Meditation
Meditation is the way to experience our own inner reality and its limitless possibilities. Within us is a boundless wealth of peace, joy and wisdom which meditation opens up to us. Through meditation we can know who and what we truly are. From the beginning of history there have been people who attained this inner wealth and shared with others the path to enlightenment or “God-realization.” In the world’s different spiritual traditions the way to this goal is meditation.
The inner journey of meditation brings us to fulfillment in self-discovery and oneness with others. The silence of the mind reveals the peace of the heart. When meditation becomes part of our lives, we can solve our problems and achieve the highest that we aspire for.
Excerpts on meditation from the writings of Sri Chinmoy:
Question: What do we learn from meditation?
Sri Chinmoy: The first thing that we learn from meditation is vastness. Meditation is the only way to expand our outer existence, our limited being. Without meditation, we would never expand ourselves; but if we meditate even for one minute, we have expansion.
Meditation means conscious self-expansion. Meditation means one’s conscious awareness of the transcendental Reality. Meditation means the recognition or the discovery of one’s own true self. It is through meditation that we transcend limitation, bondage and imperfection. First we face limitations, imperfections and bondage, then we transform them, and afterwards we transcend them.
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Meditation is dynamism on the inner planes of consciousness. If we want to achieve anything, either in our inner life or our outer life, then the help of meditation is of paramount importance. When we meditate, what we actually do is enter into the deeper part of our being. At that time, we are able to bring to the fore the wealth that we have deep within us. Meditation shows us how we can aspire for something and, at the same time, how we can achieve it. It is through meditation that we can enter into an object, a subject, a person, or into Infinity and Eternity. If we practice meditation daily, then we can rest assured that the problems of our life, inner and outer, are solved.
Why do we meditate? We meditate precisely because this world of ours has disappointed us and because failure looms large in our day-to-day life. We want fulfilment. We want joy, peace, bliss and perfection within and without. Meditation is the answer, the only answer.
True meditation can never be done with the mind. Very often we make a mistake when we say that we are meditating in the mind and utilising the mind. Real meditation is done in the psychic being and in the soul. It goes hand in hand with flaming aspiration, the burning flame that wants to climb up to the Highest.
Meditation has two things to offer us: self-mastery and self-transformation. These two go together. When we meditate, immediately we have the beginnings of self-mastery, and when we have self-mastery, we see that we cannot cherish ugly or undivine thoughts; we cannot remain inside ignorance anymore. At that time we see that our transformation is taking place. Meditation is constantly giving us the message of self-transformation.
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We get divine peace through meditation. Even if we meditate for fifteen minutes and get peace for only one minute, that one minute of peace, if it is solid peace, will be able to permeate our whole day. If in the morning we have meditated at six o’clock, in the evening we will still feel inner peace, inner joy, inner light. It is all solid power from our meditation that we are getting, and these things last for some time. When we have a meditation of the highest order, then we get really abiding peace, light and delight. We need meditation because we want to grow in light and we want to fulfil ourselves in light and through light. If this is our choice, if this is our aspiration, if this is our thirst, then meditation is the only way.
Question: What is the highest meditation?
Sri Chinmoy: The highest meditation is when you do not have any thoughts at all. Right now when we are meditating, we are victims to many thoughts, undivine thoughts, ugly thoughts, evil thoughts. At other times we do a kind of meditation where we get fairly good thoughts, divine thoughts, fulfilling thoughts and illumining thoughts. This is a higher state. But when we are in the Highest, there will be no thoughts, either good or bad. There it is only Light.
For more of Sri Chinmoy’s writings, please visit SriChinmoyLibrary.com