“Real meditation is not about mastering a technique; it’s about letting go of control. This is meditation.
Anything else is actually a form of concentration. Meditation and concentration are two different things.
Concentration is a discipline; concentration is a way in which we are actually directing or guiding or controlling our experience.
Meditation is letting go of control, letting go of guiding our experience in any way whatsoever. The foundation of True Meditation is that we are letting go of
control.
And so, when you sit down to meditate, connect with your senses— connect with how you feel, what you hear, what you sense, what you smell. Your senses actually anchor you in the moment. When your mind wanders, anchor yourself in your senses. Start to listen. What are the sounds outside? Start to feel.
How do you feel in your body? Enter into the felt sense, the kinesthetic sense of your being.
Connect not only with what you feel in your body, but also with what you sense in the room. Start to smell. As you are sitting, what does it smell like?
Through your senses, open to the whole world within and around you.
This grounds you in a deeper reality than your mind, and it also helps focus you in a place other than your mind.
Once you get the feel of it, you will be able to tune into it more and more often during your daily life.
Eventually, in the state of liberation, meditation will simply become your natural condition.”
~ Adyashanti
Adyashanti is an Americ
an spiritual teacher and author from the San Francisco Bay Area who offers talks, online study courses, and retreats in the United States and abroad.
