“Learn how to see. Realise that everything connects to everything else.”
~ Leonardo Da Vinci ~
Meditation itself is a trick. It is thought to be a complicated practice, but that is confusion. The trick begins in the following contrast: Meditation is a simple practice, and yet it enables us to understand, and to perform complexity.
Meditation is a practice that benefits the practitioner in innumerable ways, enabling mind and body. And like a lot of magic tricks, this trick really is simply a shift of perspective — and a changed perspective can shift everything else, most immediately our thinking and feeling. If we can shift our state of being to be relaxed during the intense part of the game, we can win. If we can shift our state of being to be relaxed during stressful times, we keep our cool.
Meditation is a trick of perspective.
But more than that, meditation enhances our perspective, our consciousness. The word “consciousness” is used to illustrate our deep thinking and feeling. I like to say that consciousness is the awareness of our awareness. Understanding and further practising meditation enhances our consciousness looking inward; understanding geometry enhances our consciousness looking outward.
Enhanced consciousness enhances our physical wellbeing and capability. If our consciousness is unwell and our body well, we might easily become upset or depressed, ultimately becoming destructive to our health both internally and externally. But if our consciousness is well and our body is unwell, we might still be joyful and productive, and we are more likely to become well.
Enhancing our consciousness also increases our ability to gain control over self, and our ability to accomplish in a productive and enhanced manner. For this reason, meditation is a simple way to trick ourselves to be our most happy and authentic selves.
Meditation for Youth
“If every eight year old in the world is taught meditation, we will eliminate violence from the world within one generation.”
~ Dalai Lama ~
If there is one thing that can help individuals be joyful and productive it is meditation. It can help individuals to help themselves, and yet, few people are promoting it generally, and even less so among young people.
One of my inspirations stems from a conversation I had with a meditation teacher. Long story short, I was facing an immense problem and was upset over it, and moreover I thought it was the biggest problem in the world. What the problem was is not important. The fact that I felt it was a hugely significant problem is what’s important. The conversation went like this:
“I have been thinking a lot about the world and all the people,” I said. “I have been thinking about the problems in my life, and the lives all the people in the whole world, and I think I understand what the biggest problem in the world is. And I think if we could address just this one issue, all the world’s problems would all be solved.”
I thought at the time that if this one problem could just be solved, everything else would be OK. Have you ever felt that way? Have you ever felt that if you had just one thing, or if things were different in just one way, then all else would perfectly fall into place?
I continued to tell the teacher what the problem was, and the teacher was stunned but also grinned. As huge a global issue as it was, the problem might as well have been a small personal one. After thinking for a moment he responded;
“This problem you describe is a very serious one. And all the other problems of the world are serious too, those which are connected and those which are disconnected to this problem you describe. But what is an even bigger problem is the mess from where that problem comes from. The greatest problem in the world, no matter what anyone says, the problem from which all the other problems originate from, is the problem of our lacking consciousness and our unwell consciousness.”
I was struck. I felt silly. He of course was right. All the problems of the world, and all the problems of your world, all stem from our unwell consciousness. Every external problem begins as an internal problem, or something out of balance.
That’s where meditation can help — and change our world.
A strong and steady consciousness solves problems and, just as importantly, does not create them in the first place. A healthy consciousness does not react in a way that creates problems but responds thoughtfully – mindfully creating the future.
This conversation made me realise the importance of helping others learn meditation, particularly our youth, so they in turn can help themselves, so they can develop consciousness, and so that problems great and small might meet creative solutions, not just today but in the future.
“What if we learned to be at peace with ourselves from an early age? … Just imagine how much future generations of children would gain from this regular practice… if every child was able to connect to the ocean of consciousness that permeates all that is…”
~ Will Stanton ~
