: part II - nature, mantras, audio material and Don't give up!