Vipassana meditation vs other forms of meditation

Thread originally posted on the Aeclectic Tarot Forum on 23 Jan 2003, and now archived in the Forum Library.

Woof	23 Jan 2003
I've recently begun practicing & studying vipassana meditation and have noticed a difference between that and the meditation most try to achieve in working with tarot or with trying to nurture your psychic abilities. At least that is what I have gleaned from reading these forums for the past 4 months. Am I correct in this? In the latter stress is placed on what buddhist would call reaching the "sinking mind" phenomena. My understanding of this is where one dims awareness. The "sinking mind" is achieved when you have no thought, no observation of breath, no awareness of anything. In Vipassana meditation by focusing on the breath you work on concentration and mindfullness and then work those atributes into every aspect of your life. Does anyone here practice multiple forms of meditation? What have you found to be the benefits of each? Some forms of meditation seem to denigrate other forms of meditation as illusionary or wastefull mental states to be avoided. How do you reconcile that? Is it best to choose one form of meditation and stick with it? I'm so confused! Woof

The Enchanter	24 Jan 2003
I love to meditate. I do it often. I never really studied any different kinds. I sorta just found my own way to do things and the best way for me just sorta fell into place. Good luck. Peace out!

Kiama	25 Jan 2003
I have also recently become interested in Buddhist meditation practices, and have bene attending the local Buddhist centre for a while, leaning about and practising meditations. Vipassana is one of my favourites: It aims to achieve constant mindfullness... It's like you're meditating when you're washing up, hoovering, playing, laughing, etc... The monks in Thailand do it all the time, but it's probably easier for them because they do not have the distractions of us Westerners with jobs and families... But for us, we can aim to achieve it by being constantly mindfull and aware of every single thing... A good practice which Buddhist use is a walking meditation, where they walk and make themselves aware of everysingle step... They do this for hours. The other practice is called 'Mindfullness of Breathing' where you sit down, meditate, and try to remain constantly aware of every single breath, evrey single part of the breath, how it feels, smells, etc... I have found that Vipassana helps me immensely when trying to realx or when trying to gain some new insights into the Universe. I also find another kind of mditation useful, still BUddhist, called (I hope I spell this right!) Metabhahavna, or 'Loving Kindness'. It's aim is to cultivate, through visualisation whilst meditating, a feeling of love and respect for every single being on the planet. I do use other practices, which are moe western, and I much prefer visualisation practices. Often I will use Vipassana, Metabhahavna, AND the visualisation of 'nerting a card' when I am working with Tarot. Kiama

jema	18 Feb 2003
old thread, i know... but i just recently, a few weeks ago decided to devote at least 10 minutes each day to meditation and/or ritual. often just 5 min morning and evening. and i do feel the difference. i use a simple visualization technic. but i also sometimes do a "mindfulness" meditation where i just try to be very aware of both my body, my thoughts and my environment. one of my fav meditations is a walking meditation that i do often during summers. but this is actually the first time i really dedicate myself to meditation! that i set off time to do it regulary and record all results in a journal. it is really neat to find out that the way i meditated for years actually has a name:) i didn't know that. for a long time i thought i was doing it wrong. that i should be thinking of nothing and just space out and that i had to do this for at least 30 minutes a day and that i would have sudden flashes of grand enlightment blah bla bla... it wasn't until i stopped doing it like others told me i should do it that the pieces fell into place.

The Vipassana meditation vs other forms of meditation thread was originally posted on 23 Jan 2003 in the Spirituality board, and is now archived in the Forum Library. Read the active threads in Spirituality, or read more archived threads.