Soma Meditation

Ram Dass guides a soma (divine nectar) meditation, focusing on drawing the living spirit in through the breath and body – and releasing the stuff in you that is keeping you from being with the universe: fears, negativity, doubt, inadequacy, anger, loneliness…replenishing your body with healing energy. Release the things you don’t need in order to be in the spirit.

A Walking Meditation from Jack Kornfield

One of the most useful and grounding ways of attending to our body is the practice of walking meditation. Walking meditation is a simple and universal practice for developing calm, connectedness, and embodied awareness. It can be practiced regularly, before or after sitting meditation or any time on its own, such as after a busy day at work or on a lazy Sunday morning. The art of walking meditation is to learn to be aware as you walk, to use the natural movement of walking to cultivate mindfulness and wakeful presence.To practice, select a quiet place where you can walk comfortably back and forth, indoors or out, about ten to thirty paces in length. Begin by standing at one end of this “walking path,” with your feet firmly planted on the ground. Let your hands rest easily, wherever they are comfortable. Open your senses to see and feel the whole surroundings. After a minute, bring your attention back to focus on the body. Center yourself, and feel how your body is standing on the earth. Feel the pressure on the bottoms of your feet and the other natural sensations of standing. Let yourself be present and alert.Begin to walk a bit more slowly than usual. Let yourself walk with a sense of ease and dignity. Relax and let your walking be easy and natural, as if you were a king or queen out for a royal stroll. Pay attention to your body. With each step feel the sensations of lifting your foot and leg off of the earth. Then mindfully place your foot back down. Feel each step mindfully as you walk. When you reach the end of your path, pause for a moment. Center yourself, carefully turn around, pause again so that you can be aware of the first step as you walk back. You can experiment with the speed, walking at whatever pace keeps you most present.Continue to walk back and forth for ten or twenty minutes or longer. As with the breath in sitting, your attention will wander away many times. As soon as you notice this, acknowledge where it went softly, “wandering,” “thinking,” “hearing,” “planning.” Then return to feel the next step. Like training a puppy, you will need to come back a thousand times. Whether you have been away for one second or for ten minutes, no matter. Simply acknowledge where you have been and then come back to being alive here and now with the next step you take.Use the walking meditation to calm and collect yourself and to live more wakefully in your body. Practice at home first. You can then extend your mindful walking in an informal way when you go shopping, whenever you walk down the street or walk to or from your car. You can learn to enjoy walking for its own sake instead of the usual planning and thinking and, in this simple way, begin to be truly present, to bring your body, heart and mind together as your move through your life.This meditation is taken from the book, “The Wise Heart“via Jack Kornfield

Breathing Meditation with Sharon Salzberg

Taken from "Real Happiness: The Power of Meditation, A 28-Day Program" this meditation uses the breath as an anchor. Noticing the breath and returning to it when the mind wanders forms the foundation of this practice.Real Happiness guides us through the basics of posture, breathing, and a daily schedule as well as the finer points of calming the mind, distraction, dealing with specific problem areas (pain in the legs? falling asleep?) and the larger issues of compassion and awareness. It explains how meditation works; why a daily meditation practice results in more resiliency, creativity, peace, clarity, and balance; and offers twelve meditation practices, including mindfulness meditation, lovingkindness meditation and walking meditation. 

A Meditation on Lovingkindness

This meditation uses words, images, and feelings to evoke a lovingkindness and friendliness toward oneself and others.With each recitation of the phrases, we are expressing an intention, planting the seeds of loving wishes over and over in our heart.With a loving heart as the background, all that we attempt, all that we encounter will open and flow easily.You can begin the practice of lovingkindness by meditating for fifteen or twenty minutes in a quiet place. Let yourself sit in a comfortable fashion. Let your body rest and be relaxed. Let your heart be soft. Let go of any plans and preoccupations.Begin with yourself. Breathe gently, and recite inwardly the following traditional phrases directed to your own well-being. You begin with yourself because without loving yourself it is almost impossible to love others.May I be filled with lovingkindness.May I be safe from inner and outer dangers.May I be well in body and mind.May I be at ease and happy.As you repeat these phrases, picture yourself as your are now, and hold that image in a heart of lovingkindness. Or perhaps you will find it easier to picture yourself as a young and beloved child. Adjust the words and images in any way you wish. Create the exact phrases that best open your heart of kindness. Repeat these phrases over and over again, letting the feelings permeate your body and mind. Practice this meditation for a number of weeks, until the sense of lovingkindness for yourself grows.Be aware that this meditation may at times feel mechanical or awkward. It can also bring up feelings contrary to lovingkindness, feelings of irritation and anger. If this happens, it is especially important to be patient and kind toward yourself, allowing whatever arises to be received in a spirit of friendliness and kind affection.When you feel you have established some stronger sense of lovingkindness for yourself, you can then expand your meditation to include others. After focusing on yourself for five or ten minutes, choose a benefactor, someone in your life who has loved or truly cared for you. Picture this person and carefully recite the same phrases:May you be filled with lovingkindness.May you be safe from inner and outer dangers.May you be well in body and mind.May you be at ease and happy.Let the image and feelings you have for your benefactor support the meditation. Whether the image or feelings are clear or not does not matter. In meditation they will be subject to change. Simply continue to plant the seeds of loving wishes, repeating the phrases gently no matter what arises.Expressing gratitude to our benefactors is a natural form of love. In fact, some people find lovingkindness for themselves so hard, they begin their practice with a benefactor. This too is fine. The rule in lovingkindness practice is to follow the way that most easily opens your heart.This meditation is taken from the book, "The Art of Forgivness, Lovingkindness, and Peace" This article is reprinted with permission from Jack Kornfield's website. Original article here.