Listening To Yourself

September 6, 2006 by Vishal | 2 Comments

To know what you really want without the influence of external elements, you need to look deep inside yourself and understand what your heart is telling you. To be able to listen to your own unblemished thoughts and perceptions and be one with self is something that does not come easy to everyone.

Meditation is the art of turning all your senses inwards and allowing yourself to feel the real senses. It is like closing your mind to the extraneous stimulus so that you own signals are magnified enough for you to perceive.

Though you need to know what to do, meditation is not an impossible task. It is not something that only the gurus in India can accomplish. You can start with small steps and attain a situation of thoughtlessness over a period of time. To start you need to close your eyes and take deep breaths. Try and concentrate within and not towards the external world. One good way to do this is to imagine an object and concentrate on it. IT could be anything – the tip of a flame, the cross, a tree. But be careful not to choose something that arouses emotions in you since that will defeat the purpose. You will realize immediately that there is an energy, a power inside that you had never felt before. With the bombarding stimulus of the world shut from your senses you can now be more aware of what your thoughts are. You can feel your breath (something you are so oblivious about in the daily routine of your life, even though you breathe continuously) and the thump of your heart. With this inner peace, you can also become more tuned to the smaller signals of the world that go unnoticed otherwise. The rustling of the leaves, the drone of the faraway traffic and the soft twitter of the birds, suddenly become alive.

With this exercise you can calm your senses that have been receiving multiple signals constantly. It allows your brain a few seconds of rest where you try and not think of anything. You need to loose thoughts about the past or the future, to start with. With the passage of time you will learn to not think of anything at all while you meditate. Clearing your thoughts for some time allows it to become purged.

Meditation is necessary in a world full of technology where an average American receives more than 189 messages in a day through various technological gadgets that we have become so used to. Voice mail, email, sms, cell phones, beepers, faxes and loads of other alarms that we use do not allow us to have a moment where we can get away from the world and interact with ourselves.

You do not need a long vacation to a resort to be able to connect with yourself. You can do so while carrying out your daily activities and snatch a few moments for yourself. While waiting for a friend to turn up or while you are stuck in a cab, take a few minutes off and close your eyes and turn your senses inwards. Over time you will realize that these small moments add up to a lot and they allow you to reconnect with yourself.

Posted in Meditation

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