finding the silence by creating dots
At the end of a recent sound bath I attended, we ended the bath with a discussion of the myriad ways to meditate. One of the participants lamented that she could not quiet her mind and let go of her thoughts. Other attendees assured her there were ways to go deep into meditation without an empty mind. One person offered that silently counting backward helps quiet the "monkey mind." Another mentioned using a candle. With a candle, the person trying to meditate can focus on the flickering of the flame to help capture fleeting thoughts. The dancing flame is mesmerizing and can put you in a trance. Whispering a mantra repeatedly in a rhythm can help quiet the mind. Diaphragmatic breathing or circular breathing with visual journeying can also enhance the experience.
There is no one way to meditate, but there is one feeling that comes from dedicating time to the practice - bliss. Wait, two feelings: bliss and groundedness. We at once become one with the ethereal - the Divine - and simultaneously have a sense of being connected to the earth or the universe.
As each participant was assuring the woman upset by her non-meditative experience of the sound bath, I started thinking about how sometimes, when I sit in silence, my thoughts race. I only experience the complete silence some find in meditation when my eyes are wide open. One way I meditate is by observing nature. I stare and focus on one element. During the fall, that may mean staring out the window, watching the leaves fall from trees and dance in the wind. Another way, while painting, I concentrate on the colors I mix together, how the watercolors bleed into one another or how my brush moves across the roughness of the paper. A deeper stillness comes over me when I am making dots. Yes, you read that correctly - making dots.
If you look very closely at my watercolors, you will notice in some areas of the painting, there are doodles, circles and dots I have drawn with ink. When I finish a painting, I fall deeper into meditation when I doodle over it with my ink. Inking dots are the most focused I become in silence; my mind becomes empty and clear.
The motion of creating dots on my watercolor paper, sometimes perfectly round, sometimes misshaped and not so round, is freeing. I don't know why making dots does it for me, but it does point to the fact that meditation is personal. Each spirit-mind connection is unique, so it makes sense that we can come to stillness and the Divine differently.
I invite you to experiment with various ways of stilling your mind to ground you and open you to the ethereal. Use music to help the clear your head as well. Beautiful Chorus is an amazing group with meditative music. Or try listening to Tibetan singing bowls or koshi bells. All are available on music apps.
Try to think of meditation as a form of mindfulness. One dictionary definition describes it as a mental state achieved by focusing one's awareness on the present moment, while calmly, acknowledging and accepting one's feelings, thoughts, and bodily sensations, used as a therapeutic technique. Very experienced yogis and meditators consider mindfulness as a way of living and being in the world. This means meditation is just one of the by-products of living life mindfully. There are many books on this topic, but one that helped me - "Living This Life Fully: Stories and Teaching of Munindra" by Mirka Knaster. But of course, if you have questions about meditating or any of the methods I mentioned above, please feel free to reach out to me.
