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in the flow
with DR GRAHAM WILLIAMS
A regular column exploring the benefits of
meditation
THE LUMINOUS SPACE
OF YOUR MIND
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When you are meditating
and you reach the
point where your mind and
body are deeply balanced, the
conscious and subconscious
sides of your mind are connected.
In a sense, they can
talk to each other. This usually
only happens when we
are deeply relaxed in sleep
and begin to dream. Our
conscious minds are literally
asleep, and so the subconscious
can start come into
view.
Our subconscious mind
contains the vast repository
of our experience; our
memories, the stories we
have constructed out of our
experiences, and those we
have inherited from our family
and our culture. It also includes
all the experience of
being a human being which
we have inherited simply by
having a body.
One of the things meditation
does is bring these two
sides of your mind together
while you are awake and
meditating. The hypnagogic
images of your subconscious
mind can then arise
while you are conscious, and
it is as though you are dreaming
while being awake and
alert at the same time. Your
inner world has opened
up—the world of your intuition.
I have known countless
numbers of people at
the Lifeflow courses who
have been surprised and delighted
when this experience
opens up for them, and they
know they have discovered a
tool for training their intuition.
As you continue to explore
this inner world, your mind
eventually becomes completely
still, and you discover
that this deeply balanced
state is one of the most exquisitely
blissful states it is
possible to experience. Different people respond
to it in different ways. Some
feel a sense of awe or transcendence
and from it they
draw a deep feeling of inspiration.
Others experience it as
a profound connection with
the environment, with all the
plants, animals, other races
and peoples, and even the
earth itself—with everything
which nurtures and supports
their life. And others will feel a sense of union with God,
while some will experience a
feeling of deep peace.
All of these experiences are
expressions of what it is like
to be deeply balanced. This is
the natural state of our
minds and bodies and we
feel a sense of unity, bliss and
clarity each time we touch it in
meditation. We normally
don’t experience it because
we are so preoccupied with
our thoughts and emotions.
And yet this is experience so
many of us are seeking.. It is
open, spacious and expansive,
deeply peaceful and incredibly
blissful, totally beyond
all judgements of
good and bad.
When you are in this balanced
state, you become
aware of how your thoughts
come and go as you see the
space between them. You become
aware of the space in
your mind, exactly in the
same way as you can see the
sky in which clouds come
and go.
This space is vast and luminous,
just like the sky on a
clear, cloudless day. Ultimately
meditation can bring
you to experience this—the
vast, luminous totally clear
state of mind in which everything
you experience comes
and goes.
From a balanced state you
can start to see how your
mind and your life move in
patterns and cycles, just like
the patterns of the weather.
You find that you are not
just your emotions and
thoughts, but that you can
rest in this space every time
you reach a balanced state in
meditation.
Imagine the kinds of
emotions you would have if
you genuinely believed that
you controlled the weather.
Each sunny day (presuming
you liked sunny days) would
bring elation and possibly a
rather drunken sense of
power as you knew that you
created it. Then when it became
cloudy, raining and a
thunderstorm appeared over
the horizon you would be
shattered. You would have
completely failed. Elation
would be followed by depression.
Up and down your
emotions would go, totally
at the mercy of the weather patterns, without you having
any means to do anything
about it.
Unfortunately, believing
that somehow we control, or
should control, our states of
mind is exactly the same and
leads to the same result. It
guarantees that we don’t get
to see and understand how
our minds actually work because
we are looking in the
wrong place.
For example, if it is raining
and cold and we are dressed
for a sunny day because we
believe that, as we control the
weather, this aberration of
rain shouldn’t be happening––
well it’s not hard to
guess the result. We would
be lucky not to get ill.
We know how to avoid
getting physically ill by adjusting
our behaviour and
clothing to the climate, by
eating well and by washing.
Keeping the mind in a reasonably
healthy state is no
different; however, it is totally
impossible if we are
blinded by wanting things to
be perfect and by believing
that somehow we are in control
of it.
As you move from trying
to fix how you feel and control
what your mind is doing
to learning how to establish a
calm state, you can accept
how you feel without the
need to do anything about it.
You can then watch, and notice
what your feelings and
emotions actually do. You
find that you can reach this
state of balance, the space in
your mind which is calm and
deeply peaceful, whenever
you choose.
Dr Graham Williams is a concert pianist
and ordained Lama and is the
Director of The Lifeflow Meditation
Centre, which runs regular meditation
courses in the city and retreats in
the hills. He has been teaching meditation
for 25 years and is an Associate
of a national corporate psychology
company. He has released the
CD Reflections in Water, of piano
music of Chopin, Liszt and Debussy;
music of light and water, and a CD of
piano music of Olivier Messiaen, My
Heart Keeps Watch.
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