Should You Stop Thinking During Meditation?

We often believe that meditating means emptying the mind, and we lose heart as soon as the thoughts come back, which is to say almost immediately. Yet it is not thoughts that prevent us from meditating, but the attention we give them. Posture, breathing, regularity, the role of the day itself: here is how to practice meditation without fighting the mind, and patiently return to what is constant within, beyond the mind.

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We often believe that meditating means emptying the mind, and we lose heart as soon as the thoughts come back, which is to say almost immediately. Yet it is not thoughts that prevent us from meditating, but the attention we give them. Posture, breathing, regularity, the role of the day itself: here is how to practice meditation without fighting the mind, and patiently return to what is constant within, beyond the mind.

The word "meditation" covers all kinds of practices: focused reflection on a specific subject, listening to a voice that guides the session, reciting a mantra, listening to a river or to the wind in the treetops. It can lead all the way to samadhi, the deepest state of absorption described by the traditions of India.

On The spiritual Path, which is a path of devotion, meditation takes place within the framework of a sadhana. This Sanskrit word means "what must be done"; the sadhana of original-Yoga rests on four pillars: service, satsang, meditation, and the angas, a code of conduct comparable to the yamas and niyamas of the Yoga Sutras. Original-Yoga, however, belongs neither to ashtanga nor to raja-yoga.

Let us turn today to meditation. It is often associated with a method meant to calm the mind, to silence thoughts. This idea is incomplete, and the misunderstanding it creates discourages more than it helps.

What troubles a person is less the presence of thoughts than the attention they pay to them and the fact of identifying with them. The mind never stops thinking, never stops feeling emotions; trying to stop it is a false trail, and an obstacle to deep meditation, dhyana.

The confusion comes from the mind scattering itself, and to scatter oneself is to leave what is constant in order to follow what passes. Meditating therefore means returning, patiently, to what is constant within, unrelated to the agitation of the mind, to thoughts, to emotions. An object of meditation, here the technique of the Holy-Name, gives attention a point of support that is not the fluctuations of the mind.

During the session, it is not the thought that changes in the meditator, but the attention they give it. The thought goes on existing, in the background, as if in another room of one's inner refuge, its closed door muffling the din.

Sitting down

Everything begins with a simple, almost trivial gesture: sitting down. There is no need for perfect conditions; a quiet moment, in the morning or the evening, and a place where one will not be disturbed are enough.

The back stays straight without stiffness, the body relaxes without slumping; the posture matters less than the stability it allows one to hold without effort. Remaining completely still, for a long time, without giving in to the first discomfort, helps the mind settle and turn inward.

Those who are able can sit in the lotus or half-lotus position, but it is not required. People who are ill, disabled, or elderly can meditate lying down or in a reclining chair.

To begin, attention can rest on the breath, without trying to change it, simply letting oneself be captivated by it. The air comes in, the air goes out; there is nothing to do, only to listen, to feel the lungs filling and then emptying, to feel the sway of the breath and let oneself be rocked by it.

At first, thoughts will arise almost at once: the day, a memory, a worry. This is normal. The point is not to follow them. Each time awareness clings to them, one returns to the breath, patiently, without fuss. The technique of the Holy-Name, passed on during the Revelation, gives this return its full depth.

Distraction and the inability to concentrate often accompany the beginnings, during the phase of concentration called dharana. They are part of the exercise, just as missteps are part of walking. Some days the mind scatters more, other days it settles more easily; much depends on how the day has gone. Regularity rather than duration

What matters is to meditate every day. A few minutes repeated daily often bear more fruit than a long but occasional practice, and over time, without any need to force it, the session lengthens by itself.

For someone with many obligations, about forty-five minutes is a good goal. Mystics free from social or family obligations meditate at least two hours a day, sometimes two hours in the morning and as many in the evening.

The day prepares the session. If one has spent it rushing about, forgetting what matters most, getting irritated by everything that annoys, and modern society has no shortage of that, one arrives on the cushion tense and scattered, and dharana drags on. A short meditation may then be spent entirely struggling against one's tensions and thoughts, without reaching dhyana. That is not so serious.

Still, it is better to make sure the whole day, in each of its activities, prepares the return to the center during the next session. That is the role of another pillar of the sadhana, service, to which a forthcoming article will be devoted.

Little by little, without any sharp break, something calms down. Attention, which needed effort to keep returning to the breath, begins to follow it more naturally, almost without thinking about it, the way one lets oneself go on a swing. Then begins what The spiritual Path calls deep, or formal meditation: a continuity that settles in, with nothing spectacular about it.

In a word, this formal meditation consists in turning one's senses inward. Service, for its part, is a meditation in action, turned toward the world and everyday gestures, without losing sight of the essential that rests within. One gathers attention in, the other unfolds it into what one does; the two movements complement each other, and each prepares the ground for the other.

The four techniques

On The spiritual Path, this turning inward relies on four techniques, passed on together during the Revelation. They can be named here, not taught.

The inner light and the inner sounds, or nada, rely on forms of the shanmukhi-mudra, an ancient gesture whose name evokes the seal that closes the doors of the senses. The gaze withdraws from the images outside, the hearing from the noises of the world, until both find, within, something else to see and to hear.

Together with the technique of the Holy-Name, these two techniques are practiced one after the other in the same session: first the Holy-Name, then the inner sounds, and finally the inner light. The fourth, the technique called "of the nectar," is practiced differently: it does not belong to formal meditation and accompanies the technique of the Holy-Name in service.

Beyond their different gestures, these four techniques share one thing: none of them seeks to manufacture a new experience. Each in its own way removes what was turning attention outward, so as to bring it back within, where the essential lies.

None is taught in writing. They are passed on directly, by someone who has received them personally, during a free and open video meeting: the Revelation. It is enough to ask for it, with nothing in return: no money, no identity, no address.

A first exchange by email allows one to ask questions and to make sure the approach is understood for what it is; a second appointment is then set for the Revelation itself, which lasts about two hours.

The center

Whether it stays with the breath or deepens through these four techniques, the practice gradually draws one closer to a stable point, independent of thoughts and emotions: the center, Hridaya. Meditation does not produce it; it is already there. Meditation only removes what was turning attention away from it.

It works even without any remarkable experience. The meditator who makes themselves available receives Grace without anything showing, and the fruit often appears later, during the day: a new way of seeing life, and of living it. For meditation is part of a whole; the pillars of the sadhana work together, and it is their daily Observance that brings about its effects.

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