What is it? I mean, that question sounds so simplistic as to be inane, but bear with me: I have had absolutely no interaction with anyone who meditates, beyond observing them at a distance with casual skepticism.
Alternative questions to "What is it?" would be "What is its purpose?" and "What is it like?" Having gone to my university's weekly meditation sessions twice and simply fallen asleep, I used to assume it was just that: people sleeping while sitting upright. The idea of a third state the system of sleeping/awake seems utterly alien to me.
EDIT: Having just done the obvious and skimmed over the Wikipedia article for Meditation, it's far more broad than my question here. Obviously "to meditate on something" is to ponder/think about it, sometimes while moving or working. I'm asking in regard to a the more specific, often motionless, act that Alex3917 seems to be describing.
At its simplest it is quieting the mind. A long time ago I took a transcendental meditation course (TM) (I know, I know, it dates me, there was a girl involved) they are (were?) the folks who claimed you could defy gravity if you were good enough. There was a lot of eastern mysticism but as the scientific type I was more interested in what, if any, physiological effects were to be had. Being an undergrad in a pre-med school has some perks and one of them was being able to practice meditation wearing an EEG cap.
As far as I can tell, the primary benefit of meditation is shutting down all the noise in your head. Your brain thinks a lot, about a lot of things, often all at the same time. You might be like me where you get solutions to problems that 'bubble up' from somewhere in your brain that you didn't know was working on the problem.
Anyway, if you meditate (and there aren't any big secrets here you are simply training yourself to stop thinking without going to sleep) you clear out your brain. Like doing a power cycle reboot on a computer. Flush everything all resources available for thinking. Then when new things come up you can respond more quickly because you've got cycles to spare.
My totally non-scientific theory is that normally, when you start thinking about something new, your brain has to pick something to stop thinking about so that it can free up the cycles. If you are trying to keep a lot things in your head, that is hard because you are already trying not to stop thinking about the things you need to remember. Whereas when you just come out of meditation you aren't thinking about anything so you can quickly pick up a new train of thought.
Note that this is different than sleep because when you sleep you dream, and dreaming is a way of thinking. If you're successfully meditating, you are awake, aware of your surroundings, but keeping your finger on the 'halt' button so that you don't start up new thoughts. Then you lift your finger and off you go.
>there aren't any big secrets here you are simply training yourself to stop thinking without going to sleep
This is definitely the first hurdle I encounter. The handful of times I have attempted this, I end up thinking about not thinking (isn't that silly?), or a song comes into my head, or I hear a noise in the distance, and attempts to clear out those thoughts lead to, well, more thinking!
I struggle with even imagining what it's like to not think about something. Something new or something old. Anything at all. I will note that I also have trouble sleeping for the same reason, and when someone describes "the feeling just as you fall asleep", for me that's a synonym for stress and frustration. I can never really remember how I eventually fall asleep.
Yup, that is exact right. The guy who taught me that it was about 'being the stillness' (I know, I know, but this was they 70's). Lets say you are looking at pond, smooth as glass and a pebble falls, ripples spread out. You can't stop the ripples, you can just note them and wait for them to pass. So you note the thoughts as they pop unbidden into your brain, and then wait for them to pass. If you were in a horror movie and the killer was walking in your house, you'd be scared to death trying to be invisible. That is 'being the stillness'. Actively not thinking.
"I struggle with even imagining what it's like to not think about something. Something new or something old. Anything at all. I will note that I also have trouble sleeping for the same reason, ..."
There were lots of people who fell asleep in our class. I did too a couple of times. One of the party tricks you can do while meditating is what some folks call 'lucid dreaming' which is you are balanced on the knife edge between consciousness and unconsciousness, you can learn to let your unconsciousness start up without leaving consciousness completely behind. Me, I end up going to sleep if I try that.
But having a lot of stuff happening at work, at home, and in the world, sometimes I meditate to go to sleep. But its a two step process, meditate, then once there allow yourself into the unconscious state rather than holding on to the conscious state.
There was an engineer at Google who had dug up a lot of interesting references on meditating. Some folks have decided it is a form of self hypnosis since the mental state most closely resembles that of being hypnotized.
Warning! Completely subjective descriptions ahead:
In my experience the best approach to clearing your mind is not to try and actively clear your mind (i.e. thinking about not thinking) it is training yourself to let your thoughts be more transient.
When I try to meditate I try to let all my thoughts slip. Of course, just like you I will hear a noise or some thought tries to worm its way in, but when this happens I try to relax (physically, there is a wonderful link between relaxing your muscles and relaxing your brain. Instead of forcing your brain to relax, trick yourself by relaxing physically) and let the thought go.
Of course, thoughts keep floating into my mind of course, but the longer I keep the meditation up the more transient they become. At some point they even stop being thoughts because they exist to short to even have any content or feeling associated with them.
I have noticed that with practice the time and difficulty of achieving this transient state go down, making it easier to just start. Early on I would need to be in a quiet spot alone, nowadays I can get the process fairly far even with people in the same room talking (if not to loud).
Anyhoo, I hope that description maybe helps you!
TL;DR - You don't stop thinking or actively try to shut down your brain, you passively let your thoughts become more transient.
The best explanation I have is ignoring your thoughts. You aren't sleeping, your mind is blank. Meditation feels like (to me at least) the feeling right before you fall asleep.
Imagine you're playing with bubbles, these bubbles are your thoughts. Generally, your mind tries to capture the bubbles, exploding them and seeing what was inside. When you meditate, the bubbles just kind of whizz by without looking inside.
It's a good way to explore what we are as humans, and it's sobering in it's power to tap into things we otherwise wouldn't experience.
I did Astanga yoga (also refered to as power yoga) for many years. Such a class would consist of some 10 - 20 students and 1 - 2 instructors. In this form of yoga at no time do you close you eyes (expect for the final relaxation time).
Contrary to what you might think this particular form of yoga is very very psychically hard. Although you move slowly you are never still in a relaxed position. You move a lot of small muscles and carry your own weight for 1.5 - 2 hours.
The concentration needed takes all your focus until you know the series of movement of the back of your hand. For me this took about a year. After this I would occasionally slip into a kind of mindlessness. I would "come back" and be conscience about this mindlessness at some point near the end of the session. It very much felt like 1.5 hours had passed in an instance. I would not be able to recall any detail or anything the instructors have said and I would feel immensely relaxed and full of energy. It was a great sensation.
I suspect this has something to do with how you breath during yoga. It kind of resembles the way you breath when you are deep at sleep. It takes a long time to learn and I have a feeling that the breathing is actually the most important part of yoga.
Besides swimming this is by far the best workout I have ever done. Being a programmer it does wonders for a body which spends most of the time sitting down in an office chair. If you get the chance I recommend that you try it out. You will be very surprised how hard it is - and how rewarding it is.
That strikes a chord with me, actually. Just after responding to ChuckMcM's comment, I realized that there is one way I can achieve a state of non-thought: Whenever I'm physically struck by something, clearly not injured (and thus not worried), but still in pain enough to be distracted. Somewhere in those moments I'm too busy with the sensation to think, and my brain finally shuts up.
I tried the same thing, and had some interesting experiences. Around bed-time, lie down in a relatively quiet, not too bright place. For me, a hardwood floor with thin carpet works well. Close your eyes, and try to breathe slowly. Whenever you have a startling thought or start to feel impatient (why isn't this working?) just remember that all you need to do is to breathe slowly.
Over time my mind gets quieter and quieter. I may focus on the greenish patterns inside my eyelids (similar to photo-luminescent plankton). These patterns may swirl and move like a fluid-simulation.
If I'm lucky, at some point I'll realize that I'm asleep. I've never experienced the transition -- just the realization that, yup, I'm asleep. In winter this is accompanied by an overall feeling of warmth. There's also a feeling of disconnection from hearing and motor. It's not that I can't hear, but if there were crickets or bird noises outside, I realize it's gone suspiciously quiet. It's not that I can't move, but it feels like I'd have to surface first before moving.
Often the reaction to the realization "I'm asleep" is to startle and to wake up, but you can train yourself not to.
Meditation works very similarly except the goal is to train the mind. Much like our bodies our minds are not under our complete conscious control. We can't, normally, just turn off or on feeling sad, or being angry, or relaxed, etc. That lack of control has consequences. For example, when a person is in a heated argument the fight or flight reflex will dump adrenaline into their system and create a variety of other reactions that results in diminished rationality, aggressiveness, etc. That phenomenon is the root cause of a ton of negative behaviors in people and a reason why verbal arguments turn into verbal, and then perhaps even physical, fights instead of conversations.
Generally the most important transition is to a state of relaxation, since it's easier to consciously go from that state to most other mental states intentionally and it's typically harder to go to a state of relaxation from many other mental states (anger, sadness, anxiety, frustration, etc.) However, meditation isn't limited to just relaxation.
There are many types of meditation which frankly don't have all that much in common. In buddhist meditation, which is probably the most common type in the US, there are two main types:
- Concentration meditation (shamatha): This involves training the mind to concentrate, often by focusing on a mantra, an object (like a candle), or some imaginary object (like a mandala). There are different mental states that you can reach as you get better, called jhanas.
- The second type of meditation is insight meditation, also called vipassana. In this type of meditation you focus on the sensations of the body. It basically involves starting at your head and noting every physical sensation (warm, cold, clothing touching your skin, etc.) and working all the way down to your toes, and then going up. As you progess you begin to notice more sensations that the buddhist mental map describes as being part of the 'subtle body'. These involve things like vibrations, electric shocks, etc. You also begin to feel waves of energy traveling up and down your body. To get to this point takes 3 or 4 days, assuming you are at a retreat where you are doing it 10 hours a day. The next step is where you can feel 'inside' of yourself, like all of your organs, and then being able to feel inside your organs until they dissolve into what feels like rising bubbles. This takes a bit longer, but you can often begin to feel these 'bubbles' after a week or so. Note that you don't have to believe in any of this, it just happens whether you want it to or not. There are many more mental states and experiences you will have if you continue. There is a description here of the rest of the states:
http://kennethfolkdharma.wetpaint.com/page/Collection+of+tip...
They culminate in something called stream entry, which is the first of four stages of enlightenment according to the buddhist model.
There is also a book called Mastering The Core Teachings Of The Buddha which also has a description of all the things you go through between being a beginner and reaching enlightenment. The best way to learn though is probably to do a meditation retreat, there are free vipassana retreats offered by dhamma.org that are pretty good. (There is a suggested donation of about $300 to pay for your food and housing for the 10 days, but it's optional.) There are many reviews of this online. There are also many other retreats, but most of them cost money. One example of a popular one is the insight meditation society, http://www.dharma.org/.
There are many books also. The best one for learning vipassana is probably Mindfulness In Plain English, which you can download for free as a PDF: http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma4/mpe.html
While this is good to read, you really don't want to try it without a teacher, as you are likely to hurt yourself or do it wrong (and not make progress) unless you have an actual teacher.
The third type of meditation you hear a lot about is transcendent meditation. This is basically a form of concentration meditation, although its adherents claim it is different based on brain scans. It costs a lot of money to learn, and many consider it to be a cult. I don't know a lot about it personally.
Many other religions have some form of meditation, such as catholicism. Tibetan buddhism also has its own form of meditation, as does hinduism. (Some types of yoga are basically an active form of meditation.)
If you're looking to learn one type then vipassana is probably the place to start. Advantages are:
- Free instruction, and a large community that can help you.
- A large encyclopedia of the different mental states you will encounter, so you know what you're experiencing and whether or not they are 'part of the path' or just a distraction.
- A well defined path to follow to get from a complete beginner to very advanced.
- What r/meditation is most familiar with, which is a great place to ask questions and such.
Tibetan buddism also has a very well defined path, but it's really only taught to people within the tradition, so I can't comment much on it. It's also generally hard to learn unless you happen to live in Ithaca, NY or Boulder, CO, as there aren't many tibetan llamaseries around.
Lastly, I should mention there is also zen meditation, which is fairly popular in the US. Zen is a lot of judaism, in that it combines certain practices with what are basically brain teasers as a way of trying to coax you toward enlightenment faster. There are all sorts of parables, commentaries, commentaries on the commentaries, etc. I don't know a ton about this, but there are all sorts of blogs and places you can learn. Anyway I'm not an expert by any means, but hopefully that helps a bit.
It is intense and feels like it is going to explode.
Is this a hilarious typo for "monasteries" or is this an actual thing?
There are many different types of and approaches to meditation, but the essence of all of them is mindfulness. The concept is of being "present"-- not living in the past, or the future, but experiencing what is happening right here, right now.
This is a subtly but importantly different idea from that of ignoring or quieting your thinking. You are your thoughts; you can't ignore them. (Don't think of an elephant.) However, your thoughts are not all that is happening to you, and most of the time your thoughts serve only to distract you from what is actually going on.
So, for example, one of the most basic forms of meditation is simply to be aware of your breathing. You are breathing one hundred percent of the time, but you are almost never aware of the fact that you are. So take one moment, right now, close your eyes, and breathe. Feel how your chest expands and contracts. Feel how the air flows through your nostrils.
Thoughts will occur, and it's important that you don't push them away, or try to ignore them, because you can't-- even very experienced meditators cannot. Instead, recognize that thought is occurring, be aware of it, but don't dwell on it. Let the thought exist, notice that it is happening, and let it drift away as you return your attention to your breathing.
You will find your mind drifting to more and more intrusive thoughts: The things you're stressed about, worried about, upset about. This is not wrong; it is what is happening to you right now. Be aware of it, let it pass into you just like the air through your nostrils, and let it pass out as you return to breathing.
If you really attempt this, you will notice at least a brief moment where you feel suddenly, absolutely aware of who you are, where you are, what it is that you are experiencing right now in a way that you may never have felt before. If you've never meditated before, it is very likely that you'll be terribly upset by this awareness of all of the unpleasant thoughts and feelings that you've been ignoring, trying to push under the surface and bury inside yourself. Remember that it is okay to cry. Let the emotions happen, just the way they are. You can't make them go away. But they don't control you; once you've felt them, it's okay to return your attention to your breathing.
I hope I don't make this sound easy-- it's incredibly difficult. But over time, with practice, you'll find this state of presence and awareness easier and easier to achieve, and that it's no longer necessary to close your eyes or be still to feel this. You'll be able to experience exactly what it feels like to walk down the street, or to eat a meal, in a way you never have before. You'll find yourself no longer being ruled by the emotions you've tried to suppress for so long. You will be angered, or saddened, or terrified, and you will be able to let those feelings happen inside of you, really experience them, and continue with what you are doing.
That is meditation.
(My references: My mother is a clinical psychiatrist who is trained in mindfulness-based cognitive therapy, which is, believe it or not, a clinically validated treatment for many serious mental illnesses, but especially depression and anxiety. I've used these techniques myself to overcome major recurring depression.)
In a concentration practice (such as samatha in theravadan buddhism, not sure about zen/tibetan), you eventually cultivate one-pointedness to the point that you become aware of nothing else but the object of concentration, whether it's the breath, a flame, or an imaginary colored disc.
Concentration practices feel very different, produce different effects, and have different uses. They can frequently be way more pleasurable than mindfulness practices, help improve concentration (naturally), but are generally assumed not to be able to lead to enlightenment.
Also, if you're open to the idea that there might be more, but like me, not interested in anything mystical, I highly recommend checking out Stephen Batchelor's Buddhism Without Beliefs.
In there, meditation is a structured way to develop awareness (mindfulness) of your subconscious thought processes and beliefs (which determine your day-to-day activities and your overall path in life, but which few people consciously monitor).
If you are a particularly introspective person, or have worked with CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy), the concepts will seem quite familiar albeit presented from a different angle.
Like what?
Causes an almost meditative state where you don't worry about body function (which is why its effective at treating anxiety).
I'm not lying there the whole time thinking about my breathing. I start by thinking about my breathing, so I can use that focus to exclude/ignore the usual rush of other thoughts. After some time, I'm not consciously thinking at all.