Developing a Daily Practice

Laurence Freeman speaks on how to develop a daily practice of meditation, followed by meditation and scripture comment.

Transcript

If distractions are a major challenge to our learning to meditate,

Developing a daily practice is also a challenge we have to take account of.

We recommend people to meditate twice a day,

Early morning,

Early evening are the ideal times.

Find a quiet time and a quiet place if you can,

And if you can,

Meditate in the same place every day.

That will help to develop the habit,

Develop the practice.

If you want to develop a good habit,

A new one,

It's usually helpful to hook it onto an existing habit.

So think of what you do on a regular basis without even thinking about it,

Little practices,

Little habits you have during the day,

When you start the day,

When you end the day,

And try to hook the meditation period onto one of those regular habits that you already have.

It's a good idea to meditate before eating rather than after eating,

Not too late at night because you might well be tired.

Most people find the first meditation easier in the sense that they're more awake,

More alert.

In the evening,

Of course,

For most of us,

The later you leave it,

The more tired you are after a busy day.

And for that reason,

Most people find it difficult to get two meditations in from the beginning.

But I would always keep your eye on that as a goal,

As something that you are slowly developing.

And on those days where you do meditate twice a day,

You'll notice a big difference,

That the day is more balanced,

It's more rounded,

And you perform better during the day.

A friend of mine said recently to me that when he began meditating,

The challenge was to meditate every day.

And now that it has become part of his life,

That the challenge is not to meditate because he sees what is missing in his life.

Important thing is also to get enough sleep.

Many people in our modern world are sleep deprived.

And in a medieval treatise on meditation,

The author advises you to stay healthy so that you can meditate.

That's a little countercultural for us because we think of meditation as a way of remaining healthy,

Which of course,

It does have these very significant benefits on our general physical and psychological well-being.

But it's also important to realize that if meditation is to become a natural and life-giving aspect of your life,

There may be some changes that it will suggest to you that you need to make about how you live and your lifestyle in general.

The more stressed we are,

The less time we think we have to do everything,

The easier it is of course for us to postpone the meditation or to leave it out altogether.

And that's why most people in a busy world such as ours probably do give up meditation because they feel they don't have time.

There can be an advantage in that provided you come back to it.

You start meditating again as soon as you discover that you want to.

Because when you come back to it,

You will see it in a clearer perspective and you'll probably be able to recognize its value in your life more clearly.

So this is a learning process and it's a continuous learning process.

We talk of meditation as a discipline rather than a technique.

And the word discipline comes from the word that means to learn.

So we are continually learning what meditation is and in a sense,

Continually learning how to meditate.

So even failure when we give up can help us to understand what meditation really means.

Also when you are meditating on a regular basis,

On a daily basis,

You'll find that quite naturally at other times of the day when you're waiting for an elevator,

When you're sitting in a traffic jam or when you're waiting for an appointment that's late,

That very naturally the mantra will begin to rise in your heart.

This is a wonderful gift because it means that you immediately de-stress in those circumstances and you no longer feel that those kind of intervals or delays in daily life are a waste of time.

You become more aware of the value of time and in fact how many short periods of time during the day you can use to advantage rather than just wasting them.

So during those short periods you can simply begin to say the word,

Say your mantra and listen to it and in a short space of time it will reconnect you,

Refresh you,

Re-energize you and bring you back to your own inner peace and happiness.

Meditation as I've said is a daily practice but it can also be seen to be part of the rhythm of our life on a weekly or even an annual basis.

What I mean is that for many people who want to learn to meditate,

Meditating with others on a regular basis like in a weekly group is very beneficial,

Very helpful.

The reason for this as my own teacher John Mayne used to say is that meditation creates community and also that community is a necessary context for many of us to learn to meditate.

Personally I would find it very difficult to learn to meditate entirely on my own.

We need a learning group.

If you want to learn a language or you need to learn a new skill it's quite natural that you will join a group of other people who are learning the same thing.

You benefit from each other's presence and mutual support.

So a weekly group or meditating with others on a regular basis,

We even have online meditation groups now,

Is something maybe for you to consider.

I'd also consider doing an annual retreat.

I think every meditator would benefit once a year to take a few days away in a quiet place,

Away from the bustle of their lives,

Away from the routines and habits of their lives and to be able to focus very simply and very consistently on the practice of meditation itself.

So these are some aspects of learning to develop the practice and allowing the practice to become embedded as a natural part of your life.

This simply reminds us that the essence of meditation is doing it rather than thinking about it.

So again now let's prepare for the meditation with a few moments of stillness and silence,

Letting go of our thoughts,

Letting go of the problems we're dealing with at this moment and opening ourselves to the opportunity to be still,

To be silent and to be simple.

So again let's prepare for the meditation with some silence and silence,

Letting go of our thoughts,

Letting go of the problems we're dealing with at this moment and opening ourselves to the opportunity to be still,

To be simple.

You you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you you a and you tone tone tone tone tone There's another parable about the Kingdom of Heaven,

Of heaven,

Which is very similar to the one about the man finding the treasure buried in the field.

But there's a significant difference.

In this parable,

The parable of the fine pearl,

Or the pearl of great price,

Jesus says that a merchant was out looking for fine pearls and one day he found one of very great value and he also went and sold everything he had and bought it.

Well there are similarities between the two parables.

There's a finding and the response is to sell everything what you have found is worth everything.

It's the source of value and he bought it,

Which means not just that he possessed it and kept it for himself,

But that he becomes one with it.

In the same way as when we find this kingdom of heaven within our own lives,

Within our own hearts,

We are thrown open so that we share everything we have with others.

The story is also about poverty.

To sell everything is to give up everything.

That's what we do when we meditate.

As we say the mantra,

We are entering into a radical poverty,

A letting go,

A renunciation.

That's a common meaning I think in both of these parables,

But the difference is that in the first one it's as if the man found the treasure by accident one day.

It's grace.

It's a finding by chance,

We might say,

If there is chance.

But then in the second parable it's about a merchant who's doing his job.

He's going to work every day morning looking for a pearl,

Special pearl.

And this suggests something about our relationship to our meditation and the nature of meditation.

If you like the dual nature of meditation.

On the one hand it's about grace,

It's gift,

We all speak about the gift of meditation in our life,

But it's also work.

It also becomes a discipline,

Becomes something we integrate into the routines of our daily life.

We meditate before we go to work in the morning.

We meditate at the end of the working day.

Maybe we meditate also in the middle of the day at lunch break.

Now these two aspects of meditation are perfectly complementary.

We are opening ourselves to grace without demands or expectations.

This is much more than a technique,

It is a discipline and therefore we integrate the practice into our daily lives.

Reviews

Great support on how to meditate, each meditation a valuable tool on the journey 🙏

True meditation. Thank you so much. Lovely sounding bell.

Thank you Fr. Freeman for the gift of these meditations.
Your teaching, time for Mediation and closing reflection are a blessing.

Thank you! I’m just learning about meditation. You have been very helpful!

Great piece. Namaste

Nice talk and silence!