The Problem of Other People
Sartre once said in a play he wrote, “Hell is other people.” and indeed, when it comes to meditation, hell can sometimes be other people, particularly when they don’t understand what you’re doing,… Continue reading
Category Archive: Psychology of meditation
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The Wavelike Nature of Progress in Meditation
There seems to be a pattern to some people’s relationship with meditation, and it goes a bit like this: 1. Enthused by the novelty of it all, they go at it like a… Continue reading
Between the Thoughts
I’ve been getting a lot of questions from people complaining about how they cannot stop thinking in meditation. They have the view that in some way, meditation should be helping them to stop… Continue reading
Mind Your Own Business
Question: ” … I understand the importance of meditation because when I do it, I can feel my body relaxing and my mind unwinding. But mindfulness escapes me. So could you possibly put… Continue reading
Using Mental Noting
Question: “In the early stages of the meditation, I find there’s a lot of things happening at the same time – especially Thinking, Hearing and Rising or Falling of the breath. And I… Continue reading
Accept the Struggle
Most people struggle with meditation, either with the posture or with an attention that just won’t sit still – not to mention the skeins of thinking that just won’t let you alone. It’s… Continue reading
Free download of Acharn Chah’s Teachings
Though I never had the opportunity to practice with Acharn Chah, I wish I had, because his understanding of meditation, and the tricky mental obstacle course it can be when we practice it,… Continue reading
Meditation is not the Destination
The skill of meditating is not for its own sake. We are not meditating to be excellent meditators. We’re meditating to have excellent lives. Meditation’s just a method, a tool after all –… Continue reading
Stillness – Keep it Simple
One thing that keeps coming through the emails I’m getting about the audio course is, people are turning meditation into hard work. They’re thinking too much about it and trying too hard to… Continue reading
Sensations Are Everything in Meditation
In meditation, sensations are everything, and everything should be contemplated as sensations – nameless, characterless and constantly changing. Sensations are life. Life is sensations. Everything else are the illusions we build out of… Continue reading
The Main Game of Meditation
In a culture like ours, which values excitement and novelty above most other things, a lot of people come to meditation looking for exactly that – the novelty, the new, the wow factor.… Continue reading
Essential Reading for Meditation
I found this extraordinary resource in my wanderings on the net. It’s called Dhamma Talks.net and all of the greatest teachers of Mindfulness meditation are here … what they wrote, what they said… Continue reading