Meditation

Introduction

Meditation is commonly practised by different groups of people, including spiritualists, psychics and mediums. It is a good way to relax the mind. There are numerous meditation techniques, but a well-known one is visualisation. Meditation is where a person relaxes themselves, perhaps takes a few deep, long, slow breaths and tries to clear their mind of clutter. If any thoughts crop up whilst in meditation, the person acknowledges them, then lets them go. After a while of doing that, the person should enter a state of complete tranquility, where their mind is completely clear of all thoughts. In this state, the mind may be more susceptible to psi and get impresses with information that they did not know previously.

Visualisation

Visual meditation is used in psychic and mediumship development groups as a means to help develop the psychic abilities. It is helpful in this context for several reasons:

• Since clairvoyance is visual imagery without the use of the physical eyes; so it must therefore be visual imagery that uses the mind. Visualisation is mental imagery which is seen with the mind, not the eyes.
• Visualisation is a useful means to relax the mind in order to be more susceptible to impressions of information that presents itself to the developing psychic or medium in the developing group.

As well as visualisation or mental imagery being used in meditation to help develop the 'psychic ability' or clairvoyance, visualisation can also help with the development of intuition, in that some meditations may ask the person to receive a gift from a spirit guide and are asked to find out what it means. 

 Clairaudience

Clairaudience is also developed through visualisation, because the person may be asked to meet their spirit guide or totem animal and asked by the host of the developmental group to ask the spirit guide questions. Even though this "conversation" happens in meditation or in the person's head and is made up of thoughts from the person's mind, they may also be able to "hear" this conversation - not externally like real speech, but internally, in their head. This is not a problem, unless it drives the person experiencing it mad. 

   Clairaudience may be perceived to be "talking" with spirit guides, totem animals or/and spirits by spiritualists or mediums, rather than one part of the mind (conscious mind) co-operating with another part of the mind (subconscious mind) which it could just be. It is perceived to be a conversation with a spiritual being because it seems to be: the so-called spirit's voice may sound different to the person's interal voice, the information may seem foreign or unrecognised (the person was unaware of the given information beforehand, or may believe that they weren't), or in cases where there are multiple 'people' or 'spirits' talking to the person, each of their voices 'sound' different to each other, so the psychic may conclude that their conversation they are having is with actual discarnate spirits. 

 

Facilitating the imagination

Anything can be visualised or imagined when it comes to meditation. Full-blown adventures can also take place, too. When it comes to visual meditations, the meditator can visit anywhere they choose and their only limitation is their imagination. They can visit:

a forest

a seaside

a mountain

a plane

a desert

an ocean

another planet

their own home/town/garden

underneath the Earth

a meadow

fictional places from stories

previous occupations

holiday places (e.g. Hawaii)

If the meditator has a particularly good imagination they can visit 'other beings' such as:

Elves

Elemental spirits (gnomes, elves, fairies, devas, sprites, sylphs, nymphs, mermaids)

Fictional characters from films or novels

Deceased people

Spirit guides

Totem animals

Staring at a candle

Another meditation technique is to stare at a candle. However, it is not a good idea to do, especially in near-darkness, as it may damage the eyes. 

This is done for a long moment of time, whereby one focusses their eyes on the flame of the candle. However, it may become rather uncomfortable after a while and is certainly not advisable to do. Beginners in meditation will find other techniques, such as visualisation much easier to do and will help them to focus their mind onto something (mental imagery). 

A tasting meditation

One technique of meditation is mindfulness - this is achieved by focussing the mind onto a particular activity, such as observing the behaviour of others in a non-judgemental way. A good place to practise is on the train. With a meditation involving taste, it requires that the person eats something, but is mindful of doing so - in this way, they can focus their mind on the taste of the food as they eat it. 

Imagining taste

Imagining the taste of a lemon in the mouth

Another idea for meditation is to imagine the taste of a lemon on the mouth. This is done through visualising yourself eating a lemon and whilst doing so, imagining the taste of the lemon - its bitter, acid, strong taste in one's mouth. This can result in the salivary glands producing saliva, because the brain has been tricked into thinking that a real lemon is in the mouth and, like with real food that is in the mouth, the brain sends a message to the saliva glands in the mouth to produce additional saliva.  

Memory and meditation

In order to be able to visualise something, such as a tree, you need to be able to recognise, know and remember what that something look like in real life. Through this, the mind (or brain) can be able to picture the object much more easily and realistically than if it did not know what it looked like. If a meditator doesn't know what Mount Shasta looks like and for whatever reason they decided to do a meditation in which they were there, it would be difficult to fully visualise being on Mount Shasta, or realistically, because their mind doesn't have any memory of being there. By 'memory', it is meant visual memory, as this is required for the meditation. Furthermore, the meditator cannot recall what being on the mountain felt like, because they have no past experience of it. If they had been to Mount Shasta, they should find visualising themselves there again much easier and also should find it better to imagine the feel of being there, because they draw up information from their memory for it. 

     Visualisation of fictional beings, such as elves, are based on some sort of model. This 'model' may be taken from films, folkloric tales, stories, or personal beliefs or opinions. They are also based on a human or humans and may include certain features that are pleasing visually - perhaps of a preferrable hair colour, body composition or clothing or gender. They may look rather good-looking, healthy or slim. 

Psychology of spirit guides

Spirit guides are beings that supposed to aid with an individual's spiritual growth. They are the sort of beings that may be encountered in meditations. They can also be talked to in meditation and may appear to have unique personalities which may be contrary to the personality of the meditator. Typically, they appear as warm, caring beings who are pleasing to look like. They may be male or female or have no gender. They may be 'aliens', deceased people, animals (called 'totem animals'), or elemental beings. They tend not to judge, but instead offer advice in meditation, and are generally very nice personalities. 

Adventurous meditations

Adventurous meditations are where the meditator actually DOES something in meditation. For example, imagining flying over a forest on a bird such as a swan or dragon. Or perhaps travelling through jungle with natives who may look anything like Amazon tribes to wood or water elves. Or perhaps riding on a horse by oneself, exploring a desert. Or maybe swimming amongst dolphins in the sea. 

Meditation and mediumship

Mediums, as well as psychics, can meet their spirit guides through meditation. Sometimes, they may channel information from their spirit guide if a deceased person is not able to communicate directly with the medium. This requires the medium to stay in a meditative state during the process, in order to be able to continue channelling their spirit guide. After a session of this, they may appear rather drained of energy and may not recall anything of what the spirit guide had said through them. 

Relaxation

Meditation is a good way to relax. However, visual meditations may not be as relaxing as a meditation that just involves a clear mind that listens only to external noise such as birdsong and the occasional bark of a dog. 

The benefits of meditation

Although one of the obvious benefits of meditation is relaxation, there are many other benefits that can be achieved through regular meditation. For example, meditative states are often associated with apparent examples of psychic ability. A meditative state is what is entered for mediumship and psychic abilities in development circles. Meditation is also said to help synchronise the left and right brain hemispheres. Through relaxation, it can aid one's immune system and hence help maintain one's help. With differing meditative states (i.e. light and deep meditative states), different brain waves can be accessed: alpha brainwaves are usually the brainwaves associated with the more lighter meditative states, whilst delta and theta are experienced in even deeper ones. In normal, waking everyday life, beta brainwaves are the most dominant brain wave. If someone is extremely stressed, they will benefit from either a Reiki treatment, or doing 5 minutes' to 1 hour's meditation. Meditation can aid concentration, memory and also imagination. 

Meditation in everyday life

There are countless times when people enter meditative states without realising it. A good example is during washing-up, because this is a time when the brain can just slow down and not think of anything at all, a time when the brain can just focus on one activity: washing up. Looking after animals can be therapeutic too. Mucking out a hen house also allows for one's mind to wander. There are many other examples where people enter meditative states and another example is sleep. Meditation before one goes to sleep relaxes the mind and should benefit those who suffer from insomnia. It paves the way for a deep, relaxing sleep. 

How long should a meditative state last?

A meditation should be 5 minutes long minimum. However, the length of time spent meditating is up to the meditator and, of course, time schedules. Meditation can be done anywhere and at any time. It is advisable to do it each day, although this is not necessary. However, in order to experience and appreciate the benefits of meditation, it should be practised daily. An hour's meditation is pleasant, 2 hours' meditation can lead to feelings similar to being out-of-the-body, whilst 3 hours results in extreme relaxation and a very deep sleep. The latter can cause a feeling of being in a dream or meditation even once the meditator has come out of the meditation. 

Other types of meditation

There are different kinds of meditation, including practices that involve movement but are extremely meditative - such as Tai chi and Qigong. However, there are varying disciplines of meditation, like visual meditation, transcendental meditation and mindfulness meditation.