Challenges In The Meditation Process

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You can meditate with open eyes and you can meditate with closed eyes.

When you want to meditate with open eyes then the objective is to handle the worldly affair properly. Doing work with Dhyana. Knowing the world properly and working properly.

When you want to mediate with close eyes then the objective is to know. Know your own system, your existence, your mind, your nature, your desires, restlessness, flickering and fluctuations of the mind, ego, jealousy, like, dislike of your mind. Raga and Dvesa of your mind.

The design of our sense organs is such that it is outward-going and it helps navigate the external world very efficiently.

As strong your sense organs with that much force, you will be navigating the color, sound, smell, sensation, and taste around you or in your memory.

Due to some reason if by birth some sense is weak then the neural system reorganizes itself and the neural resources of that organ are shared between other normal senses.

Our sense organs ensure our survival. In case, if a particular sense organ is weak then an external attack from the environment can kill or damage the body. For example, if someone has lost his taste sense then he may die at any time because of eating poison or improper food which his tongue could have detected easily, if it were working properly.

When you sit at someplace that is lightened, having music around, some fragrance or bad smell around and you want to take your awareness inside the body then it becomes a difficult task.

Why? Because eyes go and look at the objects, color, shape, and intensity of light falling on the objects and making us aware of our surroundings. Mind and stored memories may like some of these things around or may not like other things around.

Similarly, when you are sitting in a room, and some music is going on or sound is present, because of memories mind may like some music or sounds and may not like it.

Similarly, it happens for smell and fragrance. Your mind may like some smells and may not like others.

When the temperature in the room is making you uneasy or the seat on which you are sitting is too soft or too hard then your mind may like or may not like it.

You may not be hungry but if some food is before you, then your mind may have the temptation to eat that or may feel disgusted depending upon what food is kept before you.

This like and dislike of the mind due to different reasons has roots in the outward nature of the senses. It will never allow you to meditate inside. The body wants to take action to make the environment more friendly for living or survival.

Your sense of imagination, visualizing different colors, shapes, forms, smells, etc help you in Bhakti and external meditation. This object may be your worldly object, your sweet relationships with someone, or Ishwara or Ishta Devta.

But when you want to know your nature and meditate inside then these sense organs are a big problem because they are designed to navigate the outside world.

So in my experience when a room is completely empty and dark, no noise, no fragrance, no extreme temperature so that you can sit with a single lightest cloth, and without hurting your body, you are not feeling hungry nor you have eaten food immediately before, your stomach is empty or you have eaten 2 or 3 hours before. This is the proper setup to navigate inside.

In this situation mentally travel between the environment around you and within your body with your rhythm inhaling and exhaling.

If you are able to do this even for 5 minutes and improve this slowly you will be able to know yourself. And probably one day you will be able to learn to live in the present and renounce your fear of the future and guilt of the past. At least for the duration of meditation.

If you keep doing it regularly one day will come when even the most adverse situations can not throw you out of balance, but because of certain circumstances, if it happens then you will be able to come to the center quickly.

O Chaitanya, did you ever try to meditate when the situations in your life are adverse? Did you try to be meditative to know your own mind? Did you try to know who you really are apart from the heap of food which you have accumulated within you in the form of mental ideas (like I am Atma, I am soul, I am jiva, heaven, hell, god)? This mental food comes from your books and teachers. The food can be physical food, which you accumulated and makes your body mass, which you get by eating tasty food.

Hari Om Tat Sat Yours Truly Hari