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At another thread I started discussing Buddhist beliefs some information came to my attention that leads me to believe that meditation, as taught by Yogani in Deep Meditation, will, like Transcendental Meditation, result in a click out that a Buddhist author has given the term laxity to. Basically you sink into your mind, the meditation, rather than whatever the other, proper way is. Something about dissolving awareness VS focused awareness. The point here is I want to find proper teaching on meditation, but I am limited to certain authors at my library. I will list them here and I am asking simply which of these teach meditation properly with the goal of focused awareness. I am also asking for any free videos out there by any reputable teachers you may know of. Your help is, as always, appreciated! These are pretty much the only books/authors I can access at this time: John Kabat-Zinn Joe Dispenza, "Breaking the Habit of Being Yourself" Rodney Yee, "Meditation for Beginners" Susan Smalley, "Fully Present" Will Johnson, "Breathing Through The Whole Body" Jack Kornfield Patricia Monaghan, "Meditation, The Complete Guide" Lara Owen, "Growing Your Inner Light" Chogyam Trungpa Ian Gawler, "Meditation, An In-Depth Guide" Shunry U Suzuki, "Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind" Joan Budilovsky, "Complete Idiot's Guide to Meditation" Jonathon Ellerby, "Return To The Sacred" Tulku Tarthang James Austin, "Selfless Insight" Ronald Siegel, "The Mindfulness Solution" Sant Rajinder-Singh Michael Bernard Beckwith, "Spiritual Liberation" Steven Clevenger, "Going Within" Maritza, "Meditation for Beginners" Stephan Bodian, "Meditation for Dummies" Adele Ahlberg Calhoun, "Spiritual Disciplines Handbook" Eva Wang Cheri Huber, "The Secret Is There Are No Secrets" Richard Chilson, "Meditation" John Daido Loori, "The Art of Just Sitting" Wayne Dyer, "Getting In The Gap" Stephanie Jean Clement, "Mediatation for Beginners" Michal Levin, "Meditation" Shinzin Young, "The Beginner's Guide To Meditation" Pema Chodron Alan Watts, "Still The Mind" Lawrence LaShane, "How To Meditate" Swami Janakananda Saraswati, "Yoga" John Novak, "How To Meditate" Ernest Wood, "Concentration" There are a few others and a book by Thich Nhat Hanh which I assume will be very good, so I will get that for now and wait for opinions on the others. The library I can access, it's catalouge, is here: http://catalog.fvrl.org/uhtbin/cgisirsi.exe/?ps=Mgj0mm40Cp/FV-DIST/327530007/60/1182/X I left out the fluffy, puffy, non in-depth (as far as I could tell) stuff. But I may have missed something important. Please let me be clear! What I can get from the library is all I can get, unless you wish to mail me a book, and if so (with my deepest thanks) you can PM me for my mailing address. So if these are all garbage, well I guess I'll just have to depend on YouTube :/ Hey thanks for reading, please post your feedback on these authors/books in regards to whether or not you believe, in your direct experience or closely indirect experience, they are teaching meditation properly. Namaste! - DreamBliss

This is a very hard thing to put into words clearly. Briefly I will start by giving you some background. Some months ago I had an experience, in my mind, after an experience I had, a feeling, after reading a book, that, essentially, messed me up. I won't go into details. Basically I thought I was in love with someone and it turned out to (most likely) not be what I thought. More study and some time since I ended this has provided a few possibilities: 1. The magician's perspective - I was dealing with power which had manifested in this form. 2. The Yogic/Buddha/Tao perspective - I was dealing with Kundalini energy manifested in female form. 3. The alternate Buddha perspective - I was dealing with a Tulpa I had created. 4. My original perspective - I was really in love and energetically connected to an alien being on another world. This thread is not to talk about that, only to give you background. You know the saying, "Once burned twice shy." Before this experience I was exploring the inner landscapes of my chakras with a spirit animal named Ayhunna, who came to me during a dream re-entry session to shamanic drumming. He left as suddendly as he came, aging before my eyes and disintigrating for lack of a better word. Now he's back. This brings me to what I need help with. Before with Ayhunna I would meditate on my chakras, enter its landscape, and then Ayhunna would lead me to something I had to deal with there. Usually this was done playing his favorite game, "Chase the fox." I have since ceased to meditate on my chakras. Now I do ZaZen when I get up and try to do Deep Meditation using the mantas, "Release, Flow" or "(my real name) a Center of Consiousness." With this last mantra I was trying to see myself as a center of consiousness per the first lesson in Raja yoga. Recently with Ayhunna's return he usually sort of tells me during ZaZen through a sort of glimpse of him in my mind's eye or a sense of his presence that he wants me to follow him. Generally he comes during my last meditation of the evening. But I am having an issue here. I need to figure out how to seperate that which my mind is manufacturing to distract me from meditating and that which is truly Ayhunna wanting me to follow him. I feel it is an honor to have his guidance and help once again, and I want to honor this by following his guidance. But I also need to make sure I'm not getting disracted by thoughts. You could argue that it's all thoughts. But for now let's try to keep it simple. There are thoughts generated by my mind, and there are thoughts my mind either locks onto or is given, like a message. I want to seperate what is message and what is just mind drivel. Understand? So how do I do this? How do I make sure that I am not getting lost in thoughts durring meditation? How to I tell when Ayhunna is genuinely calling to me? How can I distinguish a mental distraction from a summons? I need to be sure so if it is a mind distraction, I can simply ignore it and focus on my mantra. But if it is Ayhunna, then I must follow him. My inner landscape/inner world/chakra landscape - whatever the heck it is - is seriously f-d up right now. Hope nobody gets mad at the swear word. But it is very apt. With the loss of Ayhunna and the confusion around this, this relationship and its recent and raw end, as well as the fact that I was, not even a year ago, a simple church-going Christian with a few questions so this is all brand new to me, well I'm a mess. Ayhunna is trying to help. I had one other indivdual who was trying to help me, but we have unfortunately sort of come up at odds to each other. My problem is I never really understood a lot of what he said. I tried and for the most part I followed his instructions. But so many things he instructed me to do just didn't feel right, or I didn't want to do them or something. But he did direct me here, so perhaps someone can help me out. One last thing... As I read, "Magical Knowledge I" by Josephine McCarthy I am seeing much that could coorelate to my experiences. Later in the book she discusses meditation and inner worlds. I think I might have to drop my Raja yoga studies for now and adopt some sort of Inner Stillness Meditation based on her training as my last meditation of the day, and the time at which I work with Ayhunna. So this is what I tenatively plan to do. However I wouldn't mind getting some other viewpoints and advice here. I mean what is the best way to go inside and work with your spirit animal? Maybe the answer is to somehow have a session devoted simply to Ayhunna and inner working, seperate from meditation. That may even be the answer to my problem. Simple enough, just train him, as much as that seems like the wrong way to think about it or say it, that meditation time is seperate from our time and ignore any glimpses or senses of him I recieve. If there is a practicing shaman somewhere in here I would dearly love to hear from you. Above anyone else you would be able to shed light on a lot of this stuff. So please post if you can help me! OK, off to meditate then sleep. Thanks everyone, and Namaste! - DreamBliss

Self realization is the realization of the Self, or Atman. The Self can be related to the experience of impersonal being, or the sense that you are pure consciousness, or that you are silence itself or awareness itself. Self realization could also be said to be the freedom from the sense of being a personal “me.” You transcend your ego identity and realize that you always were and always will be consciousness itself. Stress is created out of this sense of being a personal “me.” This personal me arises out of identifying with your thoughts. You believe you are the thinker of your thoughts. The thought arises “I don’t like potato chips” and you are the “I” in that sentence. And so every desire, fear, worry and thought that arises, you are the subject that is in fear, that desires, that worries. So it is a feeling of being bound, of being trapped in a separate sense of “I” that is in opposition to the rest of the world. It is the source of all conflict. But once you start turning your attention back upon this “me” that claims to be and have all of these thoughts, you find there is no “me” there. And this happens through meditation. Beyond the thought that “I am this,” there is no sense of personal “me” here. There is only impersonal being. And this being is aware, it is awareness itself. It exists beyond all thoughts. In fact, all thoughts arise out of it. So through this inquiry or other meditation techniques you begin to rest your attention on what is prior to this sense of being a personal me. And after a while there will be a shift, that attachment to being a separate “me” gets broken and you realize the Self, you realize you are consciousness. The feeling of this is very freeing, very peaceful and blissful. It can be a feeling of being silence or being love. But although you realize that consciousness is all that there is, there is still a very subtle sense of separation that is still there. It is not a concrete separation, but it is still there. The experience of Oneness is when you go even beyond The Self, and you feel you are everything. So self realization is you are consciousness and in oneness you are everything. Understanding this from the mind may seem like a small distinction, but it is quite a big difference. In self realization, as you remain identified with The Self, it is an inward experience, not an outward experience and there is that separation between inward and outward. You often here self realized teachers saying there is no world, it is all illusion. But in oneness, there is no separation between inward and outward. There is no denying the world. You are everything. You are fully free from being anything. There is a great release in this, an intense feeling of unconditional love. You feel yourself moving through everyone and everything. Everything is alive and radiating love just as you are alive and radiating love and there is no separation in that. You are the universe. You are the world. You are love itself. To experience either Self Realization or Oneness, spiritual practice especially meditation is needed, a healthy diet and lifestyle is also quite important and other spiritual disciplines beyond that will probably be practiced. But the most important part of attaining self realization or oneness is to receive the shaktipat from an Enlightened Master. When you receive shaktipat, the process of self realization and oneness begin to happen automatically deep within you. You begin to experience a spiritual energy within you, vibrating and moving through your body, awakening you to deep states of meditation and unconditional peace. Kip Mazuy is the Creator of Bliss Music Shaktipat Meditation Music Proven Repeatedly to Awaken You into Deep Meditation & Oneness To Hear Free Samples Visit the Spiritual Awakening Website For More Free Teachings on Meditation & Self Realization Please Visit the Spiritual Enlightenment Website

Here is a page with video teachings by Michael Tse covering a wide range of topics including Wing Chun, Tai Chi, Qigong, Meditation, and Taoism Tse Qigong Centre videos- http://www.qimagazine.com/video.html

Now here's an opportunity to lift this from the Tibetan Book of Living and Dying The Tibetan name of the Buddha of Compassion is Chenrézig. Chen is the eye, ré is the corner of the eye, and zig means "see." This signifies that with his compassionate eyes Chénrezig sees the needs of all beings. So direct the compassion that radiates from your meditation, softly and gently, through your eyes, so that your gaze becomes the very gaze of compassion itself, all-pervasive and oceanlike. There are several reasons for keeping the eyes open. With the eyes open, you are less likely to fall asleep. Then, meditation is not a means of running away from the world, or of escaping from it into a trancelike experience of an altered state of consciousness. On the contrary, it is a direct way to help us truly understand ourselves and relate to life and the world. Therefore, in meditation, you keep your eyes open, not closed. Instead of shutting out life, you remain open and at peace with everything. You leave all your senses—hearing, seeing, feeling—just open, naturally, as they are, without grasping after their perceptions. As Dudjom Rinpoche said: 'Though different forms are perceived, they are in essence empty; yet in the emptiness one perceives forms. Though different sounds are heard, they are empty; yet in the emptiness one perceives sounds. Also different thoughts arise; they are empty, yet in the emptiness one perceives thoughts." Whatever you see, whatever you hear, leave it as it is, without grasping. Leave the hearing in the hearing, leave the seeing in the seeing, without letting your attachment enter into the perception. According to the special luminosity practice of Dzogchen, all the light of our wisdom-energy resides in the heart center, which is connected through "wisdom channels" to the eyes. The eyes are the "doors" of the luminosity, so you keep them open, in order not to block these wisdom channels. When you meditate keep your mouth slightly open, as if about to say a deep, relaxing "Aaaah." By keeping the mouth slightly open and breathing mainly through the mouth, it is said that the "karmic winds" that create discursive thoughts are normally less likely to arise and create obstacles in your mind and meditation. Rest your hands comfortably covering your knees. This is called the "mind in comfort and ease" posture.

I am very happy to report that I have been awarded a scholarship to go to Karme Choling in Vermont, near the Canadian border, for a month in October. We will be engaging in meditation from about 9 to 5 every day, and i am really looking forward to it. There will be a lot of silent time, a lot of walking in the woods, and a lot of reading as well. I have done zen sesshins (if im spelling that correctly) but I have never done anything approaching a month-long intensive. Have any of you? Any advice or feedback? I am expecting some deep-seated crap and issues to come to the surface, and i am expecting to potentially push through a large chunk of childhood-issues-type-stuff. I am trying to avoid expectations and go into it with an open mind and heart, but i have done enough intensives to know that when i sit for long periods, my issues come up for review (and to bitchslap me with the wanton abandon i have come to expect from them!). I will have a lot of time to study, and no internet or phone reception for a month, so its time to settle down with some good books. I have been slowly working my way through Mahamudra: The Moonlight by Dakpo Tashi Namgyal, and will probably finish it up there, as well as his Clarifying the Natural State: A Principal Guidance. I also have ordered a copy of Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche's Wild Awakening: The Heart of Mahamudra and Dzogchen, and on Tibetan_Ice's recommendation, just got a copy of Ajahn Brahm's Meditation, Bliss, and Beyond: A Meditator's Handbook. That might do it, or I might order Gendun Rinpoche's Heart Advice from a Mahamudra Master. As you may have surmised, i have been working with mahamudra, and am looking forward to deepening my practice with this retreat. So any further recommendations? Any suggestions? thanks bums!

Hello all. I have been reading for a month or two and I finally got up the gumption to join. I am 24 years old, from the U.S.A., a college graduate of a field I have no job in and lost interest in, a very abstract thinker--it seems too much at times, an animal lover and a man teetering on the tightrope betwwen introvertism and extrovertism. My religious beliefs were never really there. My parents are christians but do not practice. They are very good people, though. I have enver witnessed them do wrong to another. This is something that I have taken for granted. They are great, slightly apathetic people. Typing this, I begin to feel sadness for them. I know they didn't picture a working class life centered around the television, as that is not what I picture for myself. That sounds a bit snide, but it is not meant to be. I hope that this is not something that eats at them. I want them to be happy. My love for them is as true as any. The sad truth is they have stagnated, which is the easy decision to make in life--not that the path is easy. My dad owns a very small business that he operates himself and my mom works at an establishment that only puts her down. They show no signs of wanting to advance in their current lines of work. My mother has always mentioned going to nursing school. She loves to help people and is an extremely caring person. I want her to do this because I think it is something she really wants. My dad has always loved antiques and he has always loved antique guns. He is no NRA extremist and could never harm an animal, but he is definitely a collector. He has recently become a vertified gunsmith and is furthering this. I would love for them to follow these paths that they have shown interest in. Looking at a large portion of my life, I have been stagnant and for the last couple of years I have when I stagnate. This is something I want to avoid, but am having some dificulties with. I was always a quiet, introspective, introverted person--although I remember being quite different before I started school and at the very beginning of elementary school. I remember innocently kissing a girl on the cheek when I was 8. She was my "girlfriend" at the time. When I look back at it, it epitomized adorableness. For about a week, I did this once a day at recess until someone told on me and the teacher scolded me infront of the entire class. That year was the last year I remember being an "alpha-male." I never bullied others or put them down. But, in my first few years of schooling, I was very outgoing, very talkative, very much interested in girls and a top performer in both academics and physical education--I was the fastest kid in class. When I was nine, my family moved in with my grandmother. I am still not sure why to this day. I believe it was because we were struggling financially. Well, my grandma, who lived to be 91, chain smoked and my father smoke at the time as well. We lived there for just over a year, but I know this was bad for my health. The main difference between my new home and my old one was the neighborhood. It had no children, nobody my age. My brother was four years older than me and began acting so and finding other freinds. I did not go outside nearly as much as I did. I resorted to eating. My parents argued a lot at that age. This may have aided my eating. My grandma spoiled me with sweets and fried food. I went from an outgoing, motivated, active, well-rounded athlete that was noted as especially intellectual by second year teacher to an overweight child who put off school work. My third year was not that bad. I got a little more plump and was a little more distracted, but I still earned good grades and still excelled in PE. But, I had the kissing incident in the back of my mind and a lowered confidence from the new lbs. I packed on. I noticed those pounds the most when the best friend of the girl I kissed told me that the girl I kissed no longer liked me because I got fat over the summer. Even as an outgoing child in those days, I think things cut me deeper than a lot of others. With my newly acquired lack of confidence, that really hurt. We moved out before that year ended, but it was to the other side of town--where we still live.By this time, I was not what society calls obese, but I was tubby. I began to be made fun of on occasion. In 4th grade, I was 100 lbs. I was in a new place with no friends and I was usually the fattest kid in the conversation. The same went on until the summer before 7th grade. I decided to join in on a diet with my mom. By this time I was always the slowest kid and ran out of breath pretty easily. I picked up video games and became even more out of shape and more distracted. I went from a bright student to a kid that while engaging in class, always pt off school work and skidded by with Bs. --I should probably let you know, from a very young age (I am not sure when I started this) I would pace back and forth in empty rooms, twiddling my finger and conjure up stories and events and pretend I was part of them. I would be in sword fights, car races, baseball games, concerts, wars, jousting duels, etc. I would do this all day. I did this my entire life. It lessened over the years, but I just recently quit about 6 months ago. I don't quite know what all this is about. But, I do know I was always a little strange, even in my more outgoing days. During bus rides or long car rides I would either stare out the window the entire time or put my head down on the seat infront of me and stare at my feet. -- Well, at about the age of 13, I became very health conscious. My father quit smoking when I was about 9 or 10 and I began eating healthier and lighter. In 7th grade, I was about 175 lbs. by the end of it, I was less than 150 lbs. and started getting back my athleticism, but I never quite recovered my old outgoing nature. I was still sort of known as a pudgy kid, I didn't have that many friends and I was pretty quiet. It didn't help that I physically developed a little slower than my peers. I became pretty slender from 16 and on. But, at some point in these years, I decided to sit and observe this game instead of participating. From then until a couple of years ago I let rules, guidelines, habits and constraints live my life rather than living it for myself. I now feel an inner-fire, but I am in search of a way to harness it. Sorry for that story, I honestly did not intend to do that and started to want to wrap things up about two to three paragraphs ago. I guess this is why I am here. I often read this forum for health tips. But, I need more than chlorella now. I have read online about Qigong, but I feel that what I have read has only been the skeleton of it. I would go to a practicioner, but I fear that I would not be able to make the monthly payments. I started to meditate around three years ago, but have never taken it as seriously as I have in the past year and a half. As of late, I have had some very profound experiences and in these last years I have reaped some long term effects as well. But, I feel I have a long way to go. I feel that I have tension in my body--my shoulder blades and shoulders. I feel that I doubt myself too much. I feel that I do not express my idea as much as I should. I feel that I do not create as much as I want to. I feel that I am capable of extraordinary things as we all are. I feel that I sometimes give in to this invisible machine that we have all slaved to at some point. I feel that some nights, instead of living life and/or creating something, I fall in to the machine and let a spinach pizza and X-files live my life. I have grown over the last few years.I am in what I consider great physical shape. I am in love with my loving girlfriend. I appreciate nature very much and I am expressing myself more than I have in the past. But, I am experiencing a need and a fire. My motivation comes and goes and when it goes, I just dwell on the fact that it has gone. Maybe it never went. Maybe I was too worried that it would go. My deepest feelings and thoughts have almost always been in line with taoist beliefs. When I realized this in my late teens, I began to look into things. I just now find myself longing for more and longing for a way to harness my energy, to feel that motivation, that fire and now how to use it. To show my inner-light, my creativity without any fear or doubt. This brought me here more than anything. I eat a vegetarian diet that is low in grains and dairy. Although I go through bouts where I will have an organic Amy's pizza and use extra cheese or make a great deal of cheese and bean dip. I feel that I fall into these moments because it is easier to eat a big load, watch a movie and fall asleep than it is to write something, paint something, take pictures or start my video project. Those moments are crutches. I notice that when my love and I eat fresh, we usually have sex every night. When we eat heavier and when we eat grains for dinner, we have sex less and I notice the difference. I can tell a lot of my energy is focusing on digesting the processed food. I would love to incorporate Qigong into my life. But, I just don't know where to start. Are there any exercises I could start doing now? Any sort of other advice? I would appreciate any help many times over. Again, thank you for reading and sorry for the novel. I look forward to the adventures I will have here and the friends that I will meet along the way.

I hope this is the right place to post this... I'm new here (a Taoist/Christian wandering along), and need a little help. I have trained Tai Chi (Wu style) for around 20 years. I had a great teacher, who poured as much as he could into me with the time we had. After training under him for around 8 years, I had to move away. By that time I was teaching my own classes for beginners. But since that time I have been on my own. Now I find myself in a small town with no resources for me. The local tai chi classes are taught by a Hard Stylist (which is going to be zero help for internal energy work), and he doesn't even do Qigong. I am looking for some help on working with my Chi, as well as some question as to Mindfulness Meditation. There are so many people in the Personal Practice area, I am guessing someone could be of help, but how do you know? So I guess this is me casting my net to see what swims in. Any help anyone could offer would be greatly appreciated!!!

A part of a BBC investigative series about religion. Here the religious and spiritual systems of China are examined including the principles and practice of Taoism- [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IExz9U3tmUk[/media ] [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7v5izH7v3_U[/media ]

Here is a cool BBC Documentary entitled "The Life of the Buddha"- [media]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFbjDcz_CbU[/media ]