Are you fearless?

"Can one meditate, can one’s mind become one-pointed without being fearless? Not possible... Fear is one of the  primal urges and it’s because of the sense of self-preservation. As long as you are aware of yourself, you are afraid of others, who is going to hurt you? But the day you don't have that thought you are free! Meditation then starts..." 

Swami Rama

Meditation: A search for our infinite capacity to be loved.

Meditation and the poverty of it is no form of self-rejection. We are not running away from ourselves, nor do we hate ourselves. On the contrary, our search is a search for ourselves and the experience of our own personal and infinite capacity to be loved. (John Main, The Gethsemani Talks)

Undefended Knowing: A Conversation With Richard Rohr and Tilden Edwards | Fr. Richard Rohr

Undefended Knowing: A Conversation With Richard Rohr and Tilden Edwards | Fr. Richard Rohr:

'via Blog this'

Two seminal teachers of the Christian contemplative movement -- Father Richard Rohr and Tilden Edwards -- joined Carole Crumley in conversation at The Shalem Institute for Spiritual Formation earlier this year to reflect on their spiritual awakening and parallel paths in the Christian contemplative tradition.

Father Rohr, founding director of the Center for Action and Contemplation in New Mexico, and Edwards, founder and senior fellow of the Shalem Institute, were both young when they started this work: Tilden an Episcopal priest and the director of an ecumenical organization focused on social issues, and Richard a religious monastic-in-training. Both were inspired by their spiritual hunger to search deeper into the Christian tradition and both discovered a hidden richness there. Their awakening has helped propel the Christian contemplative movement and brought ancient monastic teachings into the digital age. Both envision that sharing contemplative practices enables us all to touch a deeper intelligence and to make us more available to the healing of the world.

Read more here

Meditation Opens your Awareness to......

“Meditation is a receptive state that opens your awareness to the perpetual radiation of your soul”

Doug Bottorff

Native Soul:

Unlocking Your Life's Potential

6 Reasons Corporate America Should Meditate

Posted: 05/14/2013 2:36 pm 
Author: Robert Piper
Let's face it -- we all want to lounge in the sun all day on a beach in Hawaii. But we just can't, we have to go to work and go head to head with stressors that follow the daily grind coming from corporate America.

A survey done by the American Psychological Association found that one-third of employees experience chronic stress related to work.

Meditation is leading the way as a potent tool that could potentially help out. It's becoming a legitimate pushup for the brain. I don't care if you call it meditation, mindfulness, deep breathing, or chillin' time. It works -- the scientific evidence is here.

Some of the brightest minds from Harvard, Stanford, University of Wisconsin, and Yale are coming to the conclusion that meditation is an incredible tool for your health.

Here are six reasons why the practice should be embraced in corporate America.
1. It's been shown to help people stay focused in high-stress environments. 
When we get stressed, it attacks are focus, we can't concentrate. If we can't concentrate, we can't get things done. This happens to everyone who experiences stress -- why not give meditation a try?

2. It could lower stress.
A little stress is good for us, too much and it becomes are enemy. It's currently wreaking havoc on corporate America -- it is estimated that American business lose up to $300 billion a year because of stress, according to the American Psychological Association. There's evidence to suggest that meditation may help lower the stress hormone cortisol.

3. It works, even when you're not meditating. 
Similar to working out at the gym, there's evidence to suggest that meditation works even when you're not meditating. Why not do some meditation right before you go to work? This will help you have a balanced and clear mind throughout the day.

4. It lets us know our blind spots. 
We all have internal blind spots that we could work on to help improve the quality of our lives. A study published in the journal Perspectives on Psychological Science showed how mindfulness helped people to look internally at their true selves. We can use mindfulness in a productive way to manage our emotional states.

5. It could help you become more compassionate. 
Wouldn't it be better to start your day off by working on cultivating a positive attitude? What if you went to work wishing for the people around you to be happy? This would influence not only your work life, but every area of your life. Meditation has been shown to make people more compassionate.

6. It may improve sleep quality. 
A lot of times the reason we are unproductive at the workplace is because we didn't sleep well. One meditation study is showing that it may improve our quality of sleep. Why not do some during your lunch break?

Meditation is the new American pushup for the brain, it's a tool that helps us check in with ourselves throughout the day. It's a practice that should be embraced by all American corporations as a way to stay calm, focused, and productive through the day.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-piper/meditation-practice-benefits_b_3255850.html?view=print&comm_ref=false

"Meditation is a process of purifying the mind and making it one-pointed, inward and tranquil. Through the method of meditation, the mind will help you to fathom the deeper levels of your being and lead you to the highest state of realization."

Meditation begins with a call.......

 “Meditation begins with a call that awakens us out of the coma of self-preoccupation. We are called, we are chosen. Meditation is our response to that call from the deepest center of our awakened consciousness…by letting go in meditation we learn how to love.” John Main OSB

Christian Meditation

How about some Christian Mantra Meditation?

Here are some tips from Laurence Freeman a Benedictine monk. The app he mentions is WCCM app 2 for the iphone.



Here's the link if it doesn't appear in the posting.http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=67gWpBAgK0U

Every meditation is a setting out

We are always beginning. Every time we sit down to meditate we begin again. Every meditation is a setting out and because it is always a new setting out it remains fresh, always a further entry into the mystery which is infinite and inexhaustible.

John Main