Energy (The Alchemical Gold)

An exploration of the Subtle.

You may notice fairly quickly when you meditate with Mandala Time! that your perceptions of the Mandala change, the colors shift and the shapes move. This is direct feedback that your consciousness is changing to a more meditative state. While that occurs you may also experience an effervescence in your body. It may feel like a pleasant vibrational energy is welling up within you. It will be subtle but allow yourself to open up to it. Allow it to grow and blossom within you. Explore its nuances and enjoy the feeling. It is the gold of transformation.

If you can relax enough and allow the vibrations to spread throughout your body you will be laying the groundwork for transformation in your life. Experiencing your own energy in this way is evidence that you are rewiring. Which means you are slowly removing your automatic conditioned behaviors (Karma) and increasing physical vitality. Changing unproductive habits and patterns will become much easier with a consistent meditation practice that includes a deep energetic experience. It will likely also improve sleep and overall health.

Meditation is an exploration of subtle feelings. Its about setting the mind aside and getting in tune with your body. Be curious about how subtle and refined your body sensations can go. Be curious about how much you can relax and how good it can feel. Get acquainted with every cell in your body. It is a subtle but amazing adventure.

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Meditation (It's All Good)

There are many resources including books and scientific studies that provide plenty of data related to the benefits of mediation, so you don’t need me to list all of it here for you. Likely, since you are reading this blog, you have been interested in mediation and already know what benefits you are looking to achieve. However, I will recommend a book that I think covers a lot of ground on this topic; “Becoming Supernatural” by Dr Joe Dispenza. It does a great job of tying the Eastern understanding and perspective on mediation to the latest Western scientific research. In his own mediation retreats and seminars, Dr Dispenza utilizes scientific equipment to understand the depth and effects of his students mediations so through his teachings he continues to gather scientific data on the effects and benefits of meditation. The list of which is long and growing.

So aside from the physical, health related benefits, of which there are many, for me, one of the most important and beneficial side effects of mediation is how it changes your relationship to your thoughts. Most of us are subject to a standard process related to thoughts which, more or less, goes as follows - a thought arrises which produces an emotion that results in us taking a fairly immediate action. (An aside - the root of the word emotion is motive, which is related to movement. Emotions cause movement or action. A further aside - action done without consciousness creates karma, or what we call consequences in the West. A topic for another time.) Where was I? Right, most of us react immediately to our thoughts. But mediation, for a number of reasons, creates some space between you and your thoughts, and therefore your thoughts and the resulting emotion. The most basic reason for this is that as you meditate you are actually practicing not reacting to your thoughts. You sit, focusing on a Mandala, thoughts arise, and you stay sitting and focused until your mediation is done. Don’t underestimate the impact of this! This is a huge step towards freedom! Freedom from being bullied by your brain, freedom to choose what emotions you feel and act on. In short, mediation enables you to chose happiness.

How does this work? Being in a meditative state makes it much easier not react to your thoughts and emotions. By giving you the ability not to react to your thoughts, a meditative state takes you out of your default mindset and into a very special place where you can generate skills and break habits and patterns you just can’t in your standard mindset. You rewire yourself in mediation and the results are nothing short of wondrous. Little by little, you will begin to not take your thoughts so seriously and the less seriously you take your thoughts the less of them you have. Things that used to trigger you will blow through you like a sudden breeze and be gone. A mind that was typically occupied with thoughts of dreading the future, ruminations about what people think of you, constant judging, and regrets about the past, will start to get quieter and quieter. All that time and energy spent worrying will now need to get replaced and you get to choose! The less and less you are on a reactive autopilot mode in relation to your thoughts, the more and more freedom you have to choose how you feel and what you want to do with the energy you have freed up. (This is part of how mediation gives you more energy.) It’s a great problem to have. In fact, it’s not a problem, its liberation, it’s freedom. It’s all good.

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Why Visually Guided Meditation is so Effective (And Easy)

Visually guided meditation takes thinking out of the equation

Mandalas have been used as a meditation tool for thousands of years with good reason. Mandalas provide a point of focus, a place of natural symmetry and centeredness to lose yourself in. Their color and harmony impact you energetically. In contrast, Audio based mediation apps require you to listen and process what you hear which may ultimately hinder you from achieving a meditative state because it engages your mind. Mandala Time! takes thinking out of the equation, by simply relaxing and staring you can let the Mandala induce a meditative state very quickly and effectively.

Mandala Meditation Provides Feedback that it’s Working

Often, after just a few seconds into a Mandala Mediation, one can see the colors begin to blur between the shapes of the Mandala. It can start to look three dimensional or certain shapes within the Mandala can begin to move a little. This is direct feedback that you are entering a deeper more meditative state. You may begin to feel a certain effervescence in your body, pleasant vibrational sensations. Allow this to happen and relax further and further into it.

Meditation is an act of allowing not doing. All day every day we do, do, do. We try to shape the world with our will. We are not human doings we are human beings and mediation is a time for being. As you allow the Mandala to work on you it will take you out of the realm of doing and all of its associated emotional ups and downs, and center you in the world of being. This is very nourishing physically, mentally, and emotionally.

Pick out your favorite Mandala and try it for free for as long as you want. Try it three times between 2 and five minutes and there’s a good chance you’ll begin to get the feedback I describe above. Do it a few times a day for a couple of weeks and you’ll begin to realize some of the great benefits of mediation. (For more on the benefits of mediation click here)

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Mandala Meditation for Kids

Just a few minutes of “non-doing” can make a big difference. What is non-doing ? To define that let's start with doing. From all directions kids are bombarded with stimulus; video games, action movies, and YouTube videos. This is all fun stuff to a point, but it becomes an issue when children become reliant on that level of stimulation to feel happy and alive. It’s the same for all of us. Our reliance on excitement, drama and or high adrenaline means we are prisoners to it. It’s just like that old adage - it’s the little things in life. So how do you get there? How does enjoying the little things become part of your, or your child’s, life? The good news is this is one of the bigger side effects of meditation or as it is sometimes referred to, non-doing. Just a few minutes of meditation, effective meditation, can enable all of us to bring the perspective of stillness, non-doing, and peace into our lives.

With brief 2 - 5 minute Mandala Time meditations, you and your children can experience a deep sense of calm, and let’s call it “okayness”, with just being. Experiencing this regularly will result in an increased ability to sit still, focus, and concentrate for your children. The need to be running from zombies, blowing things up or watching crazy people doing crazy things on YouTube will subside to a certain extent and believe it or not, this means more freedom. This is what the term “liberation” is referring to. Because you are free from the dependence on a relatively small category of high stimuli activities, you are free to do and enjoy so much more. Even the little things, which are freely offered here and now and in every moment.

Providing this tool of Mandala Mediations at a young age provides children the ability not to build the deeply engrained patterns of behavior adults have to work hard to extricate themselves from. You are offering them more freedom from their emotions and the ability to live more conscious lives.

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