How Meditation Works

[asalantu]

Hi..!
This is an interesting essay related to meditation mechanics. Translation to spanish language is also available.

http://www.shinzen.org/shinsub3/artHow.htm

My best regards,
Ángel

[Korpo]

Shinzen Young is an insightful person, also for example recommended by Charles Tart IIRC.

Oliver

[Korpo]

I found the text very helpful.

One good example from the text of "everyday Samadhi" happening when one concentrates without a meditative purpose but nevertheless has sustained a high focus:


John Brodie, former quarterback of the San Francisco 49ers, recalled such experiences in an interview published in the January 1973 issue of intellectual Digest (pp 19-20):

"At times, and with increasing frequency now, I experience a kind of clarity that I've never seen adequately described in a football story. Sometimes, for example, time seems to slow way down, in an uncanny way, as if everyone were moving in slow motion. It seems as if I have all the time in the world to watch the receivers run their patterns, and yet I know the defensive line is coming at me just as fast as ever. I know perfectly well how hard and fast those guys are coming and yet the whole thing seems like a movie or a dance in slow motion. It's beautiful."(from the last footnote)

BTW, the feeling is not unknown in sports, I know it from marksmen and archers, and I think it is what can make Japanese archery a meditative discipline. IIRC it was also sometimes referred to under a more Western heading of "flow".

Oliver

[asalantu]

One good example from the text of "everyday Samadhi" happening when one concentrates without a meditative purpose but nevertheless has sustained a high focus:


"At times, and with increasing frequency now, I experience a kind of clarity that I've never seen adequately described in a football story. Sometimes, for example, time seems to slow way down, in an uncanny way, as if everyone were moving in slow motion. It seems as if I have all the time in the world to watch the receivers run their patterns, and yet I know the defensive line is coming at me just as fast as ever. I know perfectly well how hard and fast those guys are coming and yet the whole thing seems like a movie or a dance in slow motion. It's beautiful."



¿Something like the time distortion achievable through Lucid Dreaming techniques..?

My best regards...
Ángel

[Korpo]

I don't know what you refer to. Do you want to say Lucid Dreaming changes waking consciousness?

Here time distortion/stretching is referenced in a context of full waking consciousness, into a kind of slow motion.

Oliver

[CFTraveler]

It's probably the same effect that happens when dangerous situations arise in regular waking consciousness. Many people have reported this phenomenon when they were in a car accident or falling down the stairs. Their thinking abilities accelerate and they are able to witness what is happening to them in slow motion, even though their own physical body movements continue on at the slow speed. I experienced this years ago in the middle of a car accident. I could see the exact moment when the other car ran the red light and was coming at me. I remember maneuvering to get out of the way, the exact moment when I knew I was going to be hit, and how time went back to normal after impact, in fact blurred up.
I was just reading an instance (coincidence?) of a woman that had this happen as she was falling down the stairs, she witnessed while being airborne the flips her body was doing and tried (to no avail) to move her limbs out of the way- but they responded in real time (in other words, not as fast as her observing mind) as she was going down.
I'm glad this sort of thing happens in instances that are not necessarily dangerous.

[asalantu]

It's probably the same effect that happens when dangerous situations arise in regular waking consciousness. Many people have reported this phenomenon when they were in a car accident or falling down the stairs. Their thinking abilities accelerate and they are able to witness what is happening to them in slow motion, even though their own physical body movements continue on at the slow speed. I experienced this years ago in the middle of a car accident. I could see the exact moment when the other car ran the red light and was coming at me. I remember maneuvering to get out of the way, the exact moment when I knew I was going to be hit, and how time went back to normal after impact, in fact blurred up.
I was just reading an instance (coincidence?) of a woman that had this happen as she was falling down the stairs, she witnessed while being airborne the flips her body was doing and tried (to no avail) to move her limbs out of the way- but they responded in real time (in other words, not as fast as her observing mind) as she was going down.
I'm glad this sort of thing happens in instances that are not necessarily dangerous.

Dear CF...
An experiment was done and its results presented at Discovery Channel (¿or Infinito Channel..? the two channels are enough similar in order to justify mistake). A man was dropped unexpectedly to him, from an height of 40 meters. On his wrist the man carry an electronic device with a digital display. The experiment director program the device in order to display two digits (by example, 3 and 6 at fast speed: 3, 6, 3, 6, 3, 6, ... 100 times/second). Mission was subject under analysis must read display and a posteriori refer to experiment director that what watch. Results were conclusive, time slows when person is engaged at a critical situation.

Dear Oliver...
CF testimonial and experiment referred by me, are trivial. I remember, at http://www.intelegen.com a researcher speak about reliability of to use, enhanced gathering information capabilities of mind when person is under Lucid Dream triggered by binaural-beats. Researcher suggest on the possibility of to speed up brain efficiency and read and assimilate an entire book at computer screen under superfast scroll conditions. Experimental evidence supporting hypothesis was not provided.

Sincerely,
Ángel

[asalantu]

I don't know what you refer to. Do you want to say Lucid Dreaming changes waking consciousness?

Here time distortion/stretching is referenced in a context of full waking consciousness, into a kind of slow motion.

Oliver

Hi Oliver...
This is only like a brainstorm, since I only have a theoretical approach to astraldynamics thematics. My free time is an illusion for me, because I engaged with more common bussiness problems intead of that I consider really critical, to date unreachable.

My view is when at normal conciousness an internal clock limites our mind benchmarks. Reducing conciousness of our body, conciousness of internal clock ticks (by example, heart beats) are reduced and then mind can run more efficiently, but without to loss his waking state.

Such a state is so-called (as you know) Focus 10, Trance, or Mind Awake-Body-Asleep state.

My question, within limits of your experience, is:

¿Meditating under trance state, is or is not, the basic requirement to enhance mind performance since at trance state detachment from external (from mind viewpoint) timing reference sources (internal clock aka heartbeat, by example) is achievable in order to do a more efficient use of available time..?

My best regards,
Ángel

[Korpo]

This is not the phenomenon that seems to happen here as I interpret it.

True, in trance, when the mind detaches from the physical senses a detachment from physical time. This decoupling from outer events/senses is indeed coupled to Focus 10/trance/etc.

But here something else happens - the mind become acutely aware of the moment. It comes to a state of very clear awareness where the moment can expand and can be perceived in deeper and deeper detail *without* detachment from the senses. The mind goes from a thought interpretation to a more full understanding, it graps the moment in deeper detail, all at once, enabling a different functioning.

Or so I for now interpret it. ;)

Oliver