Many years ago, when i was in college, so-called gurus from the East came to our campus, providing students with meditation techniques that involved sitting cross-legged and concentrating on allegedly “special” mantras that were supposed to take us to a higher spiritual level. I went to a couple of these sessions and ended up telling the bearded gurus — who were taking money, by the way, for their efforts — that i felt that what they were promoting was just a glorified form of self-hypnosis. I read about hypnosis while in high school and was familiar with what it entailed. Needless to say, they were not very elated regarding my comments.
Many people are greedy and gullible. They think that they can pay money that will enable them to soar to some kind of higher spiritual plane. Real meditation is not what one can greedily arrange to happen. It is not something that one can practice. Real meditation is not doing something to attain some otherworldly result (to escape from reality). Real meditation is an effortless thing that may take place if one is very perceptive, caring, and greed-free. Real meditation is not doing something to get something out of it. One cannot “know” that one is meditating. Real meditation takes place, in one, unawares, without a person concluding that he or she is doing it.
A dull, greedy little mind can sit cross-legged (repeating so-called “special” words for decades but it will only be mesmerizing itself hypnotically… rendering itself to be even more dull and robotic). There is no path to the truly spiritual because the truly spiritual (i.e., the timeless) is not in a place. It is not locked up in a box upon an altar. Place and time are bound together.
Tom's Nature-up-close Photography and Mindfulness Blog 
Oh the colors Tom in that photo – truly you are gifted…. as for meditation I never got it – remember when so many were doing it – but the point as I understand it was to use words until one’s mind stilled… maybe this is one way people enter the timeless? I don’t know, because it doesn’t work that way for me.
Thanks much about the photo, Sara. 😊
Ah, the silence brought about by the robotic repetition of words is a form of stupefaction and dullness. Stupefaction and robotic dullness do not lead to sacred timelessness (thank goodness). There are different forms of silence.
I would agree with you. But there are many meditation techniques out there which do require some effort, such as raja yoga, which is to basically focus on nothing else but the divine, which will eventually permeate throughout your entire being. For instance, if someone imagines himself grinding his teeth against a stack of silver coins, he will begin to feel a sense of discomfort: Thoughts influencing the body. When we focus on the divine, eventually we will be permeated with a felt knowledge of the oneness in the comos, and God himself. Atleast this is how I have come to understand it. Great post though! stay blessed
Spiritual and motivational blogger https://www.georgesbiblicalmeditations.wordpress.com/
Thank you, George, for your response. 😉
Well, for one thing, God (i.e., the sacred) is not a “he.” No scrotum is involved. For goodness sake, how can a hairy humanoid begin by focusing on the divine? That seems absurd. A limited mind can easily concoct what it thinks is the divine but that is just a ruse of the limited brain. Thought is limited and symbolic; what is limited and symbolic cannot, in any way, shape, or form, produce what is divine and unlimited.
I don’t plug my blog in other peoples’ blogs. Probably either should you.
I tend to describe God as “he” because my chosen ideal of God is the avatar Jesus. I do agree that this entity we call God cannot be fully understood. Lao tzu taught this as well. But this hasn’t nor do I think it should stop us from pursuing it. Or attempting to do so. I think I once heard it described as it being an endless pit of immeasurable potentiality. The more we dig, the deeper it is. However, the more it is we dig, the more developed we get. Thus life for the spiritual seeker is a journey towards an impossible destination. But this is why its so beautiful. The joy of uncovering new things concerning God, the joy of experiencing new things concerning God is always afresh, and it will never go away.
George, ideals and the very usage of the word God can lead to (and stem from) all kinds of presumptions. I am not interested in that old game. I was deeply immersed in the Christian tradition in my youth, and it largely blocked me rather than freeing me spiritually (although there were plenty of very beneficial things about it too).
Good luck in your quest. I am not interested in debating with you on this any longer. Perhaps you should stick to your own blog and not try to plug your different ideas into other peoples’ blogs (while plugging your blog).
Muy hermosa Tom!
Thank you very much, Marcela! 😊
I have never meditated in any type of way that you describe Tom. I can tune out everything else when I want to be alone with my thoughts … that is best done in nature with no one running over to walk with me, which annoys me to no end. I leave the Park to return home to noise outside and a howling dog next door that I cannot tune out. The butterfly is beautiful and is a perfect specimen, unlike th poor Swallowtail I wrote about with its extremely tattered wings – I don’t know how it stayed aloft.
Just keep doing what you are doing, Linda. It seems great to me. Sorry about the howling dog. (Maybe earplugs can help at times?)
Yes, the elderly butterflies can develop wings that are very torn up and beaten down.
I think if one needs a guru it won’t do them any good.
Yes, Jim! Not only would it not do them any good, but it would likely help to mesmerize them into hypnotic states of delusion and self-satisfied dullness. I, for one, sure don’t want to be led into a dark hole. 😉
I couldn’t agree more Tom.
Meditation has never done ‘it’ for me and at one time I actually thought there was something lacking in me because of that – silly me! As for Gurus – I have learned from experience to stay as far far away as possible.
Love your beautiful colourful photo by the way.
I’m glad you found this out for yourself, Margaret. Yes, the so-called gurus are just another group of shysters out for prestige and money. And what they offer is generally a dead-end street that involves a form of hypnosis. Discover and investigate for yourself (far from the organized so-called “experts”). 😉