The Effortless Meditation, Peter Russell
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- Опубліковано 14 тра 2015
- www.scienceandnonduality.com/
A conversation with Peter Russell about the effortless nature of meditation.
Peter Russell is a fellow of the Institute of Noetic Sciences, of The World Business Academy and of The Findhorn Foundation, and an Honorary Member of The Club of Budapest. At Cambridge University (UK), he studied mathematics and theoretical physics. Then, as he became increasingly fascinated by the mysteries of the human mind he changed to experimental psychology. Pursuing this interest, he traveled to India to study meditation and eastern philosophy, and on his return took up the first research post ever offered in Britain on the psychology of meditation. He has written several books in this area - The TM Technique, The Upanishads, The Brain Book, The Global Brain Awakens, The Creative Manager, The Consciousness Revolution, Waking Up in Time, and From Science to God.
www.peterrussell.com
One thing that changed the way I meditate has been this simple thought change. Before, I used to meditate to relax. Now I relax to meditate.
Peter Russell, thank you for being simple and sharing this wonderful knowledge with us.
wow this is exactly what I do, I never managed to meditate until I discovered this, it's ok to just notice when you lost presence and come back to it, relax the mind, just observe. May not last long but why fight it, just keep coming back :) This is very alogned with Eckart Tolle which is where I started 🙏
Seemingly lovely, sincere, wise fella. A needle in a haystack of narcissistic hucksters.
Frank Feldman yes!,,
I very much appreciate this. I have recently been wondering about the "doing" of meditation.... and much prefer being with and awareness! Sounds really helpful and simple. It is actually transforming judgment - which to me is resistance... by being with it and allowing it to dissipate or transform naturally! Thank you Peter Russell for this teaching.
I agree with +John Burman. I understand every word Peter says, but I've been meditating constantly 10 years. I know for sure that the first years, the inner chatter and overwhelming emotions where so strong that there was no space for awareness. All I could be aware of was inner noise and anxiety and I knew I didn't want that. It took me a while to recognize that I was meditating 'to get rid of' those things, instead of just being aware of them. It was hard to believe that doing nothing, just observing, would actually be much more efficient in them leaving my system, than me fighting and resisting them. Once I clearly saw that everything started to change. So my advice would be.. keep meditating just for the sake of meditating, without looking for a particular experience.
Paula Pijoan I agree with you... but it's hard to just observe. We have been educated for struggle/survival, to achieve, consume. Doing nothing gets a bad rep, it's considered lazy, unmotivated. And in a culture which stirs us discontent to make us feel inadequate and deprived of something, we feel something missing and incomplete about us. These are the obstacles that pure consciousness needs to see and accept.
Paula Pijoan I agree with you... but it's hard to just observe. We have been educated for struggle/survival, to achieve, consume. Doing nothing gets a bad rep, it's considered lazy, unmotivated. And in a culture which stirs us discontent to make us feel inadequate and deprived of something, we feel something missing and incomplete about us. These are the obstacles that pure consciousness needs to see and accept.
Good insight. So true
I believe Peter has truly captured the essence of true meditation, pray without ceasing. Stillness is effortless and vice versa. Beautifully spoken.
My meditation is working in my flower beds.I feel peace an the presence of God.
I only discovered Peter Russell today; l'm so pleased. He's very refreshing; so, to use an old 60's term, real. No phonyness(?), or ego.
There so much confusion around meditation. I,m glad I came across this video.
It deffinenetly brings more clarity . It sounds encouraging .
Thank you !
Such an amazing gentleman. Really enjoy your online lectures.
Mindfulness gives us something which is difficult to do... which is precisely what the mind wants. Something to accomplish, something to get better at. The result is that the egoic self becomes good at mindfulness, in the same way that people who are given crossword puzzles eventually become good at crossword puzzles. Meanwhile the true self is left in the dust of accomplishment.
In fact, when we allow ourselves to relax into our hearts, we naturally move into the realm of real meditation and enlightenment. Unfortunately the mind often tries to help us along... for a plethora of reasons. It comes up with ideas, theories, dogma, ritual and all sorts of other things that ultimately make enlightenment seem virtually unattainable.
In any case, none of that really matters all that much.
One way or another, most of us are in an "argument" with what is. How do I change this? How do I get that? Why isn't my relationship working?
Enlightenment is a universal yes to everything. And enlightenment can only be realized when one ceases all effort to achieve it.
The great secret is that the point of rigorous spiritual practice is to exhaust the seeker. It is one of many ways to arrive at a place of surrender. It can be by way of an ambitious career, rampant acquisitiveness, obsessive relationships, absolutist devotional beliefs and practices... or personal catastrophe.
Enlightenment is - finally - the dissolution of that which seeks enlightenment.
We are, in fact, that for which we seek.
As always, thank you, Peter, for your clean, clear, simple teaching.
Thanks Steve, love you, ah, end of all efforts, giving up, relaxing, simply being, end of entanglements, love you Steve love you
Amazing comment, love it
Thank you Peter. If you actually look at your mind, your thoughts drop away, but there is this tightness Peter talks about, yet now, because of Peters presentations, I can relax that tightness, and still remain in the moment. A bit like the sky watching the clouds pass by. Be the sky, rest in pure conscious awareness. And just watch the tightness as its comes and goes. And smile...
i luv Peter Russell. This way speaks to me!
Erin D'Ambrosio :)
I like his sincerity and his well lived in face. I totally agree with, and apply to myself what he says, but would say that the degree of sensitivity and space he talks about is probably also a result of decades of meditation. A beginner might find the internal chatter simply dominates and restlessness takes over - keeping experiences shallow. At this stage a more focussed use of mantra (TM) might be applicable to cut through the distractions, to space beyond - just a thought. You never know in this game, its so personal.
TM is NOT focus.
on what are we meditating on about. When we are engaged in an activity eg.! cooking gardening or any hobby you enjoy, you concentration is on that particular activity, this even includes sex. Is this meditation of another nature? If listening to a lecture on a pet topic or your favourite music keeps fully aware, conscious and completely absorbed, could you be meditating. If meditation is all about the Higher being/self, then concentrate on the beauty or horror around you and the creation or evolution of the past and the present and your role in the past present and future. Buddha did not impose ,Christ did not impose? Only religion imposes and now the gurus? For what returns?The creators whims are not known.Let us be participants in the creation of the future(like Mandela or Gandhi) and worry less of Self
I'm currently reading Peter's book 'From Science to God.' Excellent video and book, much appreciated : )
Those that made a thumb down probably want you to search for the stillness inside so you miss the elephant here and believe someone else's description is this holy grail...!
fantastic stuff !
TQ.for sharing. I learn something new from experience of others.🙏🙏🙏🙏👍👍👍❤❤
He's excellent 😌
This is amazing advice!
Meditation must be effortless. The mind must become silent naturally. J. Krishnamurti.
Something else occured to me now and that is that when we dissolve blockages internally we may be doing the same on all levels of the manifesting world in some way at the same time - during our cosmically extended consciousness during meditation, this may well be the only way to change reality. Once the world has manifested, become "hard" the reality becomes a world of systems, mechanical and only manipulable in small ways, as mankind finds all the time. You probably got this already but its great when these ideas come.
im with you! Somehow I know it's the most effective way we can create change.
Yes you are correct. We are the world. Emptiness is Form and form Is emptiness-emptiness. So whatever fixation you dissolve within you actually is dissolved in the world at the same time. Because you are the world.
Peter, that's beautiful (your first point in particular) - I noticed the attention there at the pulse of a thought, as I listened to you talk through it, and there was the expansiveness, it just opened up, beautifully, in that moment, the thought dissipated and only awareness remained. It's brilliant. Now to stop the ego stroking / self back-patting and actually bring that to my practice. Actually, from now on that IS my practice! Thank you
+Subrosa_ The deepest point of TM is where there is no thought, nor awareness of absence of thought, but the brain still is in a not-sleep/not-dreaming/not-waking state. This is "pure consciousness" ala TM, but physically, it is different than pure consciousness ala mindfulness practices.
Awareness OF awareness isn't It.
Where have you been all my life ?????
Relaxation is a requirement, along with the practice of meditation. But SHAKTI, the primal energy of the universe is also necessary for Transcendence. (the experience of "The Self", i.e. Sat-Chit-Ananda or Truth-Consciousness-Bliss. To tap into the Bliss, just access "Mahamritunjaya mantra - Sacred Sound Choir", and also "Om Namah Shivaya - Shivananda Adi". Listen to each for 5 min per day for at least 2 weeks. Do this in addition to your silent meditation technique.
Bless God you my dear
I really appreciate your genuinity, and the clear way in which you communicate! Where can I see/read more of/from you?
Jocelyn Crowd on his website peterrussell.com the spirit of now. Its full of usefullness!
I’ve been with depression, of and on, for 50 years. I’d much rather be without it.
Nothing ever goes away until it teaches us what we need to know.” Pema Chodron
My experience has been to simply ALLOW the feelings/energy to flow and although painful the freedom and joy you’ll experience on the other side is so very worth it. Let go of any resistance and allow the process. Your soul knows the way to eternal happiness or as they say “let go and let God.” ❤️
Spiral;the relaxation of the attention.
Beautiful :-)
One doesn't get around the fact that all he is describing is still some sort of 'doing', though a subtle one. Initially that simply is what it takes to get some basic awareness (attention, wakefulness) established. But then - and I like the expression Jean Klein uses for this - effortless wakefulness starts to 'solicite' you, without your doing anything. From time to time you simply drop into awareness, totally open and free of the sense of a 'self' or center, here. So initially it takes active 'searching for' this awareness, an active longing for it which Jean Klein calls 'earnestness'. But then it start to seek YOU out - sometimes quite unexpectedly and out of the blue after having 'lost' it for quite some time. Your simple desire for it reconnects you to it in time, the memory of it haunts you...
Seems like we are talking about what in the Zen tradition/practice is called shikantaza.
Whats that Paino bgm at the beginning of each video ? Where can I find the full audio ? It’s next level
3:00 "recognizing we'd be drawn off and how do we come back"... that's fine and inevitable at a relatively early stage (which may still take decades though). However eventually, we should come to realize psychologically (not conceptually)-that's intuitively and unconsciously without thoughts*[see note below]-that "coming back" is the same as getting in ("that state") so to say 😂 so the back and forth starts occurring less frequently (until it vanishes) because after all everything is nothing but the good old "happening" (whether you think you're in or out) and it's all (the same timeless and empty [as in Sunyata]) "what is" or thusness/suchness. Eventually then, we don't need to realize anything anymore and we're "back to the market".
* Once you've realized something, that X is dead or that Y doesn't love you anymore, or that a noise was actually caused by the wind and not some ghost for instance; once you've learnt it, you have realized it and assimilated it psychologically and you don't think of it anymore. However, your behavior after that realization becomes radically different even though you may end up forgetting about the incident of your realization all together because you don't need it anymore. In Zen, we say that once you've reached the other side of the river you don't need your boat anymore. So practice is the vehicle not the destination and it ends up being completely abandoned and forgotten once it's not needed as such anymore. It's only true however after full awakening or enlightenment.
I wonder how many of us long term meditators are out there? I started in 1972. Of course the first 25 years I was doing myself no good cause I was a "meditator" then the understanding came that meditating was just reinforcing the "character' the ego and as Grace would have it I fell into Non Duality and learned about non meditation...
BE HAPPY, it drives people crazy
AMEN!
❤️🙏❤️
I found gold
Effortlessness is effort.
Not trying to change or move attention necessarily implies using attention, that's still paying attention not to change or move attention. So obviously it doesn't make sense. The practice is not about moving or not moving your attention. It's about cultivating (perhaps slowly but surely) the intuitive realization (at the deepest psychological level, until it becomes unconscious knowledge) that it's all the same (whether you move your attention or not), and most importantly that it's all without inherent essence. So it doesn't matter; but now since it doesn't matter, you're not stuck in your old dualistic and discriminatory (over-)thinking anymore. You become liberated. You've realized a mushin mind.
J KrishnaMurthy's teachings emphasized on the quality of attention, rather than focusing attention on something... Very similar to your experience...
He's "got it".....all the folks teaching mindfulness out there ought to pay attention to what he's saying, for those teachers are misleading millions of people.
7:00
4:00
🙂
1.30 the tension of Me
Where there is a practice there is no meditation.
Many Hindu yogis have said if you're calm, you're in a meditative state.
I disagree about accepting the experience systematically or by principle. Whether it's hunger or pain, one tends to relieve oneself spontaneously. When I'm hungry (and there's food) I eat. When I'm cold I put more clothes on. When I'm in pain I tend to ease my pain however possible. That's what all animals do by licking themselves. There's nothing "wrong" or unnatural with that. However, we do not attach ourselves neither to the sensation of pain, nor to how we may deal with it. Therefore, we don't suffer. But saying we need to "embrace" our pain systematically is the same as saying we'd rather embrace our hunger. Hell no. Unless we can't possibly ease it of course-then we accept it yes.
Thanks for the video. As always its good to hear about other peoples experiences. Looking at your videos and analysis, may I be so rude and give you a word of advice? Don't be in a hurry, we all have a very long way to go. You are falling into the usual intellectual mind-holes. Over analysing what you know and extrapolating it too far. Best of luck
He uses the word practice, notice, challenging, uncomfortable etc. That is not effortless. His might be easier but it's hardly effortless.
Is this enlightenment?:
The kingdom of heaven is spread out across the earth but man cannot see it. Infinite miracles appear each instant. Do you see that?
Definitely, I have felt knowledge about another demension when working in flower beds which is my meditation an communication with God.
Had he stuck with TM and Maharishi for that entire time, he might have been enlightened by now.
Of course, the actual physical effects of mindfulness are counter-enlightenment from the TM perspective, so once he got involved in mindfulness, his TM-style enlightenment (not to mention his "aha"-style creativity) would have become less and less likely.
+Lawson English Hi Lawson, i was wondering if you could elaborate on mindfulness being counter -enlightenment? Im trying to learn about meditation and such so if you could help me understand that would be great.
+77brick77 Different spiritual traditions have different definitions of enlightenment, and the different meditation practices promote the different physical changes in the brain that scientists are now finding are associated with different definitions of enlightenment.
Mindfulness practice trains you to always be mindful in the sense of training your attention to never wander.
TM is a resting practice that allows the nervous system to repair itself more efficiently and the long-term result is that a pure sense-of-self starts to emerge and become permanent.
The spiritual tradition that mindfulness comes from claims that what TM does is impossible, and so TM is really just creating an illusion in the brain.
+Lawson English the Maharishi was a money making scammer and TM is unnecessarily expensive. My mother spent thousands with those crooks trying to attain Siddhic powers. They told her she could learn to levitate. They "proved" this by taking her to a closed door and let her listen in to the sounds of people whooping with delight as they supposedly flew around the room. She wasn't allowed to see the miraculous spectacle of course. All she got for her money were strong ankle muscles as she bounced around on her meditation mat trying to take off.
Here's an interesting essay that gives a good picture of the scam:
www.alternet.org/economy/transcendental-meditation-how-i-paid-2500-password-inner-peace
+Lawson English are u enlightened ?no, then shut up until u are
Claudita Bonita Research on TM-style enlightenment has been published and new research is on the way. I can certainly comment on the research on both TM and on mindfulness and how the physical effects of each practice are often going against each other.
TM's enlightenment involves a pure, sense-of-self emerging out of long-term practice and eventually becoming permanent.
Mindfulness, on the other hand, actually subdues the activity of the part of the brain that TM strengthens so that the pure sense-of-self can emerge.
What is wrong with talking about that?
Meditation is like boxing.
Saying nothing after all those years