You’re not going to see immediate results. “Meditation is more like beginning an exercise program. “We are used to instant gratification,” Driscoll says. There’s a reason it’s called the “practice” of meditation. The course is offered at the First Unitarian Church of Wilmington. Participants in the Art of Living course learn a breathing technique called Sudarshan Kriya, which enables them to reach a deep state of meditation quickly and easily. By learning to control the breath, you can learn to control the emotion.” For example, you have a long exhalation when you’re sad and a long inhalation when you feel love. “Every emotion has a corresponding rhythm to the breath.
#Art of living sudarshan kriya philadelphia how to#
“The first thing they taught me in acting class was how to breathe,” he says. “It’s the connection between the inner world of silence and the outer world of activity.”įischman moved to Los Angeles many years ago with the hope of becoming an actor.
“Mind and breath are interconnected,” says Michael Fischman, president of The Art of Living Foundation. Using a labyrinth like that at the Delaware Art Museum can be very helpful in finding focus. Many groups intersperse walking with sitting mediations. Restless types may find that walking meditation is the way to go. And when people have physical challenges, we help them to meditate on the part of the body that is experiencing pain.” “If they’re more kinesthetically oriented, we work with body sensations and getting in touch with the breath moving through the body.
“If they’re more auditory, they may be inclined to use chanting, to start with a prayer and say it over and over, or to use mantra meditation,” says Neil Miesel, co-founder of The Awareness Center in Newark. A teacher can help individuals determine which type of meditation best suits them.
There are some wonderful books on the topic but the abundance of information can be overwhelming. There are two main components to meditation: concentration (on the breath, an object or a sound) and mindfulness (when we assume the role of the observer of our own thoughts). “Meditation is the tool that starts to break that down.” “The Buddha taught that our thinking is very repetitive and based in fear and desire,” says Nick Edge of Edge Construction, a 20-year meditation practitioner and an instructor with the Insight Meditation Community in Lewes. Hoegger, who teaches a meditation course at the University of Delaware’s Academy of Lifelong Learning, believes that fear keeps people away from self-improvement processes such as, ironically, meditation. Through meditation and yoga, I found I no longer had fear, which gave me the self-assurance to take the various impacts of life much more lightly.” “I had sleep loss and fear of not being good enough. “I had palpitations every time I had a confrontation with a supervisor,” Hoegger says. Research also shows better immune system functioning, lower blood pressure and other physiological benefits. But no matter what your belief system or word for it is, meditation is how we get there.”Ĭlinically documented benefits of consistent meditation are many: better concentration and focus, better health and a better overall sense of well-being. Others believe it’s where God speaks to them. “When you can quiet your rational mind, you can get to the higher mind, if you create space for it,” Portia says. We can’t stop the thoughts, but we can alter our responses to them. However one decides to practice meditation, the goal is always the same: to quiet the mind and find the peaceful spaces between thoughts. A runner may find her breathing, heartbeat and footsteps form a cadence that erases everyday cares. “What many people don’t realize is that they’ve probably experienced some form of meditation already, whether they’ve practiced it formally or not,” says Keren Portia, meditation instructor at Yoga U in North Wilmington.Īs notes flow unconsciously through a musician’s fingertips, for instance, he may lose track of time. It’s good to have a guru, and there are many in Delaware sharing their wisdom with both the newcomer and sage. The inward trek promises personal transformation and the promise of enlightenment, but it takes patience and discipline. Anyone of any age and any faith-or none at all-is welcome. The journey can begin wherever you are whenever you want. These days, the 2,500-year-old Buddhist practice is downright mainstream. When Maharishi Mahesh Yogi introduced transcendental meditation to the United States in the 1960s, it seemed like a cultish thing to do.
0 kommentar(er)
