A Million Thoughts: Learn All About Meditation from a Himalayan Mystic

The second is a mild meditator, who holds one or two sessions of meditation in a span of 24 hours, generally at dawn and dusk. The length of an average session of meditation for a mild practitioner is between 30 minutes to an hour.

If you put things in perspective, you’ll realize that we spend over six hours in school for more than 12 years before we secure a place in a university. We spend another three or four years at the university to earn an undergraduate degree. After 16 years of continuous effort, we get a job that starts to provide a reward for our work. To earn that reward, however, we must work another eight hours at least five days a week.

When it comes to meditation, most people have unrealistic expectations. You can’t start earning within six months. Like any other field of study or practice, this too has a specific path that requires years of effort. The only good news is that if you practice routinely as a matter of discipline, you’ll start to see subtle changes in you within a span of six months.

The Extraordinary Path

Bill Gates once said, “I never took a day off in my twenties.” The extraordinary path is for those who have found their calling in meditation, or for those who can’t wait any longer to discover their own truth. These are the scholars who drop out of school and just go for it. It was the path of Buddha, Mahavira, Ramana Maharishi, Jesus Christ and even their disciples who dropped everything to serve their cause. Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, who was a householder, walked the extraordinary path because with each passing moment all he did was to immerse himself in the glories of the Goddess.

Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Issac Newton, Van Gogh – they all walked the extraordinary path in their respective fields. Nothing other than a single-minded pursuit of their vision (not necessarily goal) mattered to them. On the extraordinary path of meditation, there are two types of meditators: intense and keen.

An intense meditator is someone who holds an average of six sessions of meditation in a span of 24 hours and does so on a regular basis, minimum period being six months. Average session of such a meditator lasts between 60 and 90 minutes. Anything more than that is considered supremely intense.

A keen meditator is the one who meditates an average of four times in a span of 24 hours, each session lasting a minimum of one hour. A meditator who meditates unfailingly with this discipline for at least one year can be called a keen meditator and not just someone who does it for a few weeks.

This has been my own experience too, that, ultimately, if you are serious about experiencing the supreme bliss through meditation, sooner or later, you will have to intensify your practice.

You may ask, who has time to meditate for that long in this day and age? Just to give you some context, at the peak of my practice, for roughly seven months, I meditated for nearly 22 hours every day. Out of everything I had ever tried in my life, it was the most difficult and most exhausting endeavour I had ever undertaken. It was also the most rewarding, I may add. Naturally, I didn’t start putting in the long hours from the word go; rather, built it up over several years. Clear results come through according to the quality, duration and intensity of your practice.

From Ordinary to Extraordinary

Most of what I’ve stated above applies to the practice of concentrative meditation, the kind that requires you to sit down in a specific posture and build your concentration. As you know by now, this is not the only type of meditation. There are many other options. And this is where I share the incredibly powerful practice of a mindful day.

In the practice of a mindful day, you could realize the benefits of intense and keen meditators without actually leaving for the Himalayas. You can elevate your consciousness to a degree beyond imagination for the average mind, all the while holding your job and comforts. This is the only practice I know on the path of meditation that transforms an ordinary life into an extraordinary one. It is walking the ordinary path in the extraordinary way.

How to Do It Right

It’s very simple but it’s only with practice that you can perfect it. You don’t have to sit in any yogic posture. Instead, carry on with your normal routine. It’ll be like any other day but with one great difference – you’ll do everything, every little act, with utmost mindfulness.

When you get up in the morning and brush your teeth, do it mindfully. Watch how you wet your brush, put the toothpaste on and brush. Feel every single stroke, realize how peppermint bursts against your taste buds and how you feel this freshness in your mouth.