Something to ADD TO your existing religious study/prayer/practice. Most, if not all, major religions teach, practice, and understand the value of meditating. One way Christians, I believe, can relate is based on the scripture, "Be Still and Know that I Am God".
Wayne Dyer has written a lovely little Chap Book with accompanying CD explaining/teaching how to practice meditating by "getting in the gap". He uses the first line of the universal Christian prayer, "Our Father, Which Art in Heaven . . .". The idea is to pause between each word –
Our . . . Father . . . Which . . . Art . . . In . . . Heaven . . .
Try to stay "in the gap" between the words longer each time –
Our . . . . . . Father . . . . . . Which . . . . . . Art . . .
With practice, which includes slow, deep breathing, you can stay "in the gap" for longer periods of time. "In the gap" is where you meet God, where you experience peace, where you are renewed in body, mind, and spirit.
I like to sit on my porch in the morning, after drinking my coffee and reading some passages in my Bible. I am still a novice but the way it works for me is when I close my eyes I concentrate on the darkness of the screen behind/in front? of my closed eyes. I see vague muted colors and images which "float" slowly in and around on this screen.
It seems relatively easy to concentrate on this "screen" and that enables me to keep my mind clear. I am aware of the music softly playing in the background (I keep my TV tuned to Easy Listening all day until evening when I watch the News and/or some taped program), and I can hear the birds chirping in the yard but I lose touch with some part of reality.
I know this separation happens to some degree because this morning Rocky was siting on the porch lounge with me when I began and right away he jumped off and went back in the house. When I finished meditating, I’m guessing 10-15 minutes later, I opened my eyes and he was back on the lounge with me. I never heard him come back out or jump up on the seat. Seeing him laying there next to me when I opened my eyes was a lovely surprise.
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I watched a program one evening about a town in Iowa (I forget the name) that has two meditation centers – one for men, one for women; the town residents come there twice a day to meditate together. AHA! I found a link about the program on the Internet –http://theuncarvedblog.com/2010/07/06/abc-newsnightline-transcendental-meditation-in-vedic-city-iowa/
"Famed film maker David Lynch spends a lot of time in Vedic City. He started the David Lynch Foundation, which, in the last four years, has provided scholarships for over 100,000 kids to learn to meditate for free in schools across the country.
"It’s not a religion. It’s not against any religion, it’s not mumbo-jumbo. It truly does transform life," Lynch told ABC News. "Kids come to school and they meditate together for 15 minutes in the morning. And before they go home they meditate for 15 minutes. A lot of them come from, you know, bad situations, and so this gives them this thing you know, at the beginning and the end of the day, the rest of the time you just watch the violence stop. Watch relationships improve. Watch happiness in the hallways, in the classroom, watch creativity flow more and more, watch that heavy weight that we are living under gently lift away."
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One of the things they all pray for is World Peace. All right, people. Christians. Attention, please."If My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land.
— 2 Chronicles 7:14, New King James Version (NKJV)
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All I have to say is, try it, you’ll like it. :)Sarah
