Keep Calm When Your Mind Is Wild - with Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche
Tergar Meditation Community・23 minutes read
Meditation can alter the brain's structure, leading to lasting changes in baseline happiness, with loving compassion and wisdom meditation highlighted as potent methods. The goal of meditation is to connect with underlying awareness, love, compassion, and wisdom, leading to increased inner peace and constant awareness.
Insights
- Meditation alters brain structure and gene expression, leading to lasting changes in baseline happiness, contrary to the belief that happiness levels are fixed from birth.
- The essence of meditation lies in cultivating awareness, connecting with innate qualities like love and wisdom, and making the mind pliable to gain freedom from the "monkey mind," ultimately leading to a state of constant awareness and tranquility.
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Recent questions
How can meditation impact happiness?
Meditation alters brain structure, gene expression, and baseline happiness, leading to lasting contentment. It allows for the brain's baseline to change through neuroplasticity, contrary to previous beliefs. Different types of meditation, like loving compassion and wisdom meditation, can transform one's baseline happiness and achieve lasting peace.
What is the essence of meditation?
The essence of meditation lies in awareness, which transcends subject-object distinctions and offers a deeper understanding of one's true nature. It is about recognizing and connecting with innate awareness, love, compassion, and wisdom, rather than emptying the mind or seeking peace and joy.
How does meditation impact the mind?
Meditation aims to make the mind pliable and workable, granting freedom from the "monkey mind" and allowing for a deeper understanding of experiences. Progress in meditation involves moving through different states, such as the waterfall experience, the lake without waves experience, and the experience of life without explanation, each representing a step towards deeper practice.
What are common misconceptions about meditation?
Common misconceptions about meditation include emptying the mind or seeking peace and joy. However, meditation is not about eliminating thoughts or emotions but about connecting with the underlying awareness, love, compassion, and wisdom that form the essence of one's being.
How can consistent meditation practice benefit individuals?
Consistent meditation practice leads to increased awareness and inner peace, culminating in a state of constant awareness and tranquility. It is emphasized as a profound and lasting source of happiness, contrasting external pursuits like wealth or knowledge.
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Summary
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Transforming Baseline Happiness Through Meditation
- Meditation results in a calmer and more peaceful mind, leading to a unique form of happiness that is not fleeting like the joy from drinking coffee.
- Research conducted since 2002, involving brain scans, has shown that meditation can alter the brain's structure and gene expression, leading to lasting changes in baseline happiness.
- Neuroplasticity allows for the brain's baseline to change through meditation, contrary to previous beliefs that happiness levels were fixed from birth.
- Meditation, particularly loving compassion meditation and wisdom meditation, is highlighted as a potent method to transform one's baseline happiness and achieve lasting contentment.
- The essence of meditation lies in awareness, which is the innate quality of the mind that transcends subject-object distinctions and offers a deeper understanding of one's true nature.
- The importance of recognizing and connecting with this innate awareness is emphasized, likened to realizing the main quality of a watch to tell time accurately.
- The common misconceptions about meditation, such as emptying the mind or seeking peace and joy, are addressed, with the focus being on cultivating awareness and not suppressing thoughts or emotions.
- Meditation is not about eliminating thoughts or emotions but about connecting with the underlying awareness, love, compassion, and wisdom that form the essence of one's being.
- The goal of meditation is to make the mind pliable and workable, granting freedom from the erratic nature of the "monkey mind" and allowing for a deeper understanding of one's experiences.
- Progress in meditation is described as moving through three states: the waterfall experience, the lake without waves experience, and the experience of life without explanation, each representing a step towards deeper meditation practice.
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Meditation: Journey to Inner Peace and Clarity
- When beginning meditation, initial experiences may vary from feeling peaceful to feeling worse, which is a positive sign of progress.
- Meditation can be compared to a dirty cup being cleaned or a river becoming clear after the monsoon season, revealing hidden fish.
- Meditation experiences can be categorized into peaceful and wrathful experiences, with clarity and joy being positive signs of progress.
- The journey of meditation involves ups and downs, akin to traveling through mountains to reach a destination.
- Consistent meditation practice leads to increased awareness and inner peace, culminating in a state of constant awareness and tranquility.
- Discovering inner peace through meditation is emphasized as a profound and lasting source of happiness, contrasting external pursuits like wealth or knowledge.
