How God Changes Your Brain - Andrew Newberg, M. D_ [96]
When you have found a concept or passage you wish to explore on a deeper, intuitive level, sit down in a comfortable chair. Close your eyes, breathe slowly and deeply, and make sure all of your tensions are gone.
Now focus your awareness on your selected object of contemplation. Do not repeat any words or expressions to yourself. Just be aware of all the thoughts, perceptions, feelings, images, and memories that your contemplation evokes.
Notice how you are feeling. Are you happy? Joyful? Sad? Now bring your attention back to your goal, and again watch what feelings and thoughts emerge.
If your mind wanders too far away, gently return your awareness by taking several deep breaths, bringing your focus back to your goal, phrase, or prayer. Again, let your thoughts take you wherever they want to go.
If the object of your contemplation becomes vague or disappears, simply watch what happens next. Don't “do” anything or “make” anything happen—just let the experience naturally unfold. After several minutes return again to the object of your contemplation. Do not choose to focus on a different phrase or prayer. Instead, let the contemplation work on you.
Continue this process for a minimum of twenty minutes. Then slowly open your eyes. Remain silent for two more minutes while you take slow, deep breaths and yawns.
It is helpful to have a muted timer to let you know when twenty minutes have passed. During long meditations, you will notice pains, itches, twitches, and periods of restlessness. Observe them the best you can, but if you feel impelled to move around or scratch, give yourself permission, then take several deep breaths and return to the meditation practice.
The worst thing you can do in meditation is to critically judge your performance—and yet you'll find that there's a critical voice inside of all of us that is constantly judging every little thing we do. Meditation practice teaches us how to be accepting of who we are, of our weaknesses as well as strengths. Remember: Self-criticism stimulates the amygdala, which releases myriad stress-provoking neurochemicals and hormones.
EXERCISE 8: WALKING MEDITATION
Another important step (literally!) of meditation is to bring your awareness and relaxation into the world through action. By walking and focusing on your breathing—along with an awareness of the world around you—you can achieve a very calm and balanced state of mind. In particular, this state allows you to actually experience the world in a very pleasant and engaging way. You'll even perceive the world more intensely than in your usual state of mind. Since walking is a well-established technique for enhancing physical fitness, walking meditation has the added benefit of providing a mild form of exercise, which may be especially beneficial for people with heart and lung disease. There is even evidence to suggest that it can enhance memory, attention, and quality of life,35 as well as delaying the effects of age-related disorders.36 Since we all have to walk at least a few minutes every day, why not make it a part of your daily brain-enhancement program? All you need to do is to bring attention to the act of taking a single step.
The following exercise integrates a traditional Buddhist walking meditation with Moshé Feldenkrais's “awareness through movement” techniques. Feldenkrais's work is, in essence, a mindfulness meditation, and research has shown it to be effective for reducing pain and enhancing mood, self-awareness, and overall health.37 In fact, just imagining that your movements become more flexible significantly increases the flexibility and coordination in that part of the body you are focusing on.38 Why? Because the motor cortex is highly interconnected with the imagination-processing centers in the frontal, occipital, and parietal lobes.39 In other words, our thoughts and behavior are inseparably intertwined.
The exercise appears simple, but it really requires concentrated attention and awareness, so watch out for that inner