Day 018/365: Guided Meditation | Ajahn Brahm

This track includes several tools to help strengthen your meditation practice. About 15 minutes of Dharma talk/meditation advice and inspiration. About 20 minutes of guided meditation and about 25 minutes of silent meditation practice. These are followed by a Q&A session/closing thoughts after the meditation practice.

Transcript

Hi,

Welcome to the meditation class today.

The announcement always,

First of all,

This is the ongoing meditation class.

So those of you who have come for the first time to the introduction to meditation class,

That is the series of four talks to begin your journey in meditation.

That is in the room to my right.

This is the ongoing class.

And because it's an ongoing class,

I do talk about different aspects of meditation.

I hope to try to do that every week.

So it's not always the same.

And it sometimes deals with the beginnings of meditation,

Sometimes the middle,

And sometimes what happens in deep meditation,

Because that does happen to people.

But today I wanted to even go further back than the beginnings of meditation to preparation for meditation,

Because whatever you take into the meditation class,

That takes a while to sort of settle it down and get calm.

So it's wonderful that before you come in here to make the best of meditation,

Have five or ten minutes just relaxing,

Calming down,

Because I just saw there's a couple of people who are late,

Running down the road there to get the introduction to the meditation class.

If you run to do some meditation,

You're going to get quite so tired and tense.

And it will take that bit of an extra time to get your mind peaceful.

It's a simile between the difference of a person going on a bicycle and putting on the brakes,

They can stop within a few feet.

But if that's one of these road trains which you see going along the Great Northern Highway,

Another big road in Australia,

They got so heavy and they're so fast,

If they put the brakes on,

It's going to take a long time for them to stop.

So it's nice to actually,

If you come into the meditation,

To get the best out of it,

Even just to start slowing down even before you sit on your chair or on your cushion.

That really helps.

And I've seen that and I've known that and it's one of the reasons why whenever we do a meditation here,

Every Saturday afternoon,

I talk to you for 15 minutes.

It's not just to give you information,

It's also to try and get you in the mood,

To settle you down.

Many of you have struggled to find the time to get here and to make it into this hall,

It's a bit of a rush sometimes,

Especially as you're running late,

Which most people usually do.

And then when you get into the hall,

If I start to meditate straight away,

It will take time before the mind can really,

Really settle down and become calm.

And it is the old story of how do you get the water to be still.

The more it's shaking,

The longer it will take to become peaceful once you let it go.

So it's great to do preliminary meditation,

Even before you come here.

And it's not that hard to do because most of you come here in a car,

If you came in a bus,

I'm going to deal with that afterwards,

You're sitting in a car onto meditation every time you come to the red traffic lights.

It's the time to remember,

This is stop,

Be calm,

Be peaceful.

And I do know it's been confirmed,

I've never seen it myself,

But I have many disciples,

I think it is in Chennai,

Where if you get to the red traffic lights in Chennai,

They don't say stop.

They say relax.

So they're not called stop lights anymore,

They're called relax lights.

What a beautiful thing that is.

So when you're actually waiting at the traffic lights,

It's a little bit of meditation,

You're just stopping and letting the mind become peaceful.

You don't get upset and angry or look at your clock,

How long do I have to wait here?

It's a time preparation for the meditation here,

Just to relax.

So if you're waiting for a bus,

The bus hasn't come yet,

So just be there and just learn how to relax.

You can't do anything at the red traffic lights,

You can't do anything when you're waiting for the bus.

It's these beautiful opportunities in life,

Stop moving your body,

Relax the mind,

It's a great preparation for the deeper meditation here.

And the very,

If you practice like that before you come to a meditation class,

You can actually see that it's not just even just calming the mind down as a preparation,

It's getting into the right attitude for meditation.

The same thing about being calm and being patient.

Because one of the other problems with people when they're meditating,

They're quite impatient.

I've told you many of what the beautiful experiences which happen in meditation,

You've read about them,

Other people have told you that you get nice peace,

A lot of joy,

Beautiful lights in the mind and other stuff.

And people actually hear those things and they're impatient for them,

Which is one of the reasons why when it gets to patience,

Like being at the traffic lights waiting for your bus or your train,

You remember the two types of patience.

The first type of patience is waiting for something to happen.

Waiting,

I call that waiting in the future.

And that's what most people understand as being patient.

So we're waiting for the bus to come,

We're waiting for the traffic light to change.

That is not patience,

That stresses you out.

You're in the future not enjoying the present and you're not relaxing,

You're wanting something to happen.

Every time you want something to happen,

You should feel your mind getting quite tense.

Now that's waiting in the future.

The other thing is waiting in the present moment.

So you're at the traffic lights,

You're in the present moment,

Wonderful,

I can really relax now,

I've got a few seconds,

Maybe even longer to enjoy this moment,

I don't have to pay attention to the traffic,

I don't have to look out for speed cameras,

I don't have to be worrying about pedestrians or whatever,

I'm stopped,

It's safe,

I can really relax,

I can put a lot of concerns aside.

It's called waiting in the moment.

And also waiting in the moment is that when you are at the bus stop,

Waiting in the moment,

Just enjoy,

Sit down.

That's why I think I said last night that in Montreal,

I've seen this and other people have seen this,

That at their bus stops,

They don't have benches which is so last century,

They have children's swings at the bus stops.

So everybody waiting for the bus to come,

They get on a swing and they swing backwards and forwards like in the children's playground and they are incredibly popular.

And they say,

You've got to wait,

Let's enjoy the present moment while we are waiting.

And apparently the report which I saw next to the pictures was saying the swings at the bus stop when you are waiting for your bus to come are so popular that many people on those swings,

Their bus comes and they are enjoying themselves so much they think,

Well I'll wait for the next one.

Now that's a symbol for me of enjoying waiting in the moment rather than always waiting for something to happen.

So if you can do that on your way to the meditation class,

Just enjoy waiting at the red traffic light,

Enjoy stopping,

Not doing anything,

Enjoy waiting for the bus,

Enjoy just stopping,

Then you are also not just preparing your mind and relaxing on the way here,

You are preparing your attitudes because they are the same attitudes which create great success in your meditation.

And somebody reminded me,

They showed me a little quote from a book which somebody wrote about me,

The essence of meditation is an attitude.

What I meant by that is the way to meditate,

The thing which works more than anything else is just the way you meditate.

It's not what you experience but how you experience it.

And this is a great trick because you don't have to just have great lights or other stuff happening in your mind,

All you really need is to have this beautiful attitude of learning how to wait in this moment and be content in this moment.

I don't know if you can see through the window,

There's this beautiful rain coming outside and I'm so content that I'm inside,

Not getting wet.

And so there's so much joy in this moment but many people will be waiting for the rain to stop and that will make them even more tense.

So when you are meditating,

Don't wait for something to happen,

Thinking,

Okay,

When?

Now I get peaceful,

When this thought finishes,

When the pain disappears,

Then I'll be happy.

No,

See if you can learn to have that beautiful happiness now.

Enjoy where you are.

Don't try and get somewhere else,

Which gets again to the essence of meditation.

Every time we're trying to get somewhere,

Do something,

We're putting pressure on ourselves,

Pressure on our mind to perform,

To achieve,

To reach our goals or our sales targets,

Whatever those are.

So,

Peace in meditation is learning how to do the opposite of that.

The same things you learn waiting for the bus or being in the red traffic lights,

Learning just how to wait in this moment to be and learn this beautiful contentment.

Now some people have this idea,

Well if you don't do anything,

You won't get anywhere.

And the opposite is the case because when you really relax in this moment,

When you're content at the red traffic light,

You find your mind and body get more peaceful,

You can feel that.

But when you think,

I'm at the traffic light,

When's it going to change,

When it's going to change,

You should be able to feel your body get more tense and your mind get more worried.

Say when you're meditating,

You're sitting here,

When you want something to happen,

When you want to get rid of something,

I don't like this,

I want to get out of here,

When is my bus coming,

Then you'll find you get tense,

The body gets so tight and the mind gets worried and more business.

Please remember this is not business coming to this centre and meditating,

It's not doing more work,

It's learning how not to work.

I know people think the weekend they don't do any work,

Now what a joke,

You've done a lot of work already and the weekend is not even half over yet.

If you haven't been actually working at your computer,

Getting fixed,

Fixing up loose ends,

Cleaning the house,

Doing this,

Doing that,

At the very least you'll be thinking a lot,

Planning and worrying.

So please learn here how to really have a weekend off,

Just to be and don't fight anything,

No goals,

You're stuck in the traffic,

You're stuck in this moment,

There's a red traffic light and I'm telling you stop,

You're waiting in the moment in this bus shelter called meditation,

Enjoying the swings,

Enjoying this moment,

That's all you really need to do.

So the attitude of meditation is paramount.

So just learn how to be rather than learning how to achieve things.

You're all high achievers,

You don't get anywhere in meditation in that type of path.

You get ways of meditation when you learn not to achieve,

Just to be,

You could be content,

To be still,

To stop and then all these incredible things happen.

So that is how to meditate,

Your body relaxes,

Your mind gets peaceful and then incredible joy starts to come up because the more peaceful you are,

The more joy you have,

The more still,

The more power and the more wisdom.

That is a way of meditation.

Okay,

So that's the little introduction to get you going and now we'll do the meditation as usual.

It's a 45 minute meditation,

Those who came in late,

If you came in for the introduction to meditation class,

That is in the room to my right,

This is the ongoing class.

So do a 45 minute roughly meditation,

I will guide you at the beginning of it,

Maybe for 15 minutes just to get you in and then I'm going to leave you alone so that you can discover your own little paths in meditation.

So if you like to get yourselves comfortable and you can cross your legs,

Sit on the floor,

You don't have to sit on the floor.

We have chairs there,

Still plenty of empty chairs and we also have nice wall space,

You can always lean against the wall somewhere,

Which I always say is the most popular place in this meditation hall,

It in against a nice pillar somewhere.

Very good.

Please find your nice position somewhere.

Okay,

The introduction class is the room to my right here,

Sorry?

Outside,

Yeah,

Outside and to the right over there is the introduction to meditation class.

Knock on the door,

The person inside is very nice,

They're not related to Adolf Hitler.

So,

Very good.

And for all of you here,

Closing your eyes.

With your eyes closed,

We start off with bringing awareness onto our body,

Simple mindfulness of your bodily feelings.

So this is what you're focusing on,

What you're looking out for,

How is my body?

And with your eyes closed,

You're not so distracted by sight.

So your brain has got more space to be able to feel.

It gets more sensitive to the aches and the pains,

The heat and the cold,

The itches and the comfort of your body.

So now,

You're starting to become sensitive to your body,

Do you need to move it?

It's great to move the body with your eyes closed.

You can fidget your bottom,

You can straighten your back or loosen it,

Lean back,

Find out the best position for you.

You feel your way into the most beneficial posture.

Any tight pieces of clothing,

Loosen them.

If you need to cough,

Please cough anytime.

Scratch,

Scratch.

Thank you,

I didn't say sneeze but well done,

You got the message.

And as you start to relax your body,

You'll find that only a certain amount of relaxation can be done by physical adjustment.

And there comes a time when you feel that tension,

That ache,

That pain inside of your body.

And to relax that,

We do this wonderful mindfulness,

Awareness of that irritating sensation,

Wherever it is in your body,

Be mindful of just the one part of the body which is causing you trouble.

There's many parts causing you trouble,

Just the main area first.

And when you are aware of that part of the body causing you trouble,

You will notice that the feeling,

The sensation does change.

Sometimes it gets more painful,

More irritating,

Sometimes it relaxes only a little bit but you can feel that with your mindfulness.

And next,

See if you can associate the relaxation of that irritation with an attitude of mind called letting it be.

You'll find by trial and error,

With mindfulness giving you feedback,

What letting go is.

It's that attitude of mind which releases the pressure,

Which loosens this holding on,

This stretching,

This pulling,

Which expands rather than presses down onto something.

Those visual images when applied to the irritation,

The pain,

The ache,

The itch,

It lessens the intensity of that disturbance and you move towards relaxation,

Ease,

Bodily comfort.

So with practice,

You become quite skilled at lessening the pain and irritation of a sick,

Damaged old body.

And once you've dealt with one part of the body,

You go to another part,

Which is tense or irritating or tight.

Be aware of it,

Mindful,

Learn how to relax it,

Let it be,

Be kind.

You feel that area,

Just relax,

The mindfulness shows you you're actually easing off.

This mindfulness is like looking at a dial on the dashboard of your car,

Shows you whether you're going too fast or too slow and how to move that needle one way or the other.

This is the needle of tension or relaxation.

You'll soon learn how to move that needle of bodily tension,

Relaxation towards more and more relaxation.

Just see how relaxed,

How at ease,

How comfortable your body can become.

Now with practice,

You'll soon be able to relax your body so deeply that it feels like you've just been through a massage or a spa.

You can't find any tightness or tension anywhere in your body.

In fact,

You feel what I call the delight of relaxation,

A specific form of pleasure with your body,

All over it,

Your body which is at ease,

No tension,

No tightness.

A tingling sort of feeling,

Like when you wake up in the morning,

Cozy in bed.

It's important to start the meditation with the body relaxed.

But even just getting this far has huge physical and emotional benefits,

Good health,

The start of peace of mind when your body is at ease.

Once the body is at ease,

Then we look at our inner world,

The world of your emotions,

Your thoughts.

Sometimes that inner world,

Like the body,

Can be so sick,

So many pains and aches.

The pain of the future,

The ache,

So the pain of the past,

The ache of the future,

Just like in your body.

If one of them is really strong,

Be aware of it.

This is a problem of your past,

Some of which happened.

So be aware of it,

Be mindful of it,

But don't just be mindful of the details of that event in the past which is bothering you.

Be aware of its heaviness,

Just its ability to be irritating.

See what you need to do to lessen that irritating,

That heavy,

That demanding nature of your past.

Be mindful of that attribute of your past,

The burden of it.

See what you need to do to lessen the weight of your past.

That is called letting go.

Whatever was the past softens,

It gets easier.

When it gets very light,

You can very easily let it go totally,

Or it just fades away by itself.

There's this own problem of the future,

Which is always pulling at you,

Demanding your attention because of your anxiety or worry.

Just be aware of the pull of the future,

The anxiety attribute.

So don't be aware of the details of your future problem.

Again,

Be aware of its weight,

White pausia.

See if you can lessen that.

You're mindful of that attribute,

You see it change,

Get worse,

Get better.

Soon you learn how to make that pull weaker and weaker and weaker.

So the future doesn't grab you.

Until you relax the body,

You've relaxed the mind away from the past and future.

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When the mind becomes very peaceful,

That is the time you may start to be aware of your breath.

The breath gives you something to settle on.

As you're mindfulness,

Just notice the breath coming in and going out.

Where you are aware of the breath doesn't matter as long as you know breath going in.

As you know breath going out,

At the beginning it can be helpful to say as you breathe in,

Breathing in peace,

Breathe out,

Let go.

But imagine peace coming in,

Not just the word,

Not the signpost,

But what that word describes.

However you understand it,

Bring that peace into your body and mind as you breathe in.

And whatever is troubling you,

A sickness,

A problem,

Breathe that out with every out breath.

Breathing in peace,

Breathing out,

Let go.

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Just know how you feel,

Especially be mindful of how peaceful you have become compared to when you started.

See if you can know the extent of the delight of a peaceful,

Relaxed body,

Peaceful mind.

See how beautiful that feels.

It's important,

It's where we get insight from,

Knowing the cause of freedom and the cause of being entrapped.

I am now going to ring the bell three times.

At the end of the third ringing,

Please come out from your meditation.

Excellent.

For those who have been here before,

You know that this is all streamed live.

You're not seen on the camera so you're quite safe.

The camera's up there.

And so we have,

Oh,

We have three questions here.

Two from the United States,

One from Hawaii,

Who are just listening in.

First from the United States,

Thanks to you I have been able to let go of drugs,

Depression,

Anxiety.

That's pretty good.

Now I'm so addicted to meditation that I hardly get anything else done.

Is that unhealthy?

Oh no,

That's great from the United States,

You're my hero.

That's great,

They've let go of drugs,

Depression,

Anxiety,

Now I'm so addicted to meditation I can hardly get anything else done,

Is that unhealthy?

That's very,

Very healthy.

Because with the meditation you do so much,

You get a very bright mind,

A very strong mind,

You can get heaps and heaps and heaps of things done in less time.

But also you realize how few things actually needed to be get done.

The most pursing on your agenda,

The first thing that people should always remember needs to be done first,

Is their health and their happiness.

So being addicted to meditation,

Well done.

Next one from United States,

Nick.

How can people dealing with anxiety break that barrier when trying to be more mindful during meditation?

There's several ways.

One way is all anxiety is about something happening in the future and also with a lot of negativity about it going wrong.

Imagine if you think of the future with a positive mind.

It's not anxiety,

It's wow,

I can't wait for it to happen.

And so the negativity sort of disappears.

So one of the first things when doing meditation is to develop this wonderful positive mind,

Which we do when we start to relax and bring a little bit of joy into our minds.

But also when we meditate,

If we can let go of all the future,

Of course there's no place for anxiety.

Anxiety is always when we wander off,

It's outside of our present moment.

Our present moment is like a little safety bubble for you,

Nick.

In here,

You're here,

It's not that bad,

You can enjoy this moment.

The future is so out of control,

Of course it will give you anxiety.

But by first of all coming into this present moment and realizing this is a safety bubble for you,

You also understand that your future is being made right now.

So if you really are anxious for your future,

You know you are doing the very best you can possibly ever do if you stay in this moment.

It is here that peace,

Happiness,

Health are made,

Are constructive,

Right in this present moment.

Present moment awareness is one of the best ways of overcoming that anxiety.

And number two is,

Again if you have really chronic anxiety,

What I've been telling people,

Wrote about in my book,

Any emotion,

Including especially anxiety,

Registers as a physical feeling on your body.

So if anxiety does start to come up,

Unless you are a very skilled meditator,

It's very,

Very hard to let go of and as you say,

Cross through that barrier.

So instead,

Feeling on your body where anxiety is registered as a tightness,

A tension,

A pain,

Usually in your chest.

And then deal with the manifestation of anxiety in your body.

And the best way is to always take your hand and massage in an area where anxiety manifests in your body.

Massage,

Massage,

It's so easy to be mindful if the massage is very pleasant.

And when you massage your body which has got anxiety,

After a little while,

The physical manifestation of anxiety goes.

And with it goes all the anxiety as well.

I wrote about that in my book,

It's worked really,

Really well.

Many people have wrote in,

So emailed in and it actually works.

It's very simple to overcome anxiety panic attacks.

And after a while,

It's like a neural network in your brain which overcompensates and just creates this feeling of anxiety that is trained away.

It's just a habit,

It's like a bad habit of the brain.

And we actually manage that so there are girls again,

So you're not anxious.

Lastly from Hawaii,

Aloha,

Adjourn,

Aloha,

Missy.

That's very nice.

I should actually say the G'day,

Missy.

You say Aloha,

This is Australian.

I sometimes have panic attacks and feel out of body and I notice sometimes in meditation I start to feel out of body and then I panic.

Any suggestions?

Again,

No need to panic about that.

Again,

If you do have a panic attack,

Find it in your body,

Rub it,

So the panic attack goes away.

But if you do feel out of your body,

After a while you don't panic,

You get used to that,

It's actually quite nice being outside of your body.

I don't know about your body but my body is getting old.

It used to be quite nice to be in my body when I was young,

But now I'm a bit fed up with it,

It's like being in an old car,

It rattles a lot,

Things break down.

So actually if your body disappears,

All my body disappears,

I've got an itchy nose,

I always have a bit of hay fever allergies.

So I always have to scratch my nose,

Sneeze,

Pick your nose,

It is blocked up,

It's really a hassle.

In fact,

I was wondering whether in modern medicine we could have,

We've got heart transplants,

We've got lung transplants,

But I still haven't heard yet whether you can have a nose transplant,

But if you hear of one,

Please let me know,

Because I'll go for one of those,

Especially if we can get it on our Medicare.

But there's always some part of the body,

I'm only joking,

Because if that one part gets fixed,

There's always another one,

Takes over as a problem.

So yeah,

You have panic attacks from out of the body.

Just like,

I think what the best simile for you in Hawaii,

Remember the people who've been in jail for 30,

40 years,

And they're going to be released tomorrow.

They have a panic attack,

Because the pain,

The suffering of prison,

Where they've got used to it,

Seems to be more preferable than the freedom which is beyond those walls.

So they get afraid,

They panic.

So if you're leaving your body or the body is just vanishing,

It is similar,

Almost exactly the same,

That someone has been in a prison,

In a jail,

In the body,

Now they're about to be free from it.

So usually what happens,

The way that in modern penal codes,

They deal with a person who's been incarcerated for such a long time,

And it has anxiety when they're about to be released.

They release them for a day release or a weekend release.

They release them gradually.

They always know they can go back after the day's visit outside is complete.

So if you do feel like you are leaving your body,

Just give yourself a few minutes release.

Five minutes,

You come back again,

Just to find out what it's like outside.

Maybe next time try ten minutes,

Next time fifteen minutes.

It's not that bad.

Of course there's two ways I think you're not quite sure which one you mean,

Whether it's leaving the body,

Literally floating out and wandering off.

That's not a bad thing to do,

After a while people get bored of that,

But I can never forget the story.

I mentioned it recently when I was in Singapore.

There's one fellow which I met in the prison.

I used to go to prisons to teach meditation.

This fellow was a Yugoslavian gentleman who,

Because of an operation which started going wrong when he was five years of age,

Maybe 60 years ago,

He left his body,

Floating outside of his body in his operating table in south-eastern Europe in Yugoslavia.

He knew what was going wrong with his body.

It was an interesting thing,

He knew as a five year old that the doctor was looking at the wrong place.

And all he did was to will the doctor to actually look in the right place.

And the doctor did,

It saved his life.

But he came back into his body,

But he told me from that time on,

He never had any trouble leaving his body.

He can leave it whenever he wanted.

Usually he didn't really need to,

But when he was in prison,

It was a great advantage.

He said whenever he wanted to watch a movie outside,

No one could catch him.

He just lay down in his cell,

Leave his body,

And then just go watch whatever he wanted to.

And they could not catch him.

They had no way of seeing his astral body.

And it was a fair dinkum,

It was a real,

Fair dumit,

It's true.

He was honest,

He wasn't putting my leg.

And he could do that.

So if you happen to be incarcerated,

It can be a very useful attribute.

And apart from that,

I don't really know what the purpose of it is.

There's another gentleman,

Many of you may know him,

But I won't tell his name.

He was an air-conditioned engineer and he used to go and do contracts in Darwin where his wife was over in Cannington.

And he would,

Because he was a very jealous man,

He would always come and check on his wife.

You know,

Like the old FIFA workers today,

FIFA,

They're working up north,

They don't know what their wife is doing.

If you can leave your body,

You can just come and check.

And interestingly,

His wife would tell me,

She knew that her husband was around.

Keith,

I'm okay,

I'm faithful,

Get out of here,

Go back to Darwin.

She knew when he was around in his astral body.

So that's really funny.

And it's true though,

This is not made up.

So if you do leave your body,

You're perfectly safe.

People who feel a bit afraid if they do leave their body,

All you need to do is to say,

Time to come back now.

Give gentle suggestions,

Your body will just come back.

If you panic,

Then you get stressed,

You don't know what to do,

Then you stay out for a bit longer.

Tell yourself,

The mind is very,

Very amenable to your suggestions.

But if the other way of leaving the body is just the body vanishes,

You're not floating out of the body,

Just you're not aware of your body anymore,

You're just in the realm of the mind and having a great time,

That's even much better.

That is,

The body disappears and people do feel afraid.

Even,

And I mention this to people to make them feel confident,

Even the Buddha said he felt afraid the first times when the body was vanishing.

So you're in good company.

Even the Buddha felt afraid.

But he realised it was very safe,

Very pleasant and very beneficial.

So he let it happen.

And of course he became a Buddha.

So if you feel out of the body or the body is vanishing,

Then just go out for a little while,

Then come back again,

You're perfectly safe and that will take all the panic away,

Similar to the person being released from a prison,

Having spent so much time there,

Going to places they're not really used to.

Okay,

So is there any question from the audience here?

Because we have all these questions from outside,

Let's have a question from somebody here.

Thank you Ajahn Brahm.

You just say about living to the body,

But this is just the real happen was yesterday,

For the one lady in Thailand,

She was sick and then after that she just out of her body and then she cannot talk,

She cannot move and then after that people think she is dead.

And then after,

And they just say,

Oh if dead,

Her body is still soft and then even though she cannot move or anything,

She said she around and she feel like sleeping and then she cannot really go in her body when they gotta move her body on the column and then they can feel that like she weak out and after she come and cry,

Like today she cry or whatever and then I just give her,

At one her thought,

Just talk,

Said oh don't worry,

Your body is not using anymore,

You think you die but actually it's not die and even you don't have physical body to live,

But astral body is live on and like today she come meditation with her and I said okay,

Doesn't matter if you have physical body or you have astral body,

We still need meditation,

That only thing is also is the body,

Thank you.

It is true,

You can come back again,

But just a little bit of advice if there are any doctors or anything out there,

You know the difference whether the person is dead or alive and this was one amazing thing said in one of the Buddha's teachings probably 500 years ago,

If the body is still warm,

They may not show any other forms of life,

If the body is still warm,

Then there is still viable body,

There is still basically alive,

But if the body has gone really cold,

Then they are gone,

They are dead.

And I say that because there was this one fellow who used to come here a long time ago,

He got so still in meditation,

He was taken to Charlie Gardner's,

So I thought he died,

And he had a flat line on ECG and EEG,

All flat line,

No sign of any life,

But one of the things which the doctor noticed,

His body was warm,

It should have been cold,

So that's why he kept on putting defibrillators on him until he came out of his meditation.

And when he came out of his deep meditation,

He just,

As soon as he,

He told me this story,

It's a great story,

In one of my books,

He opened his eyes,

He bent up,

What am I doing in here in Charlie Gardner's?

I was in Carinap.

How did I get here?

He was perfectly healthy,

He walked home.

And he said the only downside of the whole experience,

Really pleasant in the deep meditations,

I remember I just laughed when he told me this,

He said the only downside of the whole experience was what his wife said to him on the way home,

She really laid it into him,

I don't want you to meditate anymore,

He got a really bad scolding from his wife,

Because he scared her,

Thought they were dead.

So you're perfectly okay.

Questioner asks a question in the background Oh,

It's usually,

Oh yeah,

No,

It's usually very,

Very,

Very,

Very,

Very safe,

Because usually if a person does leave the body,

It's only for a few minutes and they come back again.

Many hundreds,

Thousands of people do that.

But if you're really sick and you're about to die,

Fair enough,

That's a way of dying,

Near death experiences.

But if you're meditating,

You're healthy,

You're going to come back again,

No problem at all,

Guaranteed.

But of course if you don't come back,

You're not around to kick my bum.

So I'm okay.

No,

Absolutely guaranteed,

I know what I'm talking about.

Okay,

So let's finish off now,

Any other questions?

Come and ask them sort of afterwards.

So let's pay respects to Buddha,

Dharma,

Sangha,

Just bowing.

Reviews

So enjoying these Meditations. Thank you Ajahn. Will try the tip on Anxiety so looking forward to it😁😘

Patience and tolerance go a long way in life and meditation practice. Thank you. I do so enjoy and learn from these. ☮️💖🙏🕉️

Indeed, Preparation for anything is an important step. Thank you for such a clear explanation and reminder 🙏💕