Does anyone have a daily meditation practice? Would anyone like one but needs motivation?

[mangolassi]

Ooh, I feel all shy

I am agnostic and generally confused about spiritual things, but after recovering from a bout of pnd found a great book - The Mindful Way Through Depression. It has a programme of daily meditation, and I've tried in the past, but it's soooo hard to stick to with no support.

The meditation style in the book is 'western insight' - basically vipassana with the Buddhism taken out - but it would be great to have a thread for anyone trying to get started with daily practice, whatever kind of meditation appeals. Even better if there's anyone who actually has a daily practice already

my daughter went to the Birmingham central mosque and it certainly was an interesting and positive experience - even though she had been to many mosques in the arab world during our travels and didnt like the architecture (well, guess it is a bit of a downer after the Umajad Mosque in Damascus....). she felt very welcome so I would highly recommend it. They have no time limits and also welcome you during Fri prayers as far as I know. Go for it!

Hi everyone, and welcome gently nice to have you onboard so to speak

I would love a visit to a mosque, have never been to one

have been having a funny old time of it lately so not felt like posting much, but have been thinking of you all often

had a nice afternoon on Monday - left work early as was feeling crap but at last minute decided to go over to the London Buddhist Centre to see if they had a meditation stool I could buy (I have a very dodgey hip and having tried a stool on my recent retreat know it will help a lot) . Anyway, I got there and went in (y first ever visit) met a lovely scottish man on teh desk who had had a similar problem. Found a gorgeous folding stool (pricey though £43 ) which I invested in (start of the salary month syndrome!) Then I asked about the centre and the guy told me to go hav ea look around. I found the shrine rooms and he told me I could sit. It felt like such a privilege to just sit in that beautiful room alone in silence for 30 mins or so. Brought me right back up

Hope everyone else is doing well and enjoying the (ahem) summer

am off camping in france next week, praying weather there will be a bit better than here

metta to all

Hi Everyone
Lovely to hear everyone's news.
PB - good to hear you're feeling a bit cheerier after your visit to the London Buddhist Centre. It sounds wonderful. I've looked at their website lots.

As for mosques I've visited a couple (which are no longer in use) and they're the most wonderful spaces. THe lack of art in the building (apart from quotes from the Koran) adds to the simplicity and beauty. (Personally I find places like the Sistine Chapel - a bit over done / "busy" - nothing a good coat of magnolia emulsion couldn't cure)

I digress.....
Growing -- hope all is going well.

Katie - hope your holiday is good / restful.

Gently - welcome aboard and thank you for recommending Momma Zen - I'm trying to resist buying her book but I've looked at her website - it's really good. She sounds quite a character. I hope to attend a Zen meeting after the summer hols are over as "BFM - Lingering", makes lots of references to Zen and it seems quite attractive strand of Buddhism - on the face of it. Does anyone here practice Zen Buddhism ?

BTW Momma Zen is running a one day women's retreat which is v tempting but sadly it's in the USA. Not sure I could get a weekend pass for that!

I managed to get a week of sun, sea and sand but failed to meditate and interestingly slept v badly. Since returning home I've resumed meditating and resumed sleeping!! Out of interest what time of day do people meditate? I try about 6pm usually to the background noise of CBeebies.

Take care all....
For those of you under canvas - may the sun shine!
Love PFS

Hi

I hope no one minds me joining this thread i have been looking at meditation for a while now, and am really keen to start, but have no idea were any suggestions for books or sites to get you started? has anyone used kundalini (sp?) meditation, and if so what experiences?

thanks mt3

Hi
Mums - the book I think is really good is Buddhism for Mothers by Sarah Napthali. Its a good book for showing how buddhism relates to everyday life. It's worth supplementing this book with bbc website (religious section) on the basics of buddhism plus buddhanet. (Google this).

Other people on this thread have recommended Buddhism for Dummies, and anything by Thich Naht Han, plus a Short Introduction to Buddhism - for a general overview. ALso worth looking at Friends of Western Buddhist order website (good audio section) and Plum Village which is where TNH is based.

Also worth looking at Tricycle for the Daily Dharma - it's basically a daily thought for the day from a Buddhist perspective. (Google Tricycle - it has lots of interesting articles.)

Hope this helps.

PFS

This morning I received this Daily Dharma from Tricycle - I thought I'd share it. It really resonates for someone like me who struggles to live in the moment. I hope you also find it helpful.

July 30, 2009
Tricycle's Daily Dharma
One Thing at a Time

It is wonderful to learn to do one thing at a time. When we do formal zazen, we just sit; this means we do not add to the sitting any judgments such as how wonderful it is to do zazen, or how badly we are doing at it. We just sit.

When we wash the dishes, we just wash dishes; when we drive on the highway, we just drive. When pain comes, there is just pain, and when pleasure comes, there is just pleasure. A Buddha is someone who is totally at one with his experience at every moment.

• Francis Dojun Cook, How to Raise an Ox, Wisdom Publications

thank you for your reply i have ordered that book and am looking forward to its arrival. have you got a link for the tricycle?

thanks

www.tricycle.com/

YOu'll find the Daily Dharma link on the same website.

PFS xx

hello my friends! hugs all round - i've missed you.

just back from a wonderful holiday in mallorca - 35 degrees every single day, med the temperature of a warm bath, kids in heaven. i managed to meditate every morning and had a couple of really beautiful bathed-in-peace experiences. which one is of course not supposed to get attached to...but 'twas pleasant nonetheless

also read 'no self, no problem' (anam thubten) - great on that (to me) thorniest aspect of buddhism, the necessary renunciation of self. it was helpful. though, er, i have not quite achieved the stated aim

now a third of the way through 'after the ecstasy, the laundry' by jack kornfield - fantastic. a classic, i am informed. it's about what happens once people have attained enlightenment - do they then have to come back to earth and still...do the laundry? pay taxes? row with their teenage kids? answer - yes! pleasingly, i thought.

v v interesting. lots of accounts of spiritual masters and the path they took to enlightenment and what actually HAPPENS when they 'got there'. and how according to suzuki roshi there are no enlightened people - only enlightened acts. hmmm. food for thought anyway!

PFS - great to read all your posts - i tend to meditate first thing in the morning but that is v dependent on when i wake up (have not needed alarm since producing two reliable human ones of my own;-) and how long i then have until the kids then do. usually 20-30 mins. kind of sets me up for the day. then i do about 15-20 mins last thing at night - like you my sleep is massively improved if i do, and i notice the difference if i don't!

peanut - really interesting to hear about the london buddhist centre - i've been meaning to ask for ages whether that's where you'd been going for your thursday evening meetings - is it FWBO-run? stool sounds well worth the investment - a snip compared to my luxury-item meditation timer which cost an outrageous 50 quid (i had to fess up to DH and he was appalled!!). it's lovely though - a smooth pyramid of sycamore that houses an internal digital 'gong' sound. saves you keeping half an eye on the clock all the time!

kids - great info re the birmingham mosque, thank you so much - that has made me more determined to go this summer. we flew out of birmingham airport and i was excitedly using all the fascinating ethnic mix of people to try to open the kids' eyes to a world beyond rural herefordshire!!!

love to all - must go to bed xxx

ps mumtoo3 - hi! welcome. i have heard of kundalini meditation but i am afraid i don't know anything about it - maybe someone else can help. i can recommend a great book called 'change your mind' about meditation technique which i read before going on holiday - but it's very FWBO-based, ie it concentrates on their two favourite meditations. mindfulness of breath and metta bhavana (loving-kindness). it is very good though. the author is one of those tricky-to-remember one word sanskrit names - paranamabanda or some such collection of syllables!

thank you for your recommendations on the books am off to check them out now! i have just completed a 6 minute meditation which was wonderful, and am really enjoying this

i smeditaiton the first thing you do in the morning before you go downstairs etc?

mt3 - i try to meditate before going downstairs, yes, depending on whether i've managed to get up before the kids! it's certainly my preference. if i don't manage then i try to get 10 minutes in while they are getting dressed/messing around in their rooms before school...pretty risky though with the threat of interruption high!
6-7 mins is great! the woman who taught my group when i went to a course a few years ago used to say that even a few seconds of managing to still one's thoughts was a few seconds more peace than we'd have managed without meditating!
xxx

Hi everyone and welcome MT3

if you are looking for easy "getting into it" books I love peace is every step by Thich Nhat Hanh - it's more about mindfulness in everyday activities than meditation but I have found it wonderful as I've gotten started with meditation

welcome back Katie - lovely to hear from you. sounds like you had a wonderful time. Isn't it hard though, as you move forward in your reading, to deal with that realisation that we shouldn't really be just seeking that peacefulness, that that is as closed minded as only lusting after fast cars etc - I was reading Pema Chodrun on the subject this morning and there is something about how she writes that makes scales fall from my eyes on a regular basis. It does make so much sense, but does sort of cause a shock when it dawns, after one had been gaily thinking oooh if I do this for long enough I will float around on a cloud of calmness and content. I suppose ultimately if you getto thet hard to master middle way you can float around on a cloud of well earned equanimity, which will be more meaningful in the end.

My daily meditation practice is coming on beautifully since I got my stool. It makes such a difference (to an old crone like me ) to be comfortable while I sit. I know some traditions suggest that you must just acknowledge the pain and work with it but I am a much bigger fan of traditions like TNH and teh FWBO who say it is very important to be comfy I now have no problem sitting for anything up to 30 mins (all I ever get time for) and have done a number of early morning sittings in the last week which have been great, set me up for the day as they say...

metta to you all

Good morning everyone!

Welcome back Katie - good to hear you had a nice holiday.
PB - are you sitting comfortably - then I shall begin!

Katie - I was v impressed by all the reading you did on holiday. I only managed light weight novels whilst basking like a beached whale in Crete. However, you did inspire me to start working my way through my tower of unread books. Whilst in the gym on Monday I started Matthieu Richard's Happiness - he's a Buddhist monk but the book isn't strictly buddhism. It's interesting.
After 5km on the cycling machine I read three chapters and burned a couple of calories !! Multi tasking at its best.

I had a wonderful break through with my meditating the other day. I managed my usual 10 minutes but instead of 90% of monkey mind I had some wonderful moments of total calm / serenity. I imagined I was looking at my heart - very peculiar but glorious.

Katie - what was your conclusion on BFM - Lingering. I'm re-reading as I find it so densely packed with info. The chapters on house work and negativity are v good!

PB in the Tricycle Buddhist review there's an interview by Pema Chodron about guiltelessness she's interview a well known teacher who's name escapes me.
BTW does anyone know if you can get Tricycle from any outlets in teh UK???

Hope you are all keeping well and enjoying the shower-dodging summer.

DD is has just wandered in - so I must away.

Hello there everybody.

I will start by saying that I haven't read the whole thread (yet) but will endeavour to read through it over the next couple of days.

I am keen to introduce some meditation (back) into my life. I started attending a local 'drop-in' meditation session a year or so ago but found it a bit intense and I felt a bit too self-conscious there.

I am agnostic and not Christened. I am grateful to my parents for not 'assigning' us to a religion but recently, I have found this hard because I feel like I am looking for something (more accurately, I feel there IS something there but I don't know what or who). Like I have spiritual beliefs but I don't know exactly what they are or which framework they fit into.

I have considered going along to different places of worship to see what seems right for me but that seems very artificial to me. I'm not sure I can just 'choose' a religion.

So, I want to create opportunities for quiet thought, giving thanks (to someone- not sure who!) and contemplation and I guess mediation fits the bill as it doesn't have to be attached to a specific faith. Perhaps it will lead me to some spiritual revelations, but if not, it should at least be beneficial for my health (mental and otherwise!)

I am going to start looking through the thread later this evening and hope to join in properly very soon.

Hi Ollifin
Good to have you on board.
I hope you enjoy reading the thread. Everyone else writes sensible interesting stuff and I digress with lots of odd comments. But anyways we're a friendly bunch - I think.

Ok enjoy - must away

PFS

olifin
welcome! i know your name from other threads, really nice to have you on this one. i come from a similarly atheistic/agnostic household and always felt there must be something more...i started with meditation and came to buddhist/quaker dabblings from there. i love the value both traditions place on stillness and quiet contemplation and on you drawing your own spiritual conclusions from your direct experience. meditation is a great place to start from i would enthusiastically agree!
fluffy great to hear from you! i LOVED lingering questions as you can imagine. in fact, i felt so grateful that sarah n. had written two such enormously helpful that i popped a thank you card in the post ! no idea if she will ever get it but i felt an urge to let her know that her books are appreciated on this side of the pond (even if bloody hard to get hold of!)
glad you had a lovely hol and i've heard good things about matthieu ricard from another friend as well as you, so i must look out for him

must go but back soon xxx

HI

HOpe you're all well - just a brief message....

In case anyone wants to subscribe to Tricycle - the Buddhist review (www.tricycle.com) you can get it for £20 for 4 issues on thsi website:
secure.wisdom-books.net/TricycleSubscribe.asp?REF=

Unfortunately this magazine isn't available in the shops over here. (I've been writing to the publishers) If you want to buy just individual issues you can get them for about £5 from the same website. The website also has some interesting books - in case you want some holiday reading.

Katie _ I think it's great you wrote a fan letter to Sarah N. Let me know if you get a reply.
BTW - I keep meaning to ask you about when you went to the FWBO "do" and new members joined. (Sorry I can't remember the formal word) Did the two people get their buddhist names? If so how / who chooses them ? Do they have long mumsnet discussions on who's going to get the silly/embarrassing name!?
(According BFM - LIngering" the Buddha called one woman "Little Sturdy" after she gained enlightenment whilst doing her housework. NOw that's a name I would have been less than grateful to receive - irrespective of who'd given it to me!)

OK I digresss. Byeee

hi fluffy!
the ceremony was called a mitra celebration and the two blokes were 'signed on'(!) to be mitras (ie 'friends' of the order) rather than fully ordained members - in other words, no silly names just yet! they can then remain mitras indefinitely, which i imagine most people with busy lives/jobs/families do, or go on to become ordained - but that takes years of commitment, study, retreats etc. for instance one woman i know there who is juggling this commitment with a child and family and job decided on pursuing ordination in 2000 and is still not quite there yet! it's at that point the silly names kick in (as i am careful to try to remember not to call them when i hang out there)
must go but thanks for the tricycle info - i must say i would much rather be subscribed to the paper version that as i am at present, the digital one - not the same at all.
xxx

ps their names are chosen for them by their tutors who have by then come to know them very well over the years and have a deep and warm relationship with them. they are chosen either to reflect prominent (positive, i imagine) qualities that they already possess, or ones they eagerly aspire to - if they have no pre-existing ones, one assumes
i am assured that everyone is hungry for their new name by that stage having worked and been devoted to their path for years by then. it's a sort of 'phoenix from the ashes' thing i think - new identity to reflect your commitment to your new life. crass and inadequate summary but that is my very basic understanding, thus far at least!
x

Thanks Katie for all that info about FWBO names. It sounds v interesting.

I've just subscribed to Tricycle and can't wait to get my hands on it. Reading it online is all very well but you can't read it / drop it in the bath when its on a laptop!

Gently- On your recommendation I've ordered Momma Zen as I've enjoyed reading her website / blog.

Have a good day all.

Hi Everyone,
Hope you're all having a good summer. Have just got back from first trip to the Gower - wonderful.... highly recommend it. Beaches there are empty ,......

Well, I've received two copies of Tricycle since last posting and have found it really interesting reading. Well worth the subscription fee. (I go it through Wisdom books website.)

Gently - my copy of Momma Zen arrived and I've really enjoyed it. V different from BFM and is more of a parenting book than I expected. Still enjoyable and I like her blog.

Hope you're all keeping well.

PFS

fluffy, bless you for keeping this thread going over the quiet summer months! i love the gower - we camped at three cliffs bay last time - one of britain's most stunning beaches, surely!
i would really like a paper sub to tricycle i must say - i just never get round to reading it properly in its digital form. must just accept the double pay-out and remember it's going to a good cause
i was thinking of you only yesterday as we were in your neck of the woods (i surmise) - camped near banbury (horrific - site was beside a busy A road - felt like we'd pitched tent on central reservation of a congested motorway) then went to blenheim palace on sunday, absolutely sublime. had been last year but our friends hadn't - so glad we went back - sun shone, and gardens amazing.
well, i am feeling progressively more worn down and desperate for some time to myself as the summer hols drag on - hence the silence! not much time for anything beyond juggling kidcare and work (and the odd snatched 24 hours on a motorway reservation, obv). bit of meditation when i can but definitely not the usual routine at all, no opportunity to go to buddhist group or quakers for weeks...i really cannot wait to get back to some sort of regular practice. i am so looking fwd to going to taraloka with our very own peanut brittle in mid-sept.
thanks for the momma zen reminder - i will check that out at some point.
hope you girls are all well and forgive my moaning!
big hugs

Hi there katiek123, mumtoo3 and everyone else! I am new to Mumsnet and have really enjoyed reading your thread (although not read all of it yet!) I am relatively new to meditation and discovering my spiritual side and have really only started in the last few months after suffering with chronic fatigue and finally admitting that I had a degree of post natal depression and anxiety. I have picked up some useful tips here, so thank you, and also some great sounding books, which I'm going to look into.

Thought I would just add what I have found useful in my meditation journey. Its really difficult for me to try and meditate in the mornings with my one and three year old, but I try and do it at the same time every evening, and this prevents me from letting other things get in the way-ie 8 0'clock is my meditation time and nothing else happens then!

I also meditate with my husband, and I find that we can chat about our experiences afterwards, and it also makes us quite disciplined about doing it!!!

Whilst I have been ill my husband developed a meditative tool for me to help me get into the meditative state and I have found it so useful. I struggled for a long time to try and meditate properly because of the old chattering mind, but this has really helped me. You can get it from www.brainzapr.com and I really like the natural healing programme, which plays natural sounds. It plays beats that are supposed to change your pattern of brainwaves completely harmlessly, to get you into that meditative state more easily. The natural healing programme starts off with a 10 minute meditation and you're supposed to build up to a 30 minute one over time. I'm presently on the 20 minute one and use it everyday, and have found it so useful. Thanks all of you for your interesting and useful thread.

with love and light, gaiamum