31-Day Meditation Challenge: Day 24

Welcome! This is the twenty-fourth lesson to a 31-Day Meditation Challenge recently recorded in July of 2020 entitled "Seek and Find Within." The audio recording is divided into an opening discourse and a guided meditation.

The last video in the SAMSARA group. It explains that the cycling of thoughts is the literal experience of Samsara and by stilling the mind the yogi meditator achieves the impossible; liberation with life!

Enjoy.

Transcript

Good evening everybody.

Hello,

Hello,

Hello.

Awesome,

Good to see you all as always.

Day 24.

So this is our third day where we're gonna focus on samsara,

A huge concept within yogic,

Buddhist,

And Hindu beliefs.

And so we all have a general understanding of what it represents through a few dimensions,

Right?

The cosmological samsara is the reality of cycles and how so many physical expressions of reality move through their own sort of independent cycles.

Animalistically is living organisms.

Understanding samsara,

Understanding these cycles makes life more predictable,

Whether that's the cycles of the season or more importantly for human beings,

The cyclical nature of our emotional state.

Happiness comes,

Happiness goes,

And then happiness comes back on its own.

You know,

Irritation comes,

Irritation goes,

And inevitably it comes back on its own.

And then the last was as psychological beings,

The repeat of our emotional states and the conditions they're entwined with.

Everything's about learning,

Everything's about evolving.

This goes for humans as much as it does for microbes and plants.

But that repeat,

Samsara,

Allows conscious organisms to evolve forward,

To learn the lessons.

So that's that.

Take time to consider it.

What I wanted to get in today,

Today before you're sort of let off on your own to observe these cycles is there's an inherent contradiction.

You know,

If you're paying attention,

If it's come up,

It's like it's good.

There's a contradiction to the way in which meditation is sort of like taught.

The first is,

The contradiction is,

First you're told that meditation is about stilling the mind,

Right?

And now you're being told that the mind moves through cycles and that those cycles are immutable,

That the mind can't be stilled.

Yet,

We still attempt to still the mind.

And so yogis recognize this as well.

And one thing to appreciate is that a yogi's concept of truth is very different than I think our understanding of a general truth,

Where we think there is truth and there is sort of falsehood.

A yogi in the expansiveness and flexibility of their worldview believes that all phenomenon are true.

Everything fits together like this insane jigsaw mosaic and it only seems false because of our tiny perception or the likelihood of our misperception.

And so all the pieces fit,

We just don't know how to put them together.

And so in that,

Something can be impossible,

Right?

Like the stilling of the mind.

Yet,

Through extreme devotion and effort to practice become possible for the select few.

And so the ambition of meditation is really to achieve the impossible,

To still samsara,

To break the personal cycles of our own existence,

Past lives as well if you believe in reincarnation.

And in that moment,

In that sort of grand display of consciousness where the individual overcomes the patterns of reality itself,

They match up with the divine.

So the internal soul Atman matches with the Brahman and in that sort of they're liberated.

And the philosophy,

The religion is they don't have to come back into this like earthly world of suffering and desire.

They've learned the big lesson that they can actually still that cycle or break the wheel.

And what that literally is experienced through is stilling the thought process.

Okay,

So now we're getting into like the practicality.

How can we still the thought process?

A lot of this has to do with peace.

That's what the breaking of samsara represents through like a living person,

Not through its philosophies.

And when we really learn to study our cycles,

The ups and downs of our emotional states,

The ups and downs of our inspiration or depression,

We learn to normalize those patterns.

I believe that you know when we consider ourselves in a really shallow way,

When we just you know think about who we are and how much control or consciousness we have over ourselves,

We think that we do have peace and we think that we do have control.

But it's only until we meditate and we're asked to either still our minds on a certain object for an extended period of time or just to sit there and enjoy the moment,

We realize that our peace is actually lacking.

It's very fragile and sort of chaotic and our capacity to actually control the mind and our attention is also very weak.

And so this false assumption that we do have control and peace is broken in that moment of meditation.

But as we learn to recognize the inevitable cycles,

The ups and downs of the mind and it all becomes normalized,

At least the subtle shame or the disappointment that we actually don't have the levels of peace we thought and we don't have the levels of focus we thought is obliterated and we can sort of come to terms with who we are and how we operate internally.

And so normalizing is a huge value to just studying the cyclical nature of our thought process.

And then the other is as our psyche is normalized,

As we really start to trust that waves of irritability,

Waves of depression,

Just sort of highlighting the negative because that's usually what's most bothersome,

That all of this isn't just normal but it's supposed to be that way.

That we are supposed to be,

You know,

We're supposed to bounce back and forth between a positive and negative state.

And this sort of goes against our ideas of what,

You know,

A mature or happy person is.

But it's not just happiness.

Yoga is about sort of achieving balance,

Wholeness and embracing the dark side as well as the good side,

Reaching into both directions.

And so from normalizing we really start to match our expectations perfectly to reality and not just sort of what we want reality to be.

And a huge sort of definition of well-being is when our expectations match our reality.

And when we can do this in terms of our own sort of like movements between up and down,

High and low states of energy,

Positive and negative emotional states,

And we can really sort of vibe with that.

Everything,

Every possible psychological experience matches our expectations of what they should be.

And in that we have a different sort of peace.

Maybe not the peace we expect,

But a peace that is deeply real.

Okay,

And so these are just,

You know,

Value points to understanding samsara.

So what are we going to do today?

Observation is key.

The more you observe something,

The more you understand it.

And in time the more likely it is that you will be able to control it.

But observation is paramount.

And so I'm going to sort of ask you to observe three dimensions of samsara in your practice.

One is interest.

I want to be meditating.

I'm into this whole thing.

And then sort of moving into disinterest.

I don't really want to meditate anymore.

I'm sort of bored with it.

I'm impatient.

This is a struggle.

I'm grinding my teeth as I breathe.

And then you want to observe that interest will reemerge.

And so that's the first sort of expression of samsara.

The second is focus,

Right?

You're naturally going to be focused and it's probably tethered to your interest.

And you're focusing on the subtle sensations of the body.

Then all of a sudden distraction emerges and you sort of,

You know,

Wander off into thoughts.

And this cycle between focus and distraction is probably going to be a bit tighter and a bit faster than the cycle of interest and disinterest.

And so it's interesting to see sort of the circumference or the length of time these different cycles sort of express themselves as.

And the last is wakefulness.

Am I awake to this experience physically and mentally?

And then,

You know,

Its opposite would of course be sort of like a lethargy or a numbness.

And this is a really powerful one.

All on its own your body will wake up again.

You don't have to do anything.

You just have to survive the fatigue.

And as always,

As samsara suggests,

You will reenliven physically and mentally.

And so these are the three patterns I want you to observe.

The last thing,

Okay,

So this is the observation piece.

What about that impossible task of actually stilling the mind?

When you're in that sort of zone of focus or you're in that zone of wakefulness or you're in that zone of enthusiasm,

How exactly can you anchor yourself into that space and prevent the wheel from spinning further along?

And the answer is physical energy.

And so the yogis understood that the quality of your consciousness is associated to the level of energy that's in the body through pranayama,

Through breath work.

And what this translates as is your ability to sort of maintain high levels of consciousness is correlated to the aliveness in your cells.

How well your cells are respirating and sort of transferring energy from blood into tissue.

And so if you want to stay locked in those sort of positive cycles,

Hold your breath and experiment with that.

Really hold your breath.

Build those CO2 levels.

Allow yourself to suffocate.

That's going to wake you up.

And you'll find that after the breath technique,

After you've held your breath for a few minutes,

You're going to be in this sort of euphoric present focused space.

And so that's the practical answer to staying locked into the upswing or the positive side of samsara.

Awesome everyone.

So let's get into this today.

Strong seated position.

I'm just going to move through a few of the lessons.

First is stillness and posture.

And appreciate that at first that might have been alien,

But now the 24th round of practice,

Stillness and posture is basic.

Diaphragmatic breathing.

Breathe into the belly and into the chest in every direction.

Forwards,

Backwards,

Left,

Right,

Up and down.

And as you exhale,

Recede into those same directions.

Just try to keep the spine tall.

Slow down the breath.

Now everyone,

Your next inhale,

Open your eyes.

And as you exhale,

Close your eyes.

Do this about three to four to five times.

As the eyes open,

Notice that something changes.

You're drawn out into the external.

Your sense of self diminishes because all this information in your environment is coming in,

Taking up space.

When you close your eyes,

The experience of yourself immediately increases and becomes more profound.

So just do this a few more times.

Notice as you shut your eyes,

There is a natural peace,

A draw,

And an attraction to keeping the eyes closed.

Move with that.

Now with the eyes closed,

Feel the buzzing,

Tingling,

And vibrational quality of your torso,

Skin,

And tissues.

If you can't feel that,

Take a second to hum.

Create physical vibration through the vocal cords and feel it resonate into the vacuum of your chest.

And so how is the mind stilled?

How is Samsara stabilized,

At least psychologically,

By investing in feeling?

Feel more,

Think less.

And then the up and down of thought,

Emotion,

All of this is replaced with the steady buzz of your physical aliveness.

All right,

So you're on your own from this point on.

Do your best to stay focused on the tingling and buzzing in your chest.

Notice the three cycles of Samsara.

Enthusiasm and then disinterest.

This tends to be a longer cycle.

Focus and distraction.

This tends to be a smaller,

Tighter cycle.

It happens a lot very often.

And then wakefulness and fatigue.

Physical.

This again tends to be a longer cycle.

And so you're observing these cyclical patterns.

And at the same time attempting to feel the tingling and buzzing in your chest.

From time to time,

Hold your breath intensely.

Lean into suffocation.

Wake up the cells.

Wake up the brain.

And what should follow once you're breathing normally is a capacity to stay on the positive side of each and every one of those cycles.

Good work.

Enjoy.

Observe.

I'll chime back in in a few.

I'll chime back in in a few.

If you haven't done it yet,

Inhale,

Hold your breath.

Exhale,

Hold your breath for as long as you can.

Two to three times.

Let all of your focus shift into this breath exercise.

As you suffocate,

Your cells wake up.

As CO2 builds in your blood,

Your red blood cells as an emergency response dump out oxygen reserves.

The longer you can hold your breath,

The more oxygen is released from the red blood cells.

This creates wakefulness and gives you the energy to stop samsara.

Let all your focus shift into this breath exercise.

Exhale,

Hold your breath for as long as you can.

Exhale,

Hold your breath for as long as you can.

Exhale,

Hold your breath for as long as you can.

Control the body to control the mind slow down your breath your breath Understanding samsara,

Perceiving samsara,

Samsara,

Is an instrumental moment in a meditator's journey.

So here we go.

The Milky Way is spinning and you are still focused.

Feel the tingling in your chest.

The Earth is orbiting the Sun and you are still focused.

It is daytime and you are focused.

It is night and you are focused.

It is summer and you are focused.

It is winter and you are focused.

You are 23 years old and focused.

You are 35 and focused.

You are 65 and focused.

You are 95 and focused.

You are healthy and you are ill and you are focused.

You are happy and focused.

You are irritated and focused.

You are comfortable and focused.

You are in pain and focused.

The miracle of a meditator's mind is a powerful disassociation from everything that samsara touches.

You are distracted and still focused.

It is a disassociation from the mind that interprets the cosmos.

Understanding samsara normalizing its patterns allows us to let go of them and create just enough space to enter an internal stillness.

Take three more breaths,

Immune to the ups and downs of the body,

The mind,

And the environment.

Feel that.

Bring your hands to heart center slowly.

The body moves and you are still focused.

The body is still and still focused.

It doesn't matter as long as you have a relationship with this mysterious,

Hard to define,

Hard to express space.

Increase your sincerity.

Try to contextualize this idea of samsara as everything that is outside of you,

Everything that moves,

Everything that comes and goes.

But feel that all of that orbits something else,

Something quiet,

Something still.

If you can feel that,

That is spiritual discrimination.

That is called vivik.

Thumb knuckles to third eye center,

Pressing the thumbs into the skin of the forehead.

The discovery of this space,

The exploration of it,

The intimacy that you can create with it,

This is meditation.

No one can touch this space but you.

No one can recognize it but you.

That is the sacredness of this process.

As always whisper namaste into this space,

Greeting it as if it was alive.

Exhale,

Hold the breath.

Release your wrist to your knees,

Nice tall spine,

Holding,

Collecting energy.

Licking up the cells enough to lock on to the upswing of samsara.

When you need to breathe in,

Inhale,

Hold the breath.

Feel that flush of physical energy.

That's the rocket fuel to stay locked on to a positive momentum,

Physical vitality.

Just something to consider.

Everyone exhale.

With your next breath in,

Eyes open.

When my eyes are open,

I am still focusing.

I am still meditating.