How to Meditate
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Recently, I one of my friends has been diagnosed with cancer
and he's only around 19 years old.
It occurred to me that we are all sufferring from cancer - the cancer of 
eventual death. And we could die anytime, not
necessarily grow old and die.  But what happens around us, we see people 
behaving like they're gonna live forever.

And I also see very sad cases amongst some colleagues.   
They're all past middle age, and some are close 
to retiring, but none of them have attained much spiritually - in terms of 
wisdom.  All still
have human failings, like anger, pride, ego, attachment.  And when, I see 
them, I see the same thing in myself. I , too, are just
like them.  I have spent valuable 41 years of my life and my spirituality 
is worse than 10 years ago - it has actually declined.

And I said to myself, I don't want to end up like these colleagues. All our 
wealth, position and possession, we cannot
carry beyond death, yet we waste so much valuable time getting upset over 
them. The things that really matter, we spend so 
little time on it, eg, self-awareness.  

We should try to discover our true self.
I also find that pain is a good teacher, especially physical pain, but 
not too much.
Too much pain may make the mind unbalanced.  But, a little pain, eg
headache, flu, body ache...  All these pain are excellent reminders that 
we are not the pain, that the pain is felt by the body.
Since we are not the body, the pain is not mine.  We can see this because 
we are separate from the body.  This leads me
to see that the awareness itself is self-sufficient, it does not need the 
body, nor objects - this realization is freedom.

My method of meditation is simple:

When experiencing pain, think:

Not my body, not my pain...


When experiencing anger, say:

Not my body, not my anger...

When experiencing any sensation, think:

Not my body, not my sensation...

others:

Not my thoughts..., not my upsets...., not my discomfort...,
Not my boredom..., not my ....


Another variation:

This body's pain,  this body's discomfort, this body's headache, this 
body's anger.....

Not mine, but this body's pain,  not my discomfort, but this body's

or,

This body is experiencing pain, but not my pain, not my body...



You can use any of the above,  or you can create your own. The important 
thing is that
it should make you dissociate your pure awareness from the object (pain, etc).

All of the above are mantras.
It always works for me. I don't know if it will work for you, since our 
minds are all different.


You will see that your body is as separate from you as your friend is a 
separate person from you.
But becoz your pure awareness can directly be aware of this body's pain, 
compassion to it 
automatically arises.

I believe that to be the beginning of all compassion.