The underlying themes of meditation practice.

Based on readings and my experience in theistic and non-theistic paradigms, I recognize that there are some fundamental philosophical differences and far more similarities in meditative techniques and purpose. Focusing on meditation techniques from what appears to be different spiritual paths, I will avoid speaking to the philosophical differences and direct attention to comparing or bridging a number of theistic and non-theistic based meditation techniques from different spiritual paradigms. What I mean by spiritual paradigms are religious or practical ways of relating to the unseen, unknown, intangible, and/or the essence of life experiences.

No matter the tradition, theistic or non-theistic, two underlying central and fundamental themes of practice appear to be that of devotion and self-reflection. Whether it is adherence to a specific practice and/or to a divine entity, devotees must principally adhere to guidelines set forth by teachers of the past and present. Generally, there are texts and doctrines written by or about those teachers of the past and the respective religious tradition that are usually transmitted by a current barer of the tradition, i.e. guru, priest, shaman, monk, etc., to devotee(s).

The practice of pondering a scriptures, stories, or phrases is a familiar style of meditation in both theistic and non-theistic traditions. Purposefully, pondering Christian scriptures, Zen Buddhist Koans, or Taoist poetic phrases, drives the practitioner towards his/her intuition and knocks on the door of spiritual realizations. Generally, in theistic traditions like Christianity, Hinduism, or Navaho, my experience of pondering a scripture or prayer often will open my heart and lead me closer to feeling a Divine or God’s presence and/or love in what is unseen, unknown, and/or intangible in my life. Comparatively, but not contradictory, a Taoist poem or Zen Buddhist Koan, also offers me openness, awareness, and/or the absence of self in relation to what is unseen, unknown, and/or intangible in my life experience.

Within the content of any religious doctrine, precise meditative practices are designed to facilitate an opening of the human spirit. In non-theistic practices like Tibetan Buddhism and Taoism, detaching from normal cognitive thinking is a steppingstone to liberating the mind and human spirit. In his book, The Meditative Mind (1988), Daniel Goldman references this steppingstone as a determined effort with an “outcome of insight into emptiness.�?(p. 83) Similar to theistic mediation practices, it is within this state of “emptiness�?the Buddhist or Taoist meditation practitioner either concentrates or lets go of the mind and becomes less “self�?driven, liberating his/her state of conscious experience, and transcends into an expansive quality of her/his universe.

Chanting, singing, or focusing on one word and repeating it over and over is another meditation technique that many traditions utilize to transcend the normal state of consciousness. Goleman describes a Jewish meditation where the practitioner “repeats the name (of God in Hebrew), he directs his attention upward from... the limited ordinary mind..., an awareness beyond ego.�?(p. 51) Goleman goes on to describe this stage; “Here his sense of separation from God dissolves, if only for a moment. He is filled with a great joy, and seized by a sweet rapture.�?(p. 52) In my own experience, controlled or manipulated breathing meditation, as in Kundalini Yoga, along with visualization, as in some Taoist meditations also changes the state of ordinary consciousness and can heighten the state of mind.

Adding movement as yet another element to meditation practice is another common technique in many theistic and non-theistic traditions. As in Christian liturgical dancing and Sufi whirling dervishes there is a belief that respectively, praise dancing and twirling will bring her/him into closer union with God. Some of the repetitive movements of a dancing Tibetan monk, as in Monk Dancers of Tibet, by Matthieu Ricard, are narrated by Drudi, a Tibetan monk �?dance master, as transforming the dancer and “once the dance is over, it is indispensable that the dancer should dedicate the merit of what he has done so that he himself and all beings in the universe may be liberated from suffering and its causes and attain buddhahood.�?(p. 54) Within all of these meditation experiences, something transpersonal occurs. The practitioner becomes formless and a connection transpires that is full with purpose or divine presence, the self, almost transparent.

Meditation techniques are bountiful. Based in spirituality, meditation techniques are designed to free humans from the bondage of body and mind. Goleman quotes Gurdjieff putting it thus: "We are imprisoned within our own minds... If we are ever to escape from our prisons,... we should realize our true situation... This can be done by holding ourselves in a state of passive awareness..." To me, the passive state of awareness ultimately results in a conscious freedom or paves the path for one to reside as one in the absoluteness of Divine love.

By Wasentha Young