Meditation is a thing that you do with your attention. When you pay attention or concentrate or get distracted, that's you doing a thing with your attention. And that's obviously important stuff in your life and the world. Meditation takes it further.

We basically have 2 kinds of meditation.

  1. Concentration meditation, which is plain ol concentration taken to a higher level.

  2. Zen meditation (aka shikantaza), which is another thing to do with your attention, kindof a left turn from concentration and is a bit esoteric.

So there you go.

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[–] 1 point 14 hours ago (2 children)

Have you ever done group/collective transcendental meditation? From my limited lack of knowledge, I understand it is used to push positive social waves into the surrounding community. Big David Lynch fan.

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  • [–] [S] 1 point 11 hours ago

    I am also a big David Lynch fan :)

    I have not done TM in any serious way. I basically fumbled around and experimented until it made sense to me. Forging my own path and such.

    I did go to a TM thing once a long time ago. They were nice people.

    As for pushing positive social waves into the surrounding community, yes, I have some small experience with that. It's a thing I study and experiment with some.

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  • [–] 1 point 15 hours ago (1 child)

    I feel like I've had undiagnosed ADHD my whole life. I've done some meditation in the past and I felt it helped a bit but it's been years.

    Any advice that you'd give me? Anything you'd like to mention about the benefits?

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  • [–] [S] 2 points 11 hours ago

    Ok I wrote a thing. It's short and polished. It's basically what I did. Check it out then ask me any questions.

    http://fleen.org/fluffy_cloud

    As for benefits.

    You will start with the concentration meditation because it's dead easy and just takes a little time and effort. It will make you sharp. Maybe a little too sharp. You'll like it. You'll feel powerful. You'll also become a little bit of a crazy asshole. I guess a monastery provides the environment for taking care of people in this state, but lacking that, try to lead a life with lots of free alone time and little stress.

    After you get a handle on that you'll do the second meditation. The "shikantaza". But that comes later. It's much kinder but you need to get a handle on the first one first.

    BUT that's just me. Maybe there's a better way. There was a teacher named Joko Beck who skipped the concentration meditation and taught only the shik. I dunno. Above all you need to become your own expert. Experiment and explore. There is no substitute.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 day ago (1 child)

    So can you meditate at will? I usually don't say I meditate as try to meditate because that is what I am doing. Sometimes I feel I get to a state which is illusive and maybe what I am looking to get to when I try to meditate but im not sure if that is meditation either.

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  • [–] [S] 4 points 1 day ago*

    Yeah, I can meditate at will. I slide in. Starts shallow, gets deeper. The longer I go the deeper it gets. Then when I'm done I slide out again over hours and days. Ideally I'd do it 24-7 but there you go.

    It's like my hand is chronically in a tight fist. When I meditate it relaxes and opens up and gets relaxed and floppy.

    That's shikantaza anyway. The other kind of meditation, the concentration, it sorta makes me tighter. But I don't do that meditation these days.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 day ago (1 child)

    How would you say this has affected your life?

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  • [–] 4 points 1 day ago (4 children)

    So, do you have a more-experienced meditator that you meet with regularly, or do you meditate on your own?

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  • [–] [S] 3 points 1 day ago (3 children)
  • [–] 4 points 1 day ago (2 children)

    Is there a principled reason why you do not consult with other meditators, or did it just work out that way?

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  • [–] [S] 4 points 1 day ago* (1 child)

    No principal involved. The way I see it, I have this thing before me and addressing it seems to be a personal one-man job. So ya, I never felt drawn to consulting like that. But when I find somebody else who meditates I do like to talk to them. Sometimes intensely.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 day ago

    That makes sense. There's been an enormous amount of meditation work done over the centuries, in the Euro-American world we tend to be unaware of it. I kinda feel like I should encourage you to seek out meditation centers and temples. But if what you're doing works for you, then awesome.

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  • [–] 2 points 23 hours ago (2 children)

    How do you not fall asleep?

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  • [–] 4 points 1 day ago (1 child)

    no question, just one single clap

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  • [–] 3 points 1 day ago (1 child)

    Have you ever had any dissociation events? Like, feeling that you are a passenger in your own body, after meditation?

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  • [–] 2 points 1 day ago (3 children)

    What’s the longest you’ve ever gone in a completely thoughtless state?

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  • [–] [S] 4 points 1 day ago (2 children)

    I guess 15 minutes. Maybe 60. Time kinda gets away from me sometimes.

    There's always idea-stuff flowing by. Like, I dunno, snow falling. It's whether I react to it that makes it into thinking, basically. When I don't interact with it by reacting to it by moving my attention and such it isn't really thinking anymore. It's like snow.

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  • [–] 1 point 18 hours ago (1 child)

    There is no good definition of a thought.

    But as a person who struggles to crack 60 seconds, respect.

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  • [–] [S] 2 points 17 hours ago

    Thanks. Keep in mind that that's the rare best-case scenario. My daily best is more like 5 minutes.

    Getting my life to where that best-case scenario happens more often is a big deal for me. I work on that.

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