4 Steps From Mindfulness To Mysticism – A Meditation Path To Enlightenment

When I discovered this meditation system while living at a Tibetan Buddhist centre it changed everything for me. At the time I was engaged in all sorts of spiritual Tibetan Buddhist practices including making prostrations to Buddhas, reciting daily prayers and making imaginary offerings to gurus, attending complicated philosophical teachings and meditating on intricate visualisations of deities. So when I discovered a complete path to enlightenment which only included what I considered actual meditation, I was very excited to start straight away.

In fact this meditation system claimed you didn’t even need to be a Buddhist to gain the incredible results and it stands by itself as a complete system to enlightenment, so it was controversial to say the least for the Buddhist establishment when it emerged in the 14th century. It makes total sense to me and it was something that you could experience for yourself that required no beliefs and relied primarily on your own efforts.

The system is called Mahamudra and it comes from the Kagyu tradition of Tibetan Buddhism and is known as the practice lineage which focuses predominantly on engaging in meditation rather than study or rituals; stripping everything down to the bare essentials. It’s especially concerned with resting in the nature of your own mind.
I didn’t know it at the time but this meditation system was the inspiration for what I now call The Way of Meditation which has since encouraged and helped hundreds of thousands of people around the world to start meditating and to deepen their practice. However I do not claim to be a  Tibetan Buddhist teacher I have translated everything and adapted it to suit my own needs and modified it to appeal to the needs of a modern secular audience.

The first stage is to stabilise your attention through mindfulness meditation focussed on a particular object like the breath. This helps to overcome distraction, calm the mind and assists in the ability to control your own attention. The second stage is broadening that mindful awareness to include more and more of the present moment, and develop the flexibility to focus on what you want to focus on, again without distraction. Next is turning inward to investigate the nature of the awareness itself and lastly it’s learning to rest naturally in the nature of mind you have discovered through the direct experience of investigation.

Mindfulness is a huge movement these days especially useful for: treatment of mental health issues, developing clarity and focus and finding a sense of inner peace. Mindfulness during the day is like meditation ‘on the go’ and aids in remaining present and managing strong emotions. But here I am talking about mindfulness meditation done in a  meditation posture  sitting still.

In brief mindfulness is necessary for everyone. After all in essence it’s simply paying attention to the present moment with the ability to not be distracted by judgements or over-thinking. In other words it’s the practice of a stable clear mind.

Mindfulness meditation allows detachment from the thinking mind which is judgemental and by nature disturbing. Once detached from the restlessness of the thinking mind, mindfulness allows our awareness to settle down to a naturally calm state of stillness and clarity.

The object used in mindfulness meditation can be a number of different things. I like to use my breath as the object to watch but you can also use your body’s posture or even use a candle flame to stare at or a Buddha statue. The idea is that the object you choose becomes the anchor for your attention. Any object of your attention that you can fix onto and observe with a bare attention free from judgements or descriptions. You train in being the calm observer of your object without labelling it.

Next once you have fixed your attention onto the object in a calm and focussed way you simply notice when you are distracted and getting caught in thinking and gently guide your attention back to your object. You will have to do this many times in a session. You are not failing when you get distracted, you are failing when you do not notice that you are distracted and remain lost in thoughts for large chunks of time.

The last piece of the puzzle is to develop a calm type of attention on your object. Not too much concentration but too much relaxation. Don’t push too hard but also don’t be too lazy. It’s the perfect balance of focus and relaxation which becomes effortless over time. The Buddhist word for this is experience is  shamatha which means abiding in a calm and even way.   Eventually attentional stability is realised which is the firm bases for success in the following meditations .
For more instructions on mindfulness meditation  CLICK HERE

After gaining some experience focussing your attention on one particular object you can expand your attention further and further until it becomes aware of the totality of the present moment. It may sound like a paradox but the essential instructions at this stage are:

Once you have tamed your mind with mindfulness using an object you can then let it off the leash and it does not wander off. Instead of focusing the attention on one object, we keep it open, monitoring all aspects of our experience, without judgement or attachment.

To be clear this stage still has a focus or object of meditation it’s just expanded to included as much as possible of the present situation and is flexible.

At this stage we are the silent witness to the contents of our present experience. From the thoughts passing through our mind, the sensations of heat or cold, the inner feelings of joy or sadness and the objects we can see and hear etc.
The next stage we turn our attention inward to recognise exactly what is doing the silent witnessing, we turn awareness onto itself.

At the very heart of every experience is this open emptiness; the clear light of awareness. Check for yourself it’s here right now. Checking for yourself is the essence of self inquiry meditation. Don’t believe me or anyone else but please check for yourself.

When we look inside with a clear, steady focus, the mind we see is transparent, spacious, and open.
This union of a transparent emptiness and conscious awareness is what The Dalai Lama means when he says the heart of all meditation practice is innermost awareness. This union of emptiness and clarity is the fundamental base of all our experiences and a universal refuge for all people in the midst of an ever changing world.

This empty clear light of awareness is the ground of our being and our undeniable fundamental existential reality. In other words it’s your true self. That’s why mystics have used the technique of placing attention on the simple phrase ‘I am’ and also found this undeniable but mysteriously empty reality. It’s because of the boundless nature of awareness that people experience a connection with all things. A oneness or unity is a common experience amongst meditators and mystics of all cultures.

This ground of being is not only empty, clear and open it’s also conscious, aware and intelligent. That union is the essential nature of who you are. The union of emptiness and clarity.

The true nature of awareness and the conditions of the world are actually not separate at all it’s only language and concepts that separate the seamless wholeness of reality. So trying to integrate the nature of awareness and the conditions of the world is only a conceptual pointer to the already existing non dual reality. Therefore resting in your nature is simply resting in the ultimate truth. You are not separate from the beautiful mystery of existence; you are it.

It’s because the nature of awareness is already existing and the fundamental truth of our being it is sometimes simply called the natural state. All my meditations these days are aimed at resting in the natural state and it has brought incredible benefits; a sense of ease and flow and an ability to show loving kindness spontaneously.
This nature is your true unchanging identity and yet it cannot be pinned down or grasped intellectually. It’s especially important not to be satisfied with a conceptual understanding but to keep being mindful, looking within and continually deepen your direct experience of this essence of awareness. In fact whenever you do think you’ve “got it” let that go too and just go on resting in a non conceptual way into your own nature.

Resting as the nature of awareness is strengthened by the non conceptual knowledge discovered through inquiry. The sky like spaciousness discovered through inquiry is intuitively known to be unchanging and therefore not created. Because there is nothing you can do to create it you simply have to be it.
Simply rest within your own nature of awareness and you will soon discover its qualities of deep peace, creative energy, bliss and a radiance of love toward everyone in your/its presence.
Meditation is resting in a natural state.
Not doing anything.
Not getting anywhere.
I get familiar with abiding calmly in my own nature.
I discover there is nothing to find.
And nothing blocking me.
I simply am here.
Already free.

From Day 11 of The 21 Day Meditation Challenge