Relational Meditation

Serge Prengel describes a way to meditate with a friend or a small group that includes talking about what we experience. It combines inner connection and interconnection. Serge has been exploring creative approaches to mindfulness: how to live with an embodied sense of meaning and purpose.

Transcript

I'm going to talk about relational meditation. It's something you do with a friend or a small group of friends. It combines inner connection and interconnection. It starts as any other form of meditation. We sit still, Doing nothing, For an amount of time, Say 25 minutes. So after that time where we've had our attention turned inward, It feels good to turn outward and connect with kindred spirits. We use words to connect. It's not so much about the words themselves, It's about the connection. The words are like the lyrics to the music of connecting, And the music is so much more important than the lyrics. What we say cannot possibly be an accurate rendition of the experience of meditating. We cannot convey the flow of physical sensations, Thoughts, Memories, Emotions, Insights, Or moments of calm presence. Talking about our experience, Especially when we make the talking brief, Involves choices. The music of connecting is how the words come about. They emerge from the pause. The meditation itself is an extended pause in which we shift our focus to being and sensing, As opposed to doing and thinking. Afterwards, As we find words for our experience, We are still in a pausing, Sensing mode. Mindfully and thoughtfully, We experiment with words to approximate some of what we experienced. There is a slower rhythm to how we speak, Allowing small pauses to sense into how the words resonate with our experience. It's the music of connection between us, The meditators, Noticing the similarities and differences in our experiences. And it's the music of carrying the inner connection beyond the moment of meditation. Now, As we talk, We are no longer just being and sensing. We shift, Moment by moment, Between recalling the experience and allowing words to emerge. And we shift between finding words and sensing how these words resonate with us. It's a transition toward carrying our meditative practice into the world of doing and talking.