The Path of the Soul

Before you start meditating, you need to quiet your mind, to prepare your mind for it. You can't just sit down and enter a state of zen, no matter how long you've been meditating.

One thing to do before anything else is sit down and think what do you really like. I mean do you like music, do you like to read or you like to simply close your eyes and let your mind wander around. Or maybe you like to actually do something physical that doesn't require any brain work.

I love music very much, especially relaxation, meditation music. Enya is one of my favorites, but I am also strongly drawn to Reiki music. So I make sure that I am alone at home, put on the CD with the music of my choice, sit down, make sure that I am in comfortable clothing - no jeans while meditating! -, and start listening to the music.

Try to avoid heavy music with a strong beat because that will excite your mind and keep it busy instead of letting it relax the right way before meditation.

When I am in the mood, I like to light a few scented candles around me and dim the big light. Then I sit down and start to relax. Not to meditate yet, just to relax.

Sometimes it takes a while to stop the chatter in my mind. That's ok. It takes as long as it takes. The mind needs to have its thing told out, so don't try to cut it short. What you can do in this case is simply start slowing down the mind chatter before you even sit down for meditation, while going about ending your other business.
One way to do it is simply listen to others instead of doing all the talking at the dinner table. Just listen and be silent. After a few attempts, you will notice that your brain follows suit. It slows down its constant chatter in your mind. It doesn't stop it, as in normal circumstances it cannot stop it, but it doesn't overwhelm you with everyday worries, thoughts, chit chat and naggings. It listens, just like you.

By starting the meditation the right way, you will gain much more benefits of meditation that if you simply sit down and say to yourself 'now i will meditate'.

I feel I've neglected my spiritual practices enough so I've decided to get back into meditation. I am currently testing two different types of meditation, the original OM CD by Tom Carey and Dick Sutphen's Ultra Depth Hypnosis. So far I find that Dick Sutphen's voice reaches me more than the OM bells, I tend to respond better to it, so I will just use this for now. I know it is a past life regression CD, but it has some good meditation tracks on it and I want to start small again, and take it one step at a time...

Also I will start again with my out of body (or astral projection) exercises in the night when going to bed, before falling off to sleep. It's a pity that I stopped actually as I was making some good headway. I got a few times to the state of vibrations earlier on, and now, I have to start it all over again. Oh well, it's true what they say, better later than never...

I have a lovely old neighbor who is in the habit of sitting out in his garden (which is just next to our bedroom window) and around 6-7 am and have his radio blasting on the news. I've tried many things, talking to him (worked temporarily), even put foam ear plugs in my hears (didn't work as I woke up with pain in my ears), left the air conditioning on in the morning, closed the window...I'm at my wits end, really. He's just one of those annoying neighbors that are old and simply don't care about their own surroundings and neighbors.

Anyway, I was sitting in the bed this afternoon reading Psychic Discoveries Behind The Iron Curtain by Sheila Ostrander and Lynn Schroeder - an amazing book about the many different psychic experiments in Russia during the Communist era - when I heard again the radio blasting fully in my year...I was actually reading about this guy who was explaining how to trained himself to become psychic. He was basically 'commanding' people to do this, do that, and of course at first it didn't work, but he kept at it until the people really started touching their foreheads, or waving away a non-existent fly from their ears. While reading the book, I remembered my previous attempts at meditation, relaxation and astral projection and since I had about an hour to kill, I started to relax my body. After a few minutes I said a couple of times 'close the radio', 'switch off the radio', I even said it in Greek. Soon I listened to something weird...silence. The guy switched off his radio and he was nowhere to be seen, he went inside the house.

Now of course, I don't say that this had anything to do with my meager psychic attempts on his brain :D But nevertheless for I moment I was grinning from ear to ear. Needless to say, I felt very smug.

After that I continued with my AP experiment - nothing happened except I became very sleepy, but it was interesting, nevertheless.

I haven't really been doing any spiritual or psychic work during the last year as 'real life' took over and I had lots of things to deal with, but I will start meditating again and I will start my AP exercises again. I've just realized today during this afternoon 'experiment' that I was actually missing them...

Today I've decided to try Focus 12. Yes, I know, I'm impatient, and I should stick with Focus 10 for a while, but I can always go back to it.

For a good while nothing really happened, I didn't feel any major difference between focus 10 and 12, however when Monroe brought me back the second time to focus 12, there was just one weird sensation that I had. I was suddenly aware of my heart beating, and I mean each and every one.

It was so amazing, to actually hear and feel every single heartbeating and quite strongly so too. I'm not sure though if that's what I was supposed to feel, lol. Monroe was saying that Focus 12 is an expanded awareness, however I kept feeling I'm very strongly in my head and in my body. Not like when you're grounded, in normal ways. I felt I was really there. I don't remember having ever felt quite like this before. It was almost spooky, but in a good way. Sometimes, when I was breathing out, the heartbeating was so strong, that I felt my upper body pushing back, like getting a kick-back with each beat, sort of like a ripple effect...

I didn't remember if I felt this also with focus 10 or not, so when I went back to focus 10, I checked it out. Basically I did feel the heart beating, but not each heartbeat and not as strongly as with focus 12. It seemed as if my heart was beating calmer.

I'll go check around on forums to see what effects focus 12 has on people, I wanted to post though first my first impressions, which are not biased by others experiences.

I've just finished my third session, I used the same track as I used yesterday, and here are my findings.

First of all, it is now 2 pm, this is the time I could meditate today. Plus I wanted to try meditation at a different time in the day, to see if there are any differences, since usually I meditate after 6 pm.

This time I didn't have that strong numbness in my hands, all went well, I got quite fast 'under'. One of my problems usually with meditating is that if I hear a loud noise, or my heart skips a beat for some reason, I get jolted out very fast from meditation. Not so today. I heard a car hoot twice, and although it was loud, I didn't react at all. Also I had twice get this 'heart skips a beat' feeling, but contrary to the past, I went right back in the meditative state. Quite nice feeling to be able to continue the meditation. Which was again, very short, even though it lasted almost 40 minutes. Not sure why I feel it is so short, but I really wish it lasted at least one hour!

At some point, when Monroe said a few times 'Focus 10', 'Focus 1o', I had a strange feeling like my whole body was floating, and just once lightly rocking back and forth like on a swing. The whole thing must have lasted just a few second. It was like I had no chair under me. I couldn't recreate this feeling though during this session again. Not exactly sure what it was, but it was quite a nice feeling. I think I never felt so light before in my life!

And finally two after-effects. I dressed quite well as I knew that the body temperate goes down during the meditation, yet still, I feel quite cold right now. And I'm extremely sleepy. I'm yawning as if it were time to go to bed. And it's only 2 pm, there's a long way to go until bed time. I don't remember having this sleepy feeling after my session yesterday. I think I'll go take a nap after lunch.

I absolutely have no ideas if these are feelings I should feel - experience or not, but again, I'll write down everything, each detail, maybe a pattern of sorts will emerge eventually?

Day 2. Came home from work and just to start the weekend nicely, I decided to continue with this project.

I had some worries from before that I was sure this meditation session will not be able to calm down, but I was wrong! I sat down, put on the headphones, put all the worries in the box and followed the instructions. I have to say, I really enjoyed this session. Hemi synch starts to grow on me. So how exactly did this session go and what did I experience?

Well, for starters I was sure nothing will happen, and I won't feel anything special. After a few minutes though, my both hands, which were with palms down on my laps, got very numb. And I mean so numb that I got for a second scared, as I didn't feel them anymore! Or at times I had a feeling that they were palm face up! Honestly, I don't think I've ever experienced such a 'loss' feeling in my limbs . I actually got nervous and a giggle escaped me. But then I continued. Eventually all my body got in a nice relaxed state, and my hands got back to the normal relaxed way along with the rest of my body. Why at first my two hands got so very numb, it's still a mystery.

Another thing I've noticed is that worries, and random thoughts still came my way, of course, however they were more lightly tugging at my mind, not really intruding. They just came and went.

Third, it was the very first time that I actually kept through a sitting for close to 40 minutes. With every traditional meditation until now, my maximum limit was around 20 minutes. After that I was getting edgy, antsy or simply woke up from the 'trance' on my own. Here, when the voice told me that after a count of 10 I will be wide awake, I was wondering where did the time go, and I wanted it to last longer. I'm still deeply puzzled about this feeling that I had, and the fact that the time went so fast by!

Finally, once I fully woke up, I remembered the acute worries I was having before, but I was (and still am) very calm, as if they could not touch me anymore. Even an email that I had to reply to (regarding one of my worries) I managed to reply very calmly and sorted out everything unexpectedly easily. It's been over 10 minutes that the session ended and I am still totally calm, as if a blanket got thrown over my worries. Absolutely wonderful way to continue the day. I haven't felt myself so out of worry in a long time. Don't get me wrong, it doesn't mean that I ignore everything at the moment, what it means is that right now, I can deal with stuff much calmer and in a more relaxed fashion. Let's see how long this feeling will last...

All in all, I loved this session. I have no idea what I was supposed to feel, to experience, but there you have it, my personal diary for this session, as it went for me.

So far I haven't had any luck with binaural beats as meditation, so I decided to change that, since I know there are loads of people out there that successfully use these to get to an altered state.

The Gateway Experience from Hemi Sync is "a life-enhancing program dedicated to the development, exploration and application of expanded states of awareness.", and it is used a lot in producing out of body (OBE) or astral travel experiences. Since I am very much interested in OBE's and I've even had a false start once, but no real OBE yet, I will give it a try.

The first track of the first CD, 'Wave 1 - Discovery - Orientation" lasts for about 30 minutes and it is a very enjoyable way to easy into it. Unlike some other programs where you simply listen and drift away, this program expects you to work as well. Breathing exercises, imagination, opening and closing your eyes at given times, these are all required here. You are put to work.

So how did my very first session go?

Well, I'm not quite sure. Truth is, I am not sure what was I supposed to feel or experience. As a first, it was nothing special. I got in a nice relaxing state, my body got relaxed as well, but my mind was really awake. Much more so than with traditional meditation. Also the exercises didn't let me 'drift away', as opening and closing my eyes based on breath in and out, was a requirement. But maybe that's what is supposed to do. No wonder that this program introduces the 'mind awake, body asleep' notion, that's exactly how I was feeling throughout. No phasing out here.
After finishing the exercise, I also felt fresher, not as sleepy and drowsy as I usually feel after regular meditation. Now if this is a good or not so good sign, I have no idea.

I'll keep on with this program, will use the same track a few more times, until I am familiar with it and then can move on, and will record here my experiences (if any), or lack of. Whatever comes. I'll give it a try.

I have a go away - come back relationship with astral projection. I keep trying it for a while, then I give up. Now I'm back again at it, wanting to try it out once again.
An interesting post has been made on the Astral Pulse forum, which got me thinking, because it is also valid for regular meditation, which I do at times.

When we meditate, we always try to get the body to relax as much as possible, almost to 'go to sleep', while keeping the mind busy - not with day to day thoughts, but with whatever it needs to be focused on during meditation. However I've tried it today the other way around. I did get comfortable, while focusing all the time on relaxing my closed eyes instead, forget about the body. Just relaxing the eyes, getting them close to the stage of before falling asleep. This would be the first stage in one of the ways to get an OBE. I'm not there yet, but it was definitely an interesting experience. 25 minutes passed practically instantly. My body went at some point numb by itself, without me trying to focus on getting it there. And while I was focusing all my time on resting, relaxing my eyes, for some reason the mind chatter, the daily chit chat was gone very fast from my mind today.
Hm, very interesting, I'll try meditating this way for a while, even when I'm not trying to project.

I loved this quote from that forum regarding the usual way of getting the mind awake and the body asleep, had a chuckle at it:

"I believe 95% of you out there who have trouble inducing an OBE fall into this trap. You spend all of your time focusing on preparing the PHYSICAL BODY for an OBE (which doesn't get to experience it), and less time on preparing your MIND for an OBE (which does get to experience it).

That's like washing your brand new car for your vacation to Disneyland, and then you take the train there instead."

The whole post is talking about OBE but I can really see the benefits of this different technique for regular meditation as well.

I've listened tonight to the original OM CD (the first three tracks, a total of 30 minutes). The first time I've listened to it about a week ago, there was nothing at all, couldn't even relax.
Tonight I got to relax quite a bit, quieted the regular chit chat in my mind, so I guess it was a progress.
Towards the end I asked myself 'what do you see', and in all I had just a few glimpses of the following:
- a soldier on a horse (had a feeling he was Roman from what he had on his head, something longish with 'something' fluttering in the wind from the back). He was looking ahead to the horizon. He felt more than a regular soldier from the posture and from the way he was looking ahead, lost in thoughts...
- somebody with a very full, long, white hair, saw them from behind, was washing something. Couldn't see the face, so have no idea of the age or anything else. I think was hand washing some clothes, and have a feeling she was old
- heard the word cucsar, but have no idea of the spelling. Could be kucsar, cuchar, cuciar...also saw a man driving a wagon with two horses ahead, like in those wild western movies. Not sure about this one at all, except the word that came through. Could be just an association from the man on the horse I've seen before.