Non-religious meditation and the like

[sheogorath]

I was wondering if anyone had advice for or discussion on non-religious meditation or other self-induced altered mental states. I would like to benefit from the supposed effects of meditation such as stress relief and improved concentration, but cannot seem to find any techniques that do not have basis in religion or spirituality. Also, I was wondering about the technique of "active imagination". Has anyone here ever tried it? If so, is it enjoyable, and to what extent do you become absorbed into the fantasies? link to wikipedia on the technique: Active imagination - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[tommo]

Zen. Buddhism is basically Hinduism without the religion. So read about Zen. Some people do bring crazy religious crap in to it, but just ignore it, it's just extra crap tagged on by other people.

[Original Poster]

I was wondering if anyone had advice for or discussion on non-religious meditation or other self-induced altered mental states. I would like to benefit from the supposed effects of meditation such as stress relief and improved concentration, but cannot seem to find any techniques that do not have basis in religion or spirituality. Also, I was wondering about the technique of "active imagination". Has anyone here ever tried it? If so, is it enjoyable, and to what extent do you become absorbed into the fantasies? link to wikipedia on the technique: Active imagination - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia I haven't opened that link so I don't know if I'm talking about the same thing but sometimes I like to close my eyes and describe everything I see into a tape recorder because the images become more and more vivid until I'm standing in a day-dream. On Buddhism and Hinduism: Hinduism has four yogas and allows people to practice which ever one's bring them fulfillment. They are Service, Worship, Knowledge and Meditation. Meditation Yoga came after Buddha, and if he were around at the time he may have found what he was looking for in Hinduism. The two religions borrowed from each other over time.

[Arra]

You could always invent your own way of doing it. Try a few methods and see which one benefits you the most. There's no need to attach religious or even spiritual baggage to the practice. It's very calming and can help with your awareness, and with analyzing your thoughts or just slowing them down.

[Replicon]

I think most teachers of meditation have a highly spiritual side. I always thought it was kind of weird, bordering on hypocritical in some cases. They teach you to live in the moment, and experience the flow of each moment as-is, not adding and not removing anything... but then, they take a subjective experience (which is fine as it is), and label it with "ah, that was a spiritual experience" just after they finished talking about how you should experience pure experience, without attaching labels and meaning to them. You might be interested in the brainwave/biofeedback stuff that's out there. I haven't researched it enough to know how legit it is, or if it's quackery, but the idea is that they use biofeedback to measure your dominant brainwaves, and associate them with mental states you've been in and know of. Then, given that feedback loop, you can actually see measurable progress towards achieving the right states. That way, you're not just sitting there, not knowing whether you're doing it right. But as I said, I don't know how legit that stuff is. I've played with entrainment stuff too (like IDoser), and have gotten absolutely zero results from it after a while. Might just be me, though. I also get zero results drinking strong coffee. And finally, if it's not just meditation, but all kinds of other things, there's a book called "get high now" that should at least give you some inspiration for stuff to try out. Or, you can look at this article I ran into just 2-3 days ago: 10 Ways to Alter Your Consciousness Without Drugs Also, I just finished reading "Mindfulness in Plain English" which was really nice (it's free, but I bought the Kindle edition for less eye strain). It goes into the practice of Vipassana, without getting all "spiritual-astral-plane-united-consciousness"-y about it.

[Supernova]

And finally, if it's not just meditation, but all kinds of other things, there's a book called "get high now" that should at least give you some inspiration for stuff to try out. Or, you can look at this article I ran into just 2-3 days ago: 10 Ways to Alter Your Consciousness Without Drugs That reminded me of something I heard of a while ago. I can't remember the name of it, but it was some sort of effect whereby if you filled the visual field with light of a uniform colour (white noise optional), after a short time visual hallucinations would begin. Recommendation I saw was to cut a ping-pong ball in half such that it would fit over your eyes.

[tommo]

That reminded me of something I heard of a while ago. I can't remember the name of it, but it was some sort of effect whereby if you filled the visual field with light of a uniform colour (white noise optional), after a short time visual hallucinations would begin. Recommendation I saw was to cut a ping-pong ball in half such that it would fit over your eyes. Ganzfeld effect. I tried it, didn't really work as well as I thought it would. But I also had the problem that the ping pong ball halves wouldn't stay on properly, so I could see little bits out the side which may have ruined it.

[Xei]

I watched the first half of Life in a Material World documentary recently, and there was something about a form of meditation using mantras. It sounded extremely similar to the WILD technique; it basically involves stopping the stream of thought in your brain.

[tommo]

Yes, assuming I'm thinking of the same thing, that is what OM is. Or focusing on breathing or playing a gong for example are also types of mantras. Just to focus on one thing and stop thinking.

[Xei]

Are there any good, concise, preferably rational resources about meditation, by the way? I tried a while ago to find out information about the field in general but Google disappointed me.

[Darkmatters]

Here's a really good book about Mindfulness Meditation in PDF form that a lot of people in here have highly recommended and I found extremely good: http://www.mindfulvalley.org/files/b...in_english.pdf

[tommo]

You can try to find "Alan Watts teaches meditation" mp3. Probably the best explanation I've heard. I think there's a couple of different talks. You'll probably find eventually that any explanation doesn't really help. You just sit there and let every thought and sensory input flow in and out of you. You don't even have to sit. You just have to sort of practice, going on from that. And find out what the people are actually trying to explain. Since it's not something most people experience, you can't relay it to others properly. But basically, you calm yourself, whether that's through mantras or deep, slow breathing etc. Then follow the stream instead of trying to swim against it.

[Wayfaerer]

Xei, it's pretty simple, practice being vigilant in being aware of as much as you can: preferably the immediate experience of your senses, the feeling of your whole body, and your thoughts/emotions while trying let them give way to the powerful and nonjudgmental awareness of immediate experience. The attempted state may seem a bit contradictory, kind of like a peaceful intensity. You want to have an exited state of intense, vigilant curiosity of what's going on and how you feel, but at the same time have a peaceful, objective watchfulness that welcomes everything non-judgmentally. Goal-oriented meditations and visualizations are another matter, I've found them to be very enjoyable too. I've read some beginners books on them, you could probably find some easily if that's what our interested in. Darkmatters reminded me of an awesome book I found on mindfulness (which is probably the most rational approach to the first type of meditation I mentioned that I've seen) called The Mindful Brain The first few chapters utterly blew me away and captured some personal experience better than I could say, but definitely started to get unnecessarily complex and redundant with how many layers of mindfulness there are and whatnot. It could have been interesting but I got all I needed from the real meat in the first several chapters.