Insight Meditation 24-27

In this meditation you use your softening skills developed in the previous mindfulness training to bring about mindful non-participation in order to enter nirvikalpa samadhi based stillness. 

Nirvikalpa samadhi based stillness arises when all participation within the processes of the mind is abandoned. The result of skillful softening as refined in the previous training, is always the arising of stillness.

The development of nirvikalpa samadhi based stillness is based on a process of systematic abandoning of effort, first physical then mental. This process of abandonment directly challenges the habitual defensive processes of mind. 

Once your mind learns the pathway to stillness it will naturally enter it when you soften into mindful non-participation. 

Even though the depth of stillness that arises after softening is sometimes brief, the impact through creating gaps within the conditioned patterns within the mind is great and part of the process of mindful deconditioning. 

This cultivates into the ability to be aware of awareness itself.

Your meditation object for nirvikalpa samadhi based stillness arises through methodical deep relaxation of your body, in this case brough about with slow softening breaths. Once you have learnt to deeply abandon all effort within your body using softening breaths, this deep relaxation is then used as a doorway to stillness.  

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• Length: 30 min.

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Meditation Structure:

1. Sit in meditation and develop mindfulness of body > 
2. Take slow abdominal breathes, feeling its pleasure >
3. After a few minutes release control of your breathing >
4. Feel, rest in the growing relaxation and calm >
5. Begin relaxing effort from your forehead, eyelids, ..... down to your feet using gentle softening breaths to help each part of your body relax >
6. Once finished, become aware of the deep relaxation, the sense of ease and rest in it as the object of your awareness.

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Meditation Instructions:

Preparation:

Step 1: Sit on a supportive chair, the floor or laying down. when laying down do so on the floor and avoid laying on a bed because slight discomfort and mental alertness is necessary. You are developing physical comfort through your mind not through your body. This is necessary for the mental clarity of stillness.

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Step 2: For a few minutes take slow diaphragmatic breaths in the lower part of your abdomen, feeling and smiling into the pleasure in the gentle stretch and relax.

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Step 3: Allow your breathing to happen naturally, spending some time feeling the pleasure of letting go that occurs with the natural expand and relax of the breath in your abdomen.

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Step 4: Bring your awareness to the growing feeling of relaxation and calm, gently smile into enjoy it, allowing it to fill your body and mind.

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Developing Stillness:

Step 5: With softening breaths, relax effort held in your forehead.

Once your body is relaxed, you gently bring awareness to your forehead and use slow softening breaths to allow the muscles in your forehead to relax. 

• Aware of this relaxation, you allow it to fill your awareness. 
• Feeling your forehead becoming heavier, smoothing out, so relaxed. 
• You experience the sense of ease of this relaxation, you allow it to enter your mind.

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Step 6: Soften effort held in your eyelids, cheeks & jaw.

As relaxation grows you allow it flow down from your forehead into your eyelids, cheeks and jaw, softening any effort that you feel held there. 

• Feeling so relaxed. 
• You gently relax your eyelids further, feeling them become heavy, so heavy. 
• You open them slightly and relax this effort, allowing them to droop, to sink. 
• Aware of this relaxation, you allow it to fill your awareness. 
• Allow them to become so heavy it feels like you’re falling asleep.
• Allowing it to flow into your cheeks, jaw and whole face.
• You experience the sense of ease of this relaxation, you allow it to enter your mind.

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Step 7: Soften effort held in your shoulders, chest, back, arms.

As relaxation grows you allow it flow down from into your shoulders, chest, upper back and down your arms, softening any effort that you feel held there. 

•  Feeling the relaxation flow down into your chest, and upper back.
• Shoulders dropping slightly.
• Feeling this relaxation coming to your upper body.
• So relaxed.
• Allowing this relaxation to flow down your arms into your hands. 
• Relaxing your fingers. 
• Allow your arms to hang loosely from your shoulders, so relaxed. 

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Step 8: Soften effort held in your chest and belly, allowing breathing to flow.

You relax your chest & belly and allow your breathing to flow freely and naturally within your body, gently softening any effort held within your breathing.

• Feeling the pleasure of the gentle flow of your breathing. 
• Allowing your breathing to become very gentle and calm. 
• To become so relaxed that you can barely feel it moving at all. 
• The sense of ease within your body deepens. 

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Step 9: Soften effort held in your hips, legs and feet.

As relaxation grows you allow it flow down into your hips, legs and feet, softening any effort that you feel held there. 

• You slightly release your hips, allowing your legs to open slightly.
• Feeling the relaxation to flow down your legs into your feet.
• Your whole body feeling so heavy, so relaxed.
• You allow the chair or the floor to take the whole weight in your body, giving up all effort in your body.

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Step 10: Soften the effort 'to do' the meditation and rest in the growing relaxation.

Once in nirvikalpa samadhi based stillness allow your mind to drift and settle by itself, avoid any doing as this will stir up the mind. The only thing you may do at this stage is relaxing with a slow breath out through your nose whenever your attention is drawn back out to engage with the world. 

Sit back and enjoy the process as your mind returns to its simplest form, pure awareness.

• SoundCloud: Guided Meditation.
• Insight Timer App: Guided Meditation.

Nirvikalpa samadhi based stillness arises by allowing the functions of your mind to slow down by not adding anything to them. Like a fire that can only survive as long as it is being fed fuel, the fire of your mind can only burn fiercely when fuel is being added to it.

Through not adding to the activity of your mind, and gently softening any habitual 'going out' of your attention, it naturally settles down and become still. 

This process of softening 'all doing' challenges the habitual tendency of the mind to create through engaging with the six sensory fields. 

When habitual going out of attention is relaxed, this challenges the last of the minds remaining defenses in a process that is experienced as disentanglement and that results in stillness.

In this meditation you gradually develop the simple skill of abandoning effort in different parts of your body to bring about deep relaxation. 

This is a beautiful practice of sitting still and allowing your body to relax part by part by giving up effort that is held within the muscles. 

As you relax you tune into the sense of ease that is associated with physical relaxation and allow it to fill every cell of your body as an expression of bodily presence.  

This process challenges and gradually removes habitual defensive armours produced by your mind by deconstructing the minds habitual bracing for danger that expresses within the body as tension. 

Through repetition your mind will gradually allow the relaxation to access deeper levels of defenselessness until all defensive armour is removed and safety is experienced within the stillness of your body itself.

Your meditation object for stillness arises through methodical deep relaxation of your body, in this case brought about by inclining your mind towards letting go of effort and allowing different parts of your body to relax as a doorway to stillness.  

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• Length: 30 min.

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Meditation Structure:

1. Sit in meditation and develop mindfulness of body > 
2. Gradually allow effort to relax in your forehead, eyelids, cheeks and jaw >
3. Gradually allow effort to relax in your shoulders, chest, upper back, arms >
4. Gradually allow effort to relax in your hips, legs and feet >
5. Experience the sense of ease within your body and allow it to fill your mind >
6. Soften effort within your mind to engage with any experience or to do anything.

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Meditation Instructions:

Step 1: Sit or lay down for meditation and gradually bring awareness into your body, smiling with your eyes into this the pleasure of this growing presence as in Meditation 04: Skill in Joyful Presence.

Developing Stillness:

Step 2: Allow relaxation to flow into your forehead.

Once your body is relaxed, you gently bring awareness to your forehead and use slow softening breaths to allow the muscles in your forehead to relax. 

• Aware of this relaxation, you allow it to fill your awareness. 
• Feeling your forehead becoming heavier, smoothing out, so relaxed. 
• You experience the sense of ease of this relaxation, you allow it to enter your mind.

..........

Step 3: Allow relaxation to flow into your eyelids.

• Feel the relaxation flow down from your forehead into your eyelids. 
• Feeling so relaxed. 
• You gently relax your eyelids further, feeling them become heavy, so heavy. 
• You open them slightly and relax this effort, allowing them to droop, to sink. 
• Aware of this relaxation, you allow it to fill your awareness. 
• Allow them to become so heavy it feels like you’re falling asleep.

Step 4: Allow relaxation to flow into your cheeks & jaw. 

• Feel the relaxation flow down through your cheeks and into your jaw. 
• Allow your jaw to open slightly. Feel the relaxation coming to the whole of your face, filling your face, becoming so relaxed. 
• Experience the sense of ease of this relaxation throughout your face.

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Step 5: Allow relaxation to flow into your shoulders, chest and upper back.

•  Feeling the relaxation flow down into your chest, and upper back.
• Shoulders dropping slightly.
• Feeling this relaxation coming to your upper body.
• Experience the sense of ease of this relaxation in your upper body.

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Step 6: Allow relaxation to flow down your arms, hands and fingers.

• Allowing this relaxation to flow down your arms into your hands. 
• Relaxing your fingers. 
• Allow your arms to hang loosely from your shoulders, so relaxed. 
• Experience the sense of ease of this relaxation in your arms, hands and fingers.

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Step 7: Relax your chest and belly, allowing your breathing to flow naturally.

• Feeling the pleasure of the gentle flow of your breathing. 
• Allowing your breathing to become very gentle and calm. 
• To become so relaxed that you can barely feel it moving at all. 
• The sense of ease within your body deepens. 

..........

Step 8: Allow relaxation to flow down into your hips, legs and feet.

As relaxation grows you allow it flow down into your hips, legs and feet, softening any effort that you feel held there. 

• You slightly release your hips, allowing your legs to open slightly.
• Feeling the relaxation to flow down your legs into your feet.
• Your whole body feeling so heavy, so relaxed.
• You allow the chair or the floor to take the whole weight in your body, giving up all effort in your body.

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Step 9: Create your object for meditation: pleasure of relaxation & ease.

This deep relaxation of your whole body will become your meditation object for your mind to access Stillness. 

• Allow the chair or the floor to take the full weight of your body. 
• Give up all effort within your body. 
• Feel the effortlessness of it all, the effortlessness of not having to do anything. 
• Feel this deep sense of ease fill every cell within your whole body. 
• Allow the sense of ease to grow.

Once in nirvikalpa samadhi based stillness allow your mind to drift and settle by itself, avoid any doing as this will stir up the mind. The only thing you may do at this stage is relaxing with a slow breath out through your nose whenever your attention is drawn back out to engage with the sensory world.

• SoundCloud: Guided Meditation.
• Insight Timer App: Guided Meditation.

You continue to develop the simple skill of allowing the deep relaxation that arises through not doing. 

This is a beautiful practice of sitting still and allowing your body to relax part by part starting from your forehead, moving down through your body to your feet. 

You then mentally feel the sense of ease with the deep physical relaxation allowing it to enter your mind. This process will challenge and gradually remove defensive armours produced by your mind. 

Through repetition your mind will gradually allow the relaxation to access deeper levels of defenselessness until all defensive armour is removed and safety is experienced within the stillness of the mind itself. 

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Accessing the Pleasure

The pleasure of deep relaxation of your body is used during this stage of stillness as the meditation of object. It is awareness of the pleasure and sense of ease of it that takes stillness to deeper levels. 

In the same way you created a feedback loop by taking piti-sukha as a meditation object from which to enter first jhana, you create a feedback loop based on abandoning, sense of ease, easiness, letting go and allow the feeling of this to grow and fill first your body and then mind.

Once you experience deep relaxation within your body, you bring awareness to the 'feeling of it', the sukha vedana aspect, and allow it to enter and engulf awareness by abandoning all 'doing'. 

Your mind will then take this object of effortlessness, the pleasure of ease and this will grow in a similar (but more tranquil) way as first jhana. this will develop a very particular type of unification: nirvikalpa samadhi (objectless unification), which will develop into a very deep state of relaxed bliss.

Your meditation object for nirvikalpa samadhi based stillness arises through methodical deep relaxation of your body, once the pleasure of this relaxation and ease grows, you take it as a meditation object and allow it to enter your mind, while relaxing any habitual 'going out' of your attention to enter deep stillness.

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• Length: 45 min.

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Meditation Structure:

1. Sit in meditation and develop mindfulness of body > 
2. Gradually allow effort to relax in your forehead, eyelids, cheeks and jaw >
3. Gradually allow effort to relax in your shoulders, chest, upper back, arms >
4. Gradually allow effort to relax in your hips, legs and feet >
5. Experience the sense of ease within your body and allow it to fill your mind >
6. Soften effort within your mind to engage with any experience or to do anything.

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Meditation Instructions:

Step 1: Sit or lay down for meditation and gradually bring awareness into your body, smiling with your eyes into this the pleasure of this growing presence as in Meditation 04: Skill in Joyful Presence.

Step 2: Create your meditation object by developing the experience of deep physical and relaxation and ease within all part of your body as in Insight 25: Stillness within Body.

Explanation: Meditation 42 Additions. 

 Step 3: Experience the deep physical relaxation & ease.

Bring full awareness to the deep relaxation and ease within your body and allow them to start to fill your mind. 

• Abandon all mental effort at this stage; just allow. 
• Take this sense of ease, effortlessness, not doing as your meditation object by bringing awareness to it, relaxing all doing, and allowing it to fill your mind.
• Just allow your mind to sink, for mental processes to slow down and stop.
• Feel your mind sinking deeper down, deeper as the sense of ease, of effortlessness fills it. 

At this stage:

Once in stillness allow your mind to drift and settle by itself, avoid any doing as this will stir up the mind. 

The only thing you may do at this stage is relaxing with a slow breath out through your nose whenever your attention is drawn back out to engage with the world.

• Allow your mind to drift, to float around. 
• Allow thoughts to come and go. 
• You will drift in and out of thoughts.  
• Gradually the thoughts will change from directed thinking with a subject, to random, floaty thoughts without meaning. 
• Allow yourself to bounce in and out of this mental activity.

Sit back and enjoy the process as your mind returns to its simplest form, pure awareness. 

• SoundCloud: Guided Meditation.
• Insight Timer App: Guided Meditation.

• Length: 60 min.

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Meditation Instructions:

• Your meditation remains the same as Insight 26: Stillness within Mind except you add one addition and now you develop your skill in calming the habitual 'going out' of your attention over a 60-minute period. 

Explanation: Meditation 43 Additions. 

The only thing you may do at this stage is relaxing with a slow breath out through your nose whenever your attention is drawn back out to engage with the world. 

Once you have reached deep stillness, bring awareness to the area just above and between your eyes. Gently soften any doing that you experience within there.

Gently disentangle awareness from experiencing anything within your six senses by relaxing the effort that supports it, including the effort to be aware of awareness itself.

Abandon any doing, including the effort to abandon or be aware and allow awareness to fold back into itself.  

• SoundCloud: Guided Meditation.
• Insight Timer App: Guided Meditation.