Chade-Meng Tan is perched on a chair, his lanky body folded into a half-lotus position. Close your eyes, he says. His voice is a hypnotic baritone, slow and rhythmic, seductive and gentle. Allow your attention to rest on your breath: The in-breath, the out-breath, and the spaces in between. We feel our lungs fill and release. As we focus on the smallest details of our respiration, other thoughtsof work, of family, of moneybegin to recede, leaving us alone with the rise and fall of our chests. For thousands of years, these techniques have helped put practitioners into meditative states. Today is no different. Theres a palpable silence in the room. For a moment, all is still. I take another breath.

The quiet is broken a few minutes later, when Meng, as he is known, declares the exercise over. We blink, smile at one another, and look around our makeshift zendoa long, fluorescent-lit presentation room on Googles corporate campus in Silicon Valley. Meng and most of his pupils are Google employees, and this meditation class is part of an internal course called Search Inside Yourself. Its designed to teach people to manage their emotions, ideally making them better workers in the process. Calm the mind, Meng says, getting us ready for the next exercise: a meditation on failure and success.

More than a thousand Googlers have been through Search Inside Yourself training. Another 400 or so are on the waiting list and take classes like Neural Self-Hacking and Managing Your Energy in the meantime. Then there is the companys bimonthly series of mindful lunches, conducted in complete silence except for the ringing of prayer bells, which began after the Zen monk Thich Nhat Hanh visited in 2011. The search giant even recently built a labyrinth for walking meditations.

Its not just Google thats embracing Eastern traditions. Across the Valley, quiet contemplation is seen as the new caffeine, the fuel that allegedly unlocks productivity and creative bursts. Classes in meditation and mindfulnesspaying close, nonjudgmental attentionhave become staples at many of the regions most prominent companies. Theres a Search Inside Yourself Leadership Institute now teaching the Google meditation method to whoever wants it. The cofounders of Twitter and Facebook have made contemplative practices key features of their new enterprises, holding regular in-office meditation sessions and arranging for work routines that maximize mindfulness. Some 1,700 people showed up at a Wisdom 2.0 conference held in San Francisco this winter, with top executives from LinkedIn, Cisco, and Ford featured among the headliners.

These companies are doing more than simply seizing on Buddhist practices. Entrepreneurs and engineers are taking millennia-old traditions and reshaping them to fit the Valleys goal-oriented, data-driven, largely atheistic culture. Forget past lives; never mind nirvana. The technology community of Northern California wants return on its investment in meditation. All the woo-woo mystical stuff, thats really retrograde, says Kenneth Folk, an influential meditation teacher in San Francisco. This is about training the brain and stirring up the chemical soup inside.

It can be tempting to dismiss the interest in these ancient practices as just another neo-spiritual fad from a part of the country thats cycled through one New Age after another. But its worth noting that the prophets of this new gospel are in the tech companies that already underpin so much of our lives. And these firms are awfully good at turning niche ideas into things that hundreds of millions crave.

Many of the people who shaped the personal computer industry and the Internet were once members of the hippie counterculture. So an interest in Eastern faiths is all but hardwired into the modern tech world. Steve Jobs spent months searching for gurus in India and was married by a Zen priest. Before he became an American Buddhist pioneer, Jack Kornfield ran one of the first mainframes at Harvard Business School.

All that woo-woo mystical stuff is so retrograde. This is training the brain. -Kenneth Folk

But in todays Silicon Valley, theres little patience for what many are happy to dismiss as hippie bullshit. Meditation here isnt an opportunity to reflect upon the impermanence of existence but a tool to better oneself and improve productivity. Thats how Bill Duane, a pompadoured onetime engineer with a tattoo of a bikini-clad woman on his forearm, frames Neural Self-Hacking, an introductory meditation class he designed for Google. Out in the world, a lot of this stuff is pitched to people in yoga pants, he says. But I wanted to speak to my people. I wanted to speak to me. I wanted to speak to the grumpy engineer who may be an atheist, who may be a rationalist.

Duanes pitch starts with neuroscience and evolutionary biology. Were basically the descendants of nervous monkeys, he says, the kind with hair-trigger fight-or-flight responses. In the modern workplace, these hyperactive reflexes are now a detriment, turning minor squabbles into the emotional equivalents of kill-or-be-killed showdowns. In such situations, the amygdalathe region of the brain believed to be responsible for processing fearcan override the rest of the minds ability to think logically. We become slaves to our monkey minds.

Repeated studies have demonstrated that meditation can rewire how the brain responds to stress. Boston University researchers showed that after as little as three and a half hours of meditation training, subjects tend to react less to emotionally charged images. Other research suggests that meditation improves working memory and executive function. And several studies of long-term practitioners show an increased ability to concentrate on fast-changing stimuli. One paper cited by the Google crew even implies that meditators are more resistant to the flu.

But Googlers dont take up meditation just to keep away the sniffles or get a grip on their emotions. They are also using it to understand their coworkers motivations, to cultivate their own emotional intelligencea characteristic that tends to be in short supply among the engineering set. Everybody knows this EI thing is good for their career, says Search Inside Yourself founder Meng. And every company knows that if their people have EI, theyre gonna make a shitload of money.

Meng has had quite a career himself, joining Google in 2000 as employee number 107 and working on mobile search. But for years, his attempts to bring meditation into the office met with limited success. It was only in 2007, when he packaged contemplative practices in the wrapper of emotional intelligence, that he saw demand spike. Now there are dozens of employee development programs at Google that incorporate some aspect of meditation or mindfulness. And Mengwho was born in Singapore and was turned on to Buddhism by an American nunhas slowly ascended to icon status within the company. More than one Search Inside Yourself student has asked Meng for his autograph.

There is in fact little data to support the notion that meditation is good for Googles bottom line, just a few studies from outfits like the Conference Board showing that emotionally connected employees tend to remain at their current workplaces. Still, the company already tends to its employees physical needs with onsite gyms, subsidized massages, and free organic meals to keep them productive. Why not help them search for meaning and emotional connection as well?

Duane, for one, credits Googles meditation program with upgrading both his business and personal life. It wasnt long ago that he was a stress case, and with good reason: He was leading a 30-person site-reliability team while dealing with his fathers life-threatening heart disease. My typical coping strategythe bourbon and cheeseburger methodwasnt working, he says. Then Duane attended a lecture Meng arranged on the neuroscience of mindfulness and quickly adopted a meditation practice of his own.

Duane believes the emotional regulation he gained from meditation helped him cope with his fathers eventual death. The increased ability to focus, he says, was a major factor in his promotion to a management post where he oversaw nearly 150 Googlers. In January he decided to leave the companys cadre of engineers and concentrate full-time on bringing meditation to more of the organization. Google executives, who have put mindfulness at the center of their internal training efforts, OKd the switch.

Duane still doesnt have much use for hippies. He still professes to be a proud empiricist. But when I walk back into the Search Inside Yourself class, neither he nor any of the other Googlers seem at all fazed when Meng tells us to imagine the goodness of everyone on the planet and to visualize that goodness as a glowing white light.

As before, Mengs voice lowers and slows to a crawl. And, of course, we close our eyes. When you breathe in, breathe in all that goodness into your heart. Using your heart, multiply that goodness by 10, he says, in a variation on a Tibetan Tonglen exercise. When you breathe out, send all that goodness to the whole world. And if its useful to you, you may visualize yourself breathing out white lightbrilliant white lightrepresenting this abundance of goodness. We exhale. I actually feel a buzzing on the underside of my skull as I try to imagine pure love. For a minute, I forget that were in a room ordinarily reserved for corporate presentations.

search inside yourself might have remained a somewhat isolated phenomenon in the Valley if a mindfulness instructor named Soren Gordhamer hadnt found himself divorced, broke, out of a job, and stuck in the town of Dixon, New Mexico (population 1,500). Gordhamer, who had spent years teaching yoga and meditation in New York Citys juvenile detention centers, was feeling increasingly beleaguered by his seemingly uncontrollable Twitter habit. He decided to write a bookWisdom 2.0: Ancient Secrets for the Creative and Constantly Connectedthat offered tips for using technology in a mindful manner.

The book wasnt exactly a best seller. But Gordhamer struck a nerve when he described how hard it was to focus in our always-on culture. By providing constant access to email, tweets, and Facebook updates, smartphones keep users distracted, exploiting the same psychological vulnerability as slot machines: predictable input and random payouts. They feed a sense that any pull of the lever, or Facebook refresh, could result in an information jackpot.

And so he got the idea to host a conference where the technology and contemplative communities could hash out the best ways to incorporate these tools into our livesand keep them from taking over. The event, billed as Wisdom 2.0, was held in April 2010 and drew a couple hundred people.

That was three years ago; since then attendance at the now annual conference has shot up 500 percent. In 2013 nearly 1,700 signed up to hear headliners like Arianna Huffington, LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner, Twitter cofounder Evan Williams, and, of course, Meng talk about how they run their enterprises mindfully. Gordhamer has become a Silicon Valley superconnector, with an array of contacts that would make an ordinary entrepreneur burst with envy. He now leads private retreats for the technorati, and more conferences are in the worksone just for women, another to be held in New York City. Everywhere you turn at Wisdom, says PayPal cofounder Luke Nosek, its like, Oh my God, youre here too?'

On an enclosed porch outside the exhibition hall at this years Wisdom 2.0 event, Zen-monk-turned-CEO Marc Lesser talks about his plans to take the Search Inside Yourself training to companies everywhere. Plantronics, Farmers Insurance, and VMware have already signed up. Nearby, companies promoting mindfulness apps and cloud-based platforms for market professionals hawk their wares while an acoustic guitar player strums. On the main stage, executives discuss how they maintain mindful practices during the workweek: One wakes up early and focuses on his upcoming meetings; another takes a moment to pause as she dries her hands in the bathroom. In the cavernous, wood-paneled main hall, oversize screens show a silhouette of a brain connected to a lotus flower and the logos for Twitter and Facebook.

One of the reasons that Wisdom 2.0and the broader movement it representshas become so big, so quickly, is that it stripped away the dogma and religious trappings. But its hard not to consider what gets lost in this whittling process. Siddhartha famously abandoned the trappings of royalty to sit under the Bodhi Tree and preach about the illusion of the ego. Seeing the megarich take the stage to trumpet his practices is a bit jarring.

It also raises the uncomfortable possibility that these ancient teachings are being used to reinforce some of modern societys uglier inequalities. Becoming successful, powerful, and influential can be as much about what you do outside the office as what you do at work. There was a time when that might have meant joining a country club or a Waspy church. Today it might mean showing up at TED. Looking around Wisdom 2.0, meditation starts to seem a lot like another secret handshake to join the club. There is some legitimate interest among businesspeople in contemplative practice, Kenneth Folk says. But Wisdom 2.0? Thats a networking opportunity with a light dressing of Buddhism.

On the THIRd day of this years Wisdom 2.0 conference, Facebook engineering director Arturo Bejar takes the stage with Thupten Jinpa, the Dalai Lamas English interpreter and right hand in North America. They tell the crowd about an experiment going on at Facebook that is at once subtle, a little strange, and potentially of deep significance. While many other Silicon Valley companies are teaching their employees to meditate, Facebook is trying to inject a Buddhist-inspired concept of compassion into the core of its business.

Bejar had been a somewhat reluctant guest at the first Wisdom 2.0 conference in 2010. But he was struck by an onstage conversation about kindness with American Buddhist trailblazer Jon Kabat-Zinn. If people truly see one another, Kabat-Zinn said, theyre more likely to be empathetic and gentle toward each other. Bejar knew something about depending on the kindness of others. As a geeky teenager in Mexico City in the 1980s, he snuck into a tech convention by bribing the guards with candy bars; a local IBM exec was so impressed he gave Bejar a job. Then Bejar had his college education paid for by a friend of a family friend: Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak.

Buddhism teaches that we are all interconnected. And nowhere is that more apparent than on Facebook.

After hearing Kabat-Zinn, Bejar began looking for ways to bring some of that compassion to Facebook, where bullying and flame wars were all too common among users and the tools for reporting offensive content werent terribly effective. Bejar set up a series of compassion research days at Facebook and brought in Buddhist-inspired academics from Berkeley, Yale, and Stanford to see if they could help.

The researchers advice: Make the tools more personal, more conversational, and more emotional. For instance, let people express their vulnerability and distress when asking for a problematic picture or status update to be removed. The changes were small at first. Instead of tagging a post as Embarrassing, users clicked a new button that read Its embarrassing. But those three letters made an enormous difference. It turned the report from a seemingly objective classification of content into a customers subjective, personal response. Use of the tool shot up 30 percent almost immediately. This in a field where a change of a few percentage points either way is considered tectonic.

Further fixes followed: personalized messages, more polite requests to take down a photo or a post, more culture-specific pleas. (In India, for example, online insults directed at someones favorite celebrity tend to cut deeper than they do in the US.) Hey, this photo insults someone important to me, reads one of the new automatically generated messages. Would you please take it down?

Itd be easy to be cynical about this effortto laugh at people who over- identify with a Bollywood starlet or to question why meditation teachers, the masters of directing attention, are working with the social networks that cause so much distraction. But when you sit with Bejar and his colleagues at Facebook as they review these reportswhen you see all the breakups, all the embarrassing photos, the tiffs between mothers and daughtersits hard not to feel sad and awed at the amount of confusion and hurt. Over a million of these disputes happen every week on Facebook. If you had a Gods-eye view of it all, wouldnt you want to handle that pain with gentle hands?

Buddhists have been preaching for centuries that we are all fundamentally interconnected, that the differences between us literally do not exist. That is the basis of Buddhist compassion. And there is no place where this interconnectedness is more obviously revealed than on Facebook. Arturo Bejar isnt running off to a monastery; his personal meditation practice, if you can call it that, is taking a walk with his camera. But incorporating Buddhisms compassionate kernel into a billion-person social network? That reflects a level of insight many people will never reach, no matter how long they sit cross-legged.

One night during the Wisdom 2.0 conference, I meet Kenneth Folk and some of his prot9g9s at a vegetarian restaurant run by the local Zen center. At first the conversation doesnt sound so different from what I might hear at Wisdom 2.0: the neuroscience of mindfulness, the remixing of ancient traditions, the meditation-as-fitness riff.

Then things turn kaleidoscopic. After the mesquite-grilled brochettes with Hodo Soy tofu, Vincent Horn, who runs the popular Buddhist Geeks website and podcast, tells me that everyone Im eating with is enlightened.

Horn drops this casually, as if he were discussing his hair color or the fact that all of the men are wearing pants. Im not sure how to respond. As Jay Michaelson the guy sitting to my left, and the author of Evolving Dharma: Meditation, Buddhism, and the Next Generation of Enlightenment gleefully notes, talking openly about enlightenment is as big a taboo as there is in modern American Buddhism, where the exploratory journey trumps any metaphysical destination. Enlightenment implies sainthood, perfect wisdom, an end to the cycle of birth and death. Michaelson, Folk, and Horn are polishing off their second bottle of red. Is that who they think they are?

Folks journey toward enlightenment, he later explains to me, started in 1982 when he ran out of cocaine. An addict, he took the only drugs he could find: four hits of LSD. He saw a glass tube open up into the sky and merge with beautiful white light. My drug addiction vanished in that moment, he recalls. It sent him on a decades-long journey to re-create the experience. He spent three months on a silent retreat in Massachusetts and another six at a Burmese monastery, wearing a sarong in winter and eating his final meal of the day at 10 am. He found himself hitting ecstatic heights. But he also found that, at times, meditation could lead to rather horrible depression.

The monks of Burma told Folk that the depressive episodes were the completely predictable result of his meditative work and that they would soon be over. He was on a well-worn path through 16 stages of insight, each one bringing him closer to enlightenment. They laid out a map of his inner voyage and told Folk precisely where he was. Folk followed their plan and, he says, eventually became enlightened.

It was a radical shift from the method traditionally used by mystics to impart wisdom, in which a master cryptically pointed the acolyte in the direction he should go. And Folk loved it. Enlightenment wasnt some completely mysterious, ungraspable goal. He returned to America ready to preach a gospel of jail-broken enlightenment: The source code for spiritual awakening is open to anyone. Enlightenment is real. It is reproducible, he says. It happens to real human beings. It happened to me.

Not surprisingly, Folks doctrine was rather attractive to a set of seekers who were raised with the idea that information should be free and status updates should be shared publicly. He and Horn started contributing to a web forum called the Dharma Overground, founded by Daniel Ingram, the soundman for one of Folks old bands. It became the place online to share tips on the most effective means to promote enlightenment, to brag about the mystical powers that come with intensive meditation, and to chart their progress through the four rounds of 16 stages that lead to a final awakening. Ingram wrote Mastering the Core Teachings of the Buddha: An Unusually Hardcore Dharma Book, which became a cult classic, in part because it likened meditation to a contemplative videogame. Episodes of Horns Buddhist Geeks podcast are now downloaded regularly by 100,000 people. On his website, Horn is constantly introducing new forms of mindfulness for the social media crowd, from concentration- boosting apps to something he calls #Hashtag Meditation.

But until recently, Folk himself remained relatively unknown. He lived with his mother-in-law in a New York City suburb, teaching meditation over Skype. Then, in the spring of 2011, Luke Noseka partner at one of Silicon Valleys most successful venture capital firmsemailed Folk from Manhattan and insisted they get together. Like, immediately. I have a spaceship, said Nosek, whose fund owned a chunk of the private rocket company SpaceX. What planet do I have to fly to so I can meet you tonight?

Nosek had a history with meditation. But nothing like this. When he and Folk meditated, it brought him into a state of such utter focus, he says, that I could see the patterns of threads in my socks with more detail than I had in my entire life. Nosek and several other execs paid to move Folk out to San Francisco so he could start opening some of Silicon Valleys most influential minds.

In some ways, Folks seemingly mystical enlightenment gospel would appear to be a bad fit for the titan-of-industry setespecially compared with the business-friendly message found at Search Inside Yourself or Wisdom 2.0. And several established Buddhist leaders who came to this years conference were openly wary of what they saw as an unhealthy fixation on the brass ring of enlightenment. If someone really wants it, Ill teach it, says Kornfield, cofounder of the Spirit Rock Meditation Center north of San Francisco. But a strong goal orientation can heighten unhealthy ambition and self-criticism. It doesnt really heighten wisdom.

Folks doctrine may be less radical than it seems, however. Yes, he calls himself enlightened. But he doesnt think of himself as some holy man. To him, the old stories of Buddhist saints shaking off their cravings for food or sex are just that: stories. Sainthood is a relic of the past, he says.

Nor is Folk interested in re-creating that LSD-induced peak anymore. Its a losers game, he says. Better to take every experience as it comes and then let it pass. (You cant hold on to those feelings anyway.) Enlightenment may be hackable and shareable, but only if its meaning radically changes. To Folk, being enlightened is about meta-OK-nessmeaning that its OK even when its not OKwhich he says anyone who tries can achieve.

At search Inside Yourself, Meng starts with a seemingly small request for Googlers to pair off and take turns meditating on each others happiness. I sit across from Duane, the tattooed former engineer, and do my best to send him good vibes. Not only is he a nice guy whos been through some pain, hes at least indirectly responsible for the tools I use a thousand times a day. I want him and every other Googler to be their highest selvescentered, focused, calm, and content. Perhaps I can help head off a future Google Buzz.

But Meng has another goal in mind for this exercise: to help his colleagues develop mental habits conducive to kindness. Its these sorts of meditations, Meng tells me later, that ultimately led him to discover the ability to access joy on demand. After a while, it became a skill. He smiles and gives me a look as if to say: No, seriously.

Maybe I shouldnt be surprised at the claim. Last year Meng published a Search Inside Yourself book. The introduction proclaims him to be a closet Bodhisattvaa Buddhist saint, next in holiness to Siddhartha himself.

Despite the language of neuroscience and business advancement, Search Inside Yourself is ultimately an attempt to replicate Mengs elevated mind-statefirst in Googlers and then in the rest of us. We can all become saints, because saintly habits are trainable, he tells the class. I hope you all do.

And if we start such training, Meng insists, we wont just be helping ourselves. My dream is to create the conditions for world peace, and to do that by creating the conditions for inner peace and compassion on a global scale, he writes. Fortunately, a methodology for doing that already exists Most of us know it as meditation.

Suddenly acid-inspired Kenneth Folk seems downright grounded in comparison. Its hard to deny that meditation can have remarkable benefits. But world peace? Sainthood? That may be a bit of a stretch. Steve Jobs spent lots of time in a lotus position; he still paid slave wages to his contract laborers, berated subordinates, and parked his car in handicapped stalls.

One of Mengs students raises her hand. This saintly training, this randomly wishing for others happinessit doesnt seem all that genuine, she says: It felt like I was saying the words, but I wasnt actually doing anything by thinking that.

Duane tells her its OK to feel that way. The practice will help you later, he says, even if it comes across as empty at the time. Theres definitely a fake-it-till-you-make-it aspect to it, he says.

Oh no, Meng answers. Its the first time in the whole class hes corrected anyone. Its not faking it until you make it, he says. Its faking it until you become it.

The session ends and we walk out into the sun feeling slightly dazed. The next lesson begins in five minutes.

ARTURO BEJAR: The Facebook engineer rewrote the networks alerts to be more compassionate.

Contributing editor Noah Shachtman (noah.shachtman@gmail .com) wrote about cracking an ancient secret code in issue 20.12.

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In Silicon Valley, Meditation Is No Fad. It Could Make Your ...

Meditation is a word that has come to be used loosely and inaccurately in the modern world. That is why there is so much confusion about how to practice it. Some people use the word meditate when they mean thinking or contemplating; others use it to refer to daydreaming or fantasizing. However, meditation (dhyana) is not any of these.

Meditation is a precise technique for resting the mind and attaining a state of consciousness that is totally different from the normal waking state. It is the means for fathoming all the levels of ourselves and finally experiencing the center of consciousness within. Meditation is not a part of any religion; it is a science, which means that the process of meditation follows a particular order, has definite principles, and produces results that can be verified.

In meditation, the mind is clear, relaxed, and inwardly focused. When you meditate, you are fully awake and alert, but your mind is not focused on the external world or on the events taking place around you. Meditation requires an inner state that is still and one-pointed so that the mind becomes silent. When the mind is silent and no longer distracts you, meditation deepens.

From childhood onward, we have been educated only to examine and verify things in the external world. No one has taught us how to look within, to find within, and to verify within. Therefore, we remain strangers to ourselves, while trying to get to know others. This lack of self-understanding is one of the main reasons our relationships dont seem to work, and why confusion and disappointment so often prevail in our life.

Very little of the mind is cultivated by our formal educational system. The part of the mind that dreams and sleepsthe vast realm of the unconscious which is the reservoir of all our experiencesremains unknown and undisciplined; it is not subject to any control. It is true that the whole of the body is in the mind, but the whole of the mind is not in the body. Except for the practice of meditation, there is no method to truly develop control over the totality of the mind.

The goal of meditation is to go beyond the mind and experience our essential naturewhich is described as peace, happiness, and bliss. But as anyone who has tried to meditate knows, the mind itself is the biggest obstacle standing between ourselves and this awareness. The mind is undisciplined and unruly, and it resists any attempts to discipline it or to guide it on a particular path. The mind has a mind of its own. That is why many people sit for meditation and experience only fantasies, daydreams, or hallucinations. They never attain the stillness that distinguishes the genuine experience of deep meditation.

We are taught how to move and behave in the outer world, but we are never taught how to be still and examine what is within ourselves. When we learn to do this through meditation, we attain the highest of all joys that can ever be experienced by a human being. All the other joys in the world are momentary, but the joy of meditation is immense and everlasting. This is not an exaggeration; it is a truth supported by the long line of sages, both those who renounced the world and attained truth, and those who continued living in the world yet remained unaffected by it.

Meditation is a practical means for calming yourself, for letting go of your biases and seeing what is, openly and clearly. It is a way of training the mind so that you are not distracted and caught up in its endless churning. Meditation teaches you to systematically explore your inner dimensions. It is a system of commitment, not commandment. You are committing to yourself, to your path, and to the goal of knowing yourself. But at the same time, learning to be calm and still should not become a ceremony or religious ritual; it is a universal requirement of the human body.

Learning how to be still is the method of meditation. The process of cultivating stillness begins with the body. In the yoga tradition, you are guided by a competent teacher to keep your head, neck, and trunk straight while sitting in a meditative posture (asana). When you have learned to be comfortable in this posture, you should form a regular habit of practicing in the same posture at the same time and at the same place every day.

Find a simple, uncluttered, quiet place where you will not be disturbed. Sit on the floor with a cushion under you or in a firm chair, with your back straight and your eyes closed. Then bring your awareness slowly down through your body, allowing all of the muscles to relax except those that are supporting your head, neck, and back. Take your time and enjoy the process of letting go of the tension in your body. Meditation is the art and science of letting go, and this letting go begins with the body and then progresses to thoughts.

Once the body is relaxed and at peace, bring your awareness to your breath. Notice which part of your lungs are being exercised as you breathe. If you are breathing primarily with your chest you will not be able to relax. Let your breathing come primarily through the movement of the diaphragm. Continue to observe your breath without trying to control it. At first the breath may be irregular, but gradually it will become smooth and even, without pauses and jerks.

Meditation is a process of giving your full attention to whatever object you have chosen. In this case you are choosing to be aware of the breath. Allow yourself to experience your breathing in an open and accepting way. Do not judge or attempt to control or change it. Open yourself so fully that eventually there is no distinction between you and the breathing. In this process many thoughts will arise in your mind: Am I doing this right? When will this be over? Perhaps I should have closed the window. I forgot to make an important call. My neck hurts. Hundreds of thoughts may come before you and each thought will call forth some further response: a judgment, an action, an interest in pursuing the thought further, an attempt to get rid of the thought.

At this point, if you simply remain aware of this process instead of reacting to the thought, you will become aware of how restless your mind is. It tosses and turns like you do on a night when you cannot fall asleep. But that is only a problem when you identify with the mind and react to the various thoughts it throws at you. If you do, you will be caught in a never-ending whirlwind of restless activity. But if you simply attend to those thoughts when they arise, without reacting, or if you react and attend to the reaction, then they cannot really disturb you. Rememberit is not the thoughts that disturb you, but your reaction to them.

Meditation is very simple. It is simply attending. You can begin by attending to your breath, and then if a thought comes, attend to it, notice it, be open to itand it will pass. Then you can come back to the breath. Your normal response is to react to all your thoughts, and this keeps you ever busy in a sea of confusion. Meditation teaches you to attend to what is taking place within without reacting, and this makes all the difference. It brings you freedom from the mind and its meandering. And in this freedom you begin to experience who you are, distinct from your mental turmoil. You experience inner joy and contentment, you experience relief and inner relaxation, and you find a respite from the tumult of your life. You have given yourself an inner vacation.

This inner vacation is not a retreat from the world but the foundation for finding inner peace. You must also learn to apply the principle of attending in your worldly activities, so that you can apply yourself in the world more effectively. Through practicing meditation you can learn to be open to what comes before you in your daily life and give it your full attention.

Ordinarily, you react to the experiences that come before you in much the same way that you react to your thoughts. If someone says something negative to you, you become angry or depressed. If you lose something, you become emotionally upset. Your mood depends on what comes before you, and, as a result, your life is like a roller coaster ride. You react before you have fully experienced what you are reacting to. You immediately interpret what you see or hear according to your expectation, fears, prejudices, or resistances. You short-circuit the experience, and thus limit yourself to one or two conditioned responses instead of responding to a situation openly and creatively.

But if you apply the principle of meditation to experiences that come before you, you can fully attend to what is taking place. You can attend to your initial reaction without reacting to your reaction: Oh, look how threatened I feel by that. Let yourself be open to experiencing your reaction and it will move through you and allow other spontaneous responses to also come forward, so that you can select the one that is most helpful in that particular situation.

In this way meditation is very therapeutic. It not only leads to inner balance and stability, it also exposes your inner complexes, your immaturities, your unproductive reflexes and habits. Instead of living in these complexes and habits and acting them out, they are brought to your awareness and you can give them your full attention. Only then will they clear.

Have patience and do your practice systematically. Every action has a reaction. It is not possible for you to meditate and not receive benefits. You may not notice those benefits now, but slowly and gradually you are storing the samskaras (impressions) in the unconscious mind that will help you later. If you sow a seed today, you dont reap the fruit tomorrow, but eventually you will. It takes time to see results; be gentle with yourself.

Meditation means gently fathoming all the levels of your being, one level after another. Be honest with yourself. Dont care what others say about their experienceskeep your mind focused on your goal. It is your own mind that does not allow you to meditate. To work with your mind, youll have to be patient; youll have to work with yourself gradually.

At first you may see progress in terms of physical relaxation and emotional calmness. Later you may notice other, more subtle changes. Some of the most important benefits of meditation make themselves known gradually over time and are not dramatic or easily observed. Persist in your practice and you will find that meditation is a means of freeing yourself from the worries that gnaw at you. Then you are free to experience the joy of being fully present, here and now.

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The Real Meaning of Meditation | Yoga International

The terms meditation and mindfulness are tossed around quite a bit these days, highlighted in studies touting their health benefits, or yoga studios declaring new ways for you to find inner peace in your busy life. The terms are often used interchangeably, and sometimes, in their simplified forms, refer to the same general thing the idea of calming your frenzied mind.

The differences between mindfulness and meditation have beendebated and interpreted in thousands of ways, and the debate likely will continue. Theyre two sides of the same coin they complement each other, and they very often overlap. At the same time, each has its own specific definition and purpose.

Much like yoga, the history of meditation and mindfulness is ancient and spiritual, originating in religion. Meditation predates even ancient times, having its origins in prehistoric religions that involved rhythmic chants, or mantras. But the earliest records of meditation can be found in the Vedas, the oldest texts of Hinduism, dating from 1700-1100 BCE. Later on, different forms of meditation began developing in Buddhism and Taoism, mainly in India and China.

Ancient meditation focused on spiritual growth and transcending emotions to live in a calm present state. After being introduced to the West in the 20th century, meditation was realigned to match the goals of a modern, secular society and it was soon used as a way to reduce stress and improve healthy living, similar to the Western worlds version of yoga.

This painting from the 1800s, "Man Meditating in a Garden Setting," depicts a man practicing traditional meditation. Wikimedia / PD-US

Though its often a fine line, heres the main difference between the two:Meditation is a large umbrella term that encompasses the practice of reaching ultimate consciousness and concentration, to acknowledge the mind and, in a way, self-regulate it. It can involve a lot of techniques or practices to reach this heightened level of consciousness including compassion, love, patience, and of course, mindfulness. So mindfulness is a type of meditation, alongside tantra, yoga, sexuality, silence, breathing, and emptiness.

Mindfulness is the act of focusing on being in the present, such as focusing completely on drinking a hot cup of tea, taking in its scent, warmth, and taste and removing overpowering emotions from the mind.

Mindfulness is a form of meditation, Lodro Rinzler, a meditation author and teacher, as well as founder of MNDFL, told Medical Daily. There are many forms of meditation, including contemplation and visualization, but mindfulness is the type where you bring your full mind to an object. Being mindful of your breath, for example, is a common form of mindfulness during meditation. Following your breath improves your awareness of being in the present. This is called mindfulness meditation, known as shamatha among Buddhists.

Rinzler adds that eating could be another way to practice mindfulness: You can be mindful of your food, truly tasting it, and when you drift off into all sorts of thoughts, returning to tasting your food that is an act of mindfulness.

The practice of meditation predates the idea of mindfulness, Rinzler explains. Mindfulness is often aligned with the time of the Buddha, in which the Buddha discovered that focusing entirely on his breath would allow him to see reality and reach meditation more quickly.

Thich Nhat Hanh (third from the right, wearing a scarf) arrives in Vietnam. Wikimedia

In the modern age, Thich Nhat Hanh, a Vietnamese Buddhist monk who is well-known for his teachings on mindfulness, introduced The Five Mindfulness Trainings to the world. One of Hanhs students, Jon Kabat-Zinn, would become famous for popularizing mindfulness as a stress reduction and health-based approach in the U.S. In 1979, Kabat-Zinn, Professor of Medicine Emeritus at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, started the Stress Reduction Clinic and the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society to treat chronically ill patients. This jumpstarted the notion and trend of employing mindfulness as a way to live a healthier life.

Whether you want to learn all about the different techniques of meditation or if you simply want to learn how to be more mindful in your daily life to reduce stress, theres plenty of evidence to support that harnessing your mind to be in the present can improve your mental and physical health.

One recent study found that people who practice mindfulness had healthier glucose levels, suggesting that improved focus and self-control could help fight obesity and unhealthy eating habits. Mindfulness meditation was also linked to improved sleep quality among older adults who would normally be using pills. It has been associated with improved focus, reduced dependency on opioid drugs, and lowered anxiety and depression levels. But perhaps whats most remarkable is that research has actually shown that mindfulness and positive thinking had a beneficial effect on the DNA of breast cancer patients, suggesting that the effects of mindfulness meditation on the body may be far more extensive than we know.

Embarking on the journey of meditation can be difficult but if you want to start out with baby steps, take ten minutes out of each day to remain mindful when drinking tea, taking a break during work, or focusing on your breath before sleep. Theres quite a bit of power in the simple act of focusing your mind.

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meditation - Medical Daily

KMC Georgia Classes

Kadampa Meditation Center Georgia offers many kinds of ongoing classes, class series and one-time events throughout Georgia and Alabama, suitable for both beginners and experienced meditators. Everyone is welcome. The format of each class varies depending on the topic. But in general ourteachers

Most classes run for an hour and a half. There is no physical exercise or special clothing involved. Come dressed however is comfortable for you. You do not need to be a Buddhist to attend and to derive great benefit. They are perfectly suitable for individuals of all faiths.

The meditation practices we apply are very time-honored and authentic.Here is a video of a Kadampa Teacher explaining the many benefits of meditation. To get a feel for the practice itself, you can also view general guidanceon how to meditatehere.

Easy! KMC Georgia offers three levels of classes

If you are new to Kadampa Buddhism or Buddhism in general, then

Here are a few other things you may want to look at to get to know us better

If you would like more information, please dont hesitate at (678) 453-6753 or at info@meditationingeorgia.org.Were very nice! We look forward to seeing you soon.

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Classes - Kadampa Meditation Center Georgia

This is a simple yet powerful meditation available to anyone who can invest 12 minutes of their day. This is an effortless meditation.

The purpose of this free guided meditation is to help an individual get in touch with the source of his existence and create life according to his own wish and vision. Daily practice brings health, dynamism, peace and wellbeing. It is a powerful tool to cope with the hectic pace of modern life.

This free guided meditation is simple, and easy to practice in the comfort of your own home. It has the potential to transform the life of anyone who is willing to invest just a few minutes a day!

Meditation is not something that you do; meditation is something that you become. Meditation is not an act; it is a certain quality that you grow into. Why is there a need to become meditative, first of all?

When you were born, you were so small. And now, you have grown your body. Obviously, the body is something that you gathered; it is an accumulation. Similarly, the mind is also an accumulation. The body is an accumulation of food; the mind is an accumulation of impressions. Whatever you accumulate can be yours, but it can never be you, because the very fact that you accumulate means you gather something from somewhere else. Let us say you gathered a 150-pound body; if you are determined, in a few days, you could make it 140 pounds. Where did these 10 pounds of body go? You would not go looking for them, because they are an accumulation.

Once you get identified with things that you have gathered from the outside, your perception has completely gone haywire; you cannot perceive life the way it is. The moment you experience the body as myself, and the moment you experience the impressions that you have in your mind as myself, you cannot perceive life the way it is. You can only perceive life the way it is necessary for your survival. For a human being, survival is very important, but it is not enough. For any other creature on this planet, when the stomach is full, life is settled. But for a human being, life does not end with the survival process. Actually, for a human being, life begins only after survival is fulfilled.

Meditation means giving you an experience, an inner state, where what is you and what is yours is separate. It brings an absolute clarity of perception; you see life just the way it is. Right now, your ability to go through this world is only to the extent that you clearly see it. For example, for thousands of years, people went on arguing about whether the planet is round or flat. Leave all the textbooks that you have read aside, take a walk and see in your experience, is this planet round or flat? In your experience, it is still flat. This argument could have continued forever, but man started flying. We went up and looked down and it was very clear that the planet was round. We even went to the moon and looked down, and it was 100 percent clear. Only when we removed ourselves from this earth and looked down was there no more argument about it. Otherwise, we would still be arguing.

The same is true for your own body and mind; unless there is a little distance, you dont see it the way it is, because you are in it. Meditation is a simple process that gives you a little distance from your own mind and your own body. You have probably heard of the word Buddha. Bu means buddhi, or the intellect. Dha means dada, or one who is above. One who is above his intellect is a Buddha. A Buddha has clear perception of the nature of his mind. One who is in the intellect is a nonstop suffering human being.

Look at this sincerely. Whatever you experience as moments of happiness and peacefulness are just those moments where you are able to leave anxiety, tension and stress behind. But if you turn back, they will be sitting right there, because once you are in your intellect, stress, anxiety and tension are very normal. But if you are above the intellect, it is the end of suffering. Being a Buddha means there is no question of suffering, because suffering has either come through your body or through your mind. Do you know any other kind of suffering other than physical and mental suffering? Once there is a distance from your physical body and your mental structure that is the end of suffering.

Meditation is the first and the last freedom, because it gives you a gallery view of your own body and your own mind. There can be no suffering once this distance is established. Sadhguru

Here are some simple meditation tips to help you meditate with ease:

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Free Guided Meditation - Isha Foundation USA

In meditation we are constantly discovering who and what we are. Chgyam Trungpa

For over 40 years, the Shambhala Meditation Center has offered New Yorkers the opportunity to work with their minds and hearts through meditation. Our mission is to inspire an awake and compassionate society through personal and collective transformation.

We offer public meditation classes, mindfulness training workshops, and a wide range of teachings from the Shambhala Buddhist tradition. Come and sit with us.

Key Dates and Deadlines for those planning their 2018 Retreat Schedule:

Desung Training: Compassionate Care for CommunityApplication Deadline: Thursday, December 21st

Shambhala Training: The Complete PathThe Six-Month Curriculum begins Thursday, January 4th

Sacred Path: The Complete SeriesPre-requisite: Shambhala Training. See the 2018 Dates

Teaching Mindfulness: A 200-Hour CertificationApplication Deadline: Monday, January 29thMeditation in the City Retreat: The Winter WeekthunThis retreat is a pre-requisites for Enlightened Society Assembly, and takes place the week of February2ndEnlightened Society Assembly:Application Deadline: Thursday, May 25th

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Shambhala Meditation Center of New York

Alexander C.N., et al. Treating and preventing alcohol, nicotine, and drug abuse through Transcendental Meditation: A review and statistical meta-analysis. Alcoholism Treatment Quarterly 11: 13-87, 1994.

Aron E.N. and Aron A. The patterns of reduction of drug and alcohol use among Transcendental Meditation participants. Bulletin of the Society of Psychologists in Addictive Behaviors 2: 28-33, 1983.

Clements G., et al. The use of the Transcendental Meditation programme in the prevention of drug abuse and in the treatment of drug-addicted persons. Bulletin on Narcotics 40(1): 5156, 1988.

Gelderloos P., et al. Effectiveness of the Transcendental Meditation program in preventing and treating substance misuse: A review. International Journal of the Addictions 26: 293325, 1991.

Gelderloos P., et al. Effectiveness of the Transcendental Meditation program in preventing and treating substance misuse: A review. International Journal of the Addictions 26: 293325, 1991.

Orme-Johnson D. W. Transcendental Meditation as an epidemiological approach to drug and alcohol abuse: Theory, research, and financial impact evaluation. Alcoholism Treatment Quarterly, 11, 119-165, 1994.

Royer A. The role of the Transcendental Meditation technique in promoting smoking cessation: A longitudinal study. Alcoholism Treatment Quarterly 11: 219-236, 1994.

Shafii M. et al. Meditation and marijuana. American Journal of Psychiatry 131: 60-63, 1974.

Shafii M. et al. Meditation and the prevention of alcohol abuse. American Journal of Psychiatry 132: 942-945, 1975.

Wallace R.K. et al. Decreased drug abuse with Transcendental Meditation: A study of 1,862 subjects. In Drug Abuse: Proceedings of the International Conference, ed. Chris J.D. Zarafonetis (Philadelphia: Lea and Febiger): 369-376, 1972.

Walton K. G., and Levitsky, D.A. A neuroendocrine mechanism for the reduction of drug use and addictions by Transcendental Meditation. Alcoholism Treatment Quarterly 11: 89-117, 1994.

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New York City - Transcendental Meditation

Alexander C.N., et al. Treating and preventing alcohol, nicotine, and drug abuse through Transcendental Meditation: A review and statistical meta-analysis. Alcoholism Treatment Quarterly 11: 13-87, 1994.

Aron E.N. and Aron A. The patterns of reduction of drug and alcohol use among Transcendental Meditation participants. Bulletin of the Society of Psychologists in Addictive Behaviors 2: 28-33, 1983.

Clements G., et al. The use of the Transcendental Meditation programme in the prevention of drug abuse and in the treatment of drug-addicted persons. Bulletin on Narcotics 40(1): 5156, 1988.

Gelderloos P., et al. Effectiveness of the Transcendental Meditation program in preventing and treating substance misuse: A review. International Journal of the Addictions 26: 293325, 1991.

Gelderloos P., et al. Effectiveness of the Transcendental Meditation program in preventing and treating substance misuse: A review. International Journal of the Addictions 26: 293325, 1991.

Orme-Johnson D. W. Transcendental Meditation as an epidemiological approach to drug and alcohol abuse: Theory, research, and financial impact evaluation. Alcoholism Treatment Quarterly, 11, 119-165, 1994.

Royer A. The role of the Transcendental Meditation technique in promoting smoking cessation: A longitudinal study. Alcoholism Treatment Quarterly 11: 219-236, 1994.

Shafii M. et al. Meditation and marijuana. American Journal of Psychiatry 131: 60-63, 1974.

Shafii M. et al. Meditation and the prevention of alcohol abuse. American Journal of Psychiatry 132: 942-945, 1975.

Wallace R.K. et al. Decreased drug abuse with Transcendental Meditation: A study of 1,862 subjects. In Drug Abuse: Proceedings of the International Conference, ed. Chris J.D. Zarafonetis (Philadelphia: Lea and Febiger): 369-376, 1972.

Walton K. G., and Levitsky, D.A. A neuroendocrine mechanism for the reduction of drug use and addictions by Transcendental Meditation. Alcoholism Treatment Quarterly 11: 89-117, 1994.

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Transcendental Meditation (TM) Technique - New Hampshire

DIRECTIONS TO MEDITATION GROUP:Click here.SUBSCRIBE TO E-MAIL NOTICES:Click hereSUBSCRIBE TO RSS NEWS FEEDS:Click here

NOTE: We recently revised the set-up of our meeting times for the Meditation Circles About page and wanted to share that with members of the circle and those interested in attending. | Thad and Doug

WHO WE ARE:

Welcome. The Meditation Circleis a meditation group in the Buddhist tradition, practicing vipassana or insight meditation. Were based in Charleston, West Virginia, and meet every Tuesday from 6 to 7 p.m. at theUnitarian Universalist Congregation, 520 Kanawha Blvd.

Those wishing instruction in basic, breath-centered Buddhist meditation are welcome to arrive from 5:30 to 6 p.m., alongwith seasoned meditators who maywish to sit longer or for whom that time period is better for their schedules.

Were a lay support group for people interested in meditation or who wish to deepen their practice through the support of a meditation sangha. Our members come from a wide variety of spiritual traditions and backgrounds. You do not need to be Buddhist to enjoy the benefits of a meditation practice. The circlesfacilitators are not teachers and we encourage people to seek out seasoned teachers to further their practice. Cushions, meditation benches and chairs are available or you arewelcome to bring your own cushion, if you wish.

WHAT WE DO:

The time from5:30 to 6 p.m. p.m.. is set asideforbasic instruction in sitting, standing, and walking meditation for those new to meditation, along with discussion about maintaininga regular meditation practice.Regular meditators are also welcome to come and sit during this period.

From6 to 7 p.m,time is set aside for seated meditation. The format consists of two rounds of meditation, each lasting about 20 minutes, with a 5 minute period of standing or walking meditation between rounds.We close the evening with a short Metta meditation. (Metta is the Pali term for loving-kindness or friendliness.) There is an opportunity for questions or discussion about practice at the end of the meditation period. Feedback welcome!

Those new to meditation practice may visit ourResource pagefor more information about the type of meditation we practice at the Meditation Circle.

There is no cost to join the circle. We do accept donations in a box titled dana to offer to the Unitarians to cover the costs for their kindness in letting us use the space and also to help defray the costs of occasionally bringing Buddhist monks to town.

Come join the Circle!(Although sometimes it resembles an oblong or parallelogram, but the Meditation Parallelogram of Charleston didnt have quite the right sound.)

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the Meditation Circle | A meditation group in the Buddhist ...

Meditation

Meditation is a mental and physical course of action that a person uses to separate themselves from their thoughts and feelings in order to become fully aware.

It plays a part in virtually all religions although some don't use the word 'meditation' to describe their particular meditative or contemplative practice.

Meditation does not always have a religious element. It is a natural part of the human experience and is increasingly used as a therapy for promoting good health and boosting the immune system.

Anyone who has looked at a sunset or a beautiful painting and felt calm and inner joy, while their mind becomes clear and their perception sharpens, has had a taste of the realm of meditation.

Successful meditation means simply being - not judging, not thinking, just being aware, at peace and living each moment as it unfolds.

In Buddhism the person meditating is not trying to get into a hypnotic state or contact angels or any other supernatural entity.

Meditation involves the body and the mind. For Buddhists this is particularly important as they want to avoid what they call 'duality' and so their way of meditating must involve the body and the mind as a single entity.

In the most general definition, meditation is a way of taking control of the mind so that it becomes peaceful and focused, and the meditator becomes more aware.

The purpose of meditation is to stop the mind rushing about in an aimless (or even a purposeful) stream of thoughts. People often say that the aim of meditation is to still the mind.

There are a number of methods of meditating - methods which have been used for a long time and have been shown to work. People can meditate on their own or in groups.

Meditating in a group - perhaps at a retreat called a sesshin or in a meditation room or zendo - has the benefit of reminding a person that they are both part of a larger Buddhist community, and part of the larger community of beings of every species.

David Midgley is founding director of the Jamyang Buddhist Centre Leeds. Dr Susan Blackmore is Lecturer in Psychology at the University of the West of England and Bristol. They discuss meditation practices with Liz Watson, director of the London Christian Meditation Centre.

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These lines from the ancient Buddhist scripture the Dhammapada suggest that the mental states we experience are the key to everything in our lives.

If we are consumed by craving or aversion, we will experience the world very differently from the way we will experience it if we are overflowing with generosity and kindness.

Buddhist meditation is an invitation to turn one's awareness away from the world of activity that usually preoccupies us to the inner experience of thoughts, feelings and perceptions.

For Buddhists, the realm of meditation comprises mental states such as calm, concentration and one-pointedness (which comprises the six forces: hearing, pondering, mindfulness, awareness, effort and intimacy).

The practice of meditation is consciously employing particular techniques that encourage these states to arise.

Some classical meditation methods use the meditator's own breathing. They may just sit and concentrate on their breathing... not doing anything to alter the way they breathe, not worrying about whether they're doing it right or wrong, not even thinking about breathing; just 'following' the breathing and 'becoming one' with the breathing.

It is important not to think: "I am breathing". When a person does that they separate themselves from the breathing and start thinking of themselves as separate from what they are doing - the aim is just to be aware of breathing.

This is more difficult than it sounds. Some meditators prefer to count breaths, trying to count up to ten without any distraction at all, and then starting again at one. If they get distracted they notice the distraction and go back to counting.

But there are many methods of meditation - some involve chanting mantras, some involve concentrating on a particular thing (such as a candle flame or a flower).

Nor does meditation have to involve keeping still; walking meditation is a popular Zen way of doing it, and repetitive movements using beads or prayer wheels are used in other faiths.

In the West, for many of those who want to explore a spiritual path, meditation is the first thing they encounter.

In Buddhist tradition, meditation is the second part of the 'threefold path'.

There are many formulations of the Buddhist path to spiritual awakening but the threefold path is generally seen as the most basic one.

The first training, and the indispensable basis for spiritual development, according to the Buddha, is ethics (shila).

Buddhism does not have laws or commandments but its five ethical precepts are guidelines for how to live in a way that avoids harming others or oneself.

Meditation (samadhi) is the second training. Acting ethically gives rise to a simpler life and a clear conscience, which are a sound basis for meditation practice.

Meditation clarifies and concentrates the mind in preparation for the third training: developing wisdom (prajna). The real aim of all Buddhist practice is to understand the true nature of our lives and experience.

A useful way of understanding the diversity of meditation practices is to think of the different types of meditation.

These practices are known as:

This isn't a traditional list - it comes from modern meditation teachers who draw on more than one Asian Buddhist tradition. Neither are there hard and fast distinctions.

A particular meditation practice usually includes elements of all four approaches but with the emphasis on one particular aspect.

Connected with meditation, but not quite the same as it, is the practice of mindfulness. This, too, is an essential part of Buddhist practice and means becoming more fully aware of what one is experiencing in all aspects of one's life.

Mindfulness always plays a part in meditation, but meditation, in the sense of setting out to become more and more concentrated, is not necessarily a part of mindfulness.

If you focus your attention on an object it gradually becomes calmer and more concentrated.

In principle, any object will do - a sound, a visual image such as a candle flame, or a physical sensation.

In the tantric Buddhism of Tibet and elsewhere, meditators visualise complex images of Buddha forms and recite sacred sounds or mantras (in fact these images and sounds have significance beyond simply being objects of concentration).

But the most common and basic object of concentrative meditation is to focus on the naturally calming physical process of the breath.

In the 'mindfulness of breathing', one settles the mind through attending to the sensations of breathing.

There are many variations on how this is done. Here is a common version of the practice:

An example of a 'generative' practice is the 'development of loving kindness' meditation (metta bhavana). This helps the person meditating to develop an attitude of loving kindness using memory, imagination and awareness of bodily sensations.

In the first stage you feel metta for yourself with the help of an image like golden light or phrases such as 'may I be well and happy, may I progress.'

In the second stage you think of a good friend and, using an image, a phrase, or simply the feeling of love, you develop metta towards them.

In the third stage metta is directed towards someone you do not particularly like or dislike.

In the fourth stage it is directed towards someone you actually dislike.

In the last stage, you feel metta for all four people at once - yourself, the friend, the neutral person and the enemy.

Then you extend the feeling of love from your heart to everyone in the world, to all beings everywhere.

Scripture on this practice says: 'As a mother would risk her life to protect her child, her only child, even so should one cultivate a limitless heart with regard to all beings. With goodwill for the entire cosmos cultivate a limitless heart.' (Metta Sutta)

Other generative practices in Buddhism include tonglen - the Tibetan practice of breathing in the suffering of others and breathing out a purifying white light. This practice is aimed at cultivating compassion.

In the mindfulness of breathing or the metta bhavana meditation practice, a balance needs to be struck between consciously guiding attention and being receptive to whatever experience is arising.

This attitude of open receptive attention is the emphasis of the receptive type of meditation practice.

Sometimes such practices are simply concerned with being mindful. In zazen or 'just sitting' practice from the Japanese Zen tradition, one sits calmly, aware of what is happening in one's experience without judging, fantasising or trying to change things.

A similar practice in Tibetan tradition is dzogchen. In both cases, the meditator sits with their eyes open. (Usually people close their eyes to meditate).

Zazen and dzogchen practices gain depth from the underlying belief in the significance of being in the present moment.

Reflective meditation involves repeatedly turning your attention to a theme but being open to whatever arises from the experience.

Reflective practices in Buddhism include meditations on impermanence and interconnectedness as well as faith enhancing practices such as meditation on the qualities of the Buddha.

The classical meditation position is 'the lotus position'. This involves sitting cross-legged with the left foot on top of the right thigh and the right foot on top of the left thigh.

If you can't manage that it is still good to sit on the floor either kneeling or cross-legged with enough support to have both knees on the ground and the back erect without having to strain.

But it is possible to meditate in any stable posture that keeps the spine straight. Sitting quietly in a chair is perfectly acceptable.

While it helps for the body to be alert, relaxed and stable, meditation is really about the mind and the inner experience. Posture is a support to that but most Buddhist traditions do not regard it as an end in itself.

It is useful to take time before and after you meditate to settle into and emerge from the practice. It is always a good idea to have some space to let thoughts die down and tune into your feelings and bodily sensations.

Over the last half century meditation has gradually become a more familiar practice in the West.

Just as many people practice hatha yoga (which is Hindu in origin) or T'ai Chi (which is Taoist) for their health benefits, so many people practice Buddhist meditation without being a Buddhist.

It is a valuable tool for developing self-knowledge, learning to concentrate and dealing with stress.

In recent years there has been growing interest in using meditation and mindfulness in palliative care, particularly learning to cope with chronic pain and preventing relapse into depression.

Within its Buddhist context, meditation is a vital component of its path to spiritual awakening.

In the UK, as in many other western countries, there are many Buddhist centres and independent teachers offering meditation classes and courses.

There are also many books, tapes and websites devoted to the subject.

But the general advice from Buddhists is that it helps to meditate with others and to have teachers who can help you with issues that arise along the way.

It also helps to go on retreat with other meditators, when you can focus on meditation more fully.

Zen is about living in the present with complete awareness.

Practitioners turn off the automatic pilot that most of us operate from throughout the day -- we don't really notice all the things that are going on around us or within our own minds.

They try to experience each moment directly. They don't let thoughts, memories, fears or hopes get in the way.

They practice being aware of everything they see, hear, feel, taste, and smell.

Another way of looking at this is to say that a Zen practitioner tries to be completely aware in the activity of any particular moment -- to the extent that they are one with what they are doing. So, for example:

Zen practice is to realise that thoughts are a natural faculty of mind and should not be stopped, ignored, or rejected.

Instead, thinking, especially discursive thinking, is to be acknowledged but then put to one side so that the mind is not carried away by worries, anxieties, and endless hopes and fears.

This is liberation from the defilements of the mind, the suffering of the mind, leaving the truth of this vast, unidentifiable moment plain to see.

In Zen Buddhism the purpose of meditation is to stop the mind rushing about in an aimless (or even a purposeful) stream of thoughts. People often say that the aim of meditation is "to still the mind".

Zen Buddhism offers a number of methods of meditation to people - methods which have been used for a long time, and which have been shown to work.

Zen Buddhists can meditate on their own or in groups.

Meditating in a group - perhaps at a retreat called a sesshin or in a meditation room or zendo - has the benefit of reminding a person that they are both part of a larger Buddhist community, and part of the larger community of beings of every species.

The key Zen practice is zazen. This involves sitting in one of several available positions and meditating so that you become fully in touch with the true nature of reality.

Different schools of Zen do zazen in different ways: Soto meditators face a wall, Rinzai meditators sit in a circle facing each other.

Meditation is possible in any stable posture that keeps the spine fairly straight. Sitting quietly in a chair is perfectly acceptable.

The classic posture for Zen meditation is called the Lotus Position. This involves sitting cross-legged with the left foot on top of the right thigh and the right foot on top of the left thigh.

The lotus position is difficult and uncomfortable for beginners, and there are other sitting positions that are a lot easier to achieve, such as the half lotus (in which only one foot is put on top of the opposite thigh) or simply sitting cross-legged or sitting on a cushion with knees bent and lower legs tucked under upper legs.

Some classic meditation methods use the meditator's own breathing. They may just sit and concentrate on their breathing not doing anything to alter the way they breath, not worrying about whether they're doing it right or wrong, not even thinking about breathing; just "following" the breathing and "becoming one" with the breathing.

But there are many methods of meditation - some involve chanting mantras, some involve concentrating on a particular thing (such as a candle flame or a flower). Nor does meditation have to involve keeping still; walking meditation is a popular Zen way of doing it, and repetitive movements using beads or prayer wheels are used in other faiths.

Meditation teaches self-discipline because it's boring, and because the body gets uncomfortable. The meditator learns to keep going regardless of how bored they are, or how much they want to scratch their nose.

Koans are questions or statements, often paradoxes, that provoke spiritual understanding. They are often used by masters as a way of teaching pupils, and also to test enlightenment.

Don't think that the koan and its solution are themselves wisdom and truth. They may be, but their particular importance here is their use as tools to help you understand the true nature of yourself and of everything, and to increase your awareness of what is.

A well known koan is "In clapping both hands a sound is heard; what is the sound of one hand?"

Koans can't be solved by study and analytical thought. In order to solve a koan, the pupil must leave behind all thoughts and ideas in order to respond intuitively.

Koans don't have a right answer. Western pupils often find this very frustrating, since most westerners are used to trying to get the right (and only) answer to a problem. For the same reason, the truths of Zen can't be learned just by reading a scripture or getting a solution from a a teacher or a text book.

The best way to work with koans is with a teacher. Without a teacher it can be too easy to fool yourself into thinking that you've solved a koan.

The first collection of koans was made in the 11th century CE. They are a favourite teaching tool of the Rinzai school of Buddhism.

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BBC - Religions - Buddhism: Meditation