In this week’s practice, meditation teacher Toby Sora will be walking through three different types of meditation and explaining that all techniques are in common.
Have you ever wondered why there are so many types of meditation practices, why some of them seem to contradict each other in their approach, style, and even objectively?
In today’s guided practice, meditation teacher Toby Sora will take you through three common types of meditation. It also explains why the word “meditation” is so similar to the word “sport” and why these different practices all share the same comprehensive purpose.
If you’re new to meditation or are interested in trying out a new approach, you’ll love this week’s practice.
Mindful Buffet: 3 types of meditation
Read and practice the guided meditation script below and pause after each paragraph. Or listen to audio practice.
As a meditation teacher, one of the most common questions I get is: Someone told me that meditation is focusing on your breath, but someone else would let go of me. What gives?
The answer to this question is simple. The word meditation is like the word sport. There are a variety of sports, and some even have contradictory rules. For example, in American soccer, you cannot touch the ball with your hands. But in basketball, you are. At the same time, there is a common thread that brings together all sports. It can be said that all sports develop a certain kind of physical fitness, flexibility and skills. Meditation is exactly the same. There are a wide variety of meditation techniques, some of which even have contradictory instructions. However, all meditation techniques develop the same core skills of focus, clarity and balance.
This meditation offers a quick tour of three very different meditation techniques to get a sense of what’s there.
To start, lengthen the spine. Relax your shoulders and arms. Pay attention to what you are listening in your environment. Maybe you’ll hear people talking in traffic, the wind, or nearby. Maybe you just listen to the silence. It’s all good. Pay attention to anything you hear.
This type of practice is an example of a family of meditation techniques that I call “notes and labeling.” When you focus and label your techniques, you choose one or several naturally occurring sensory experiences to focus and focus on distractions.
Pause the recording and give it extra time to practice this technique if necessary.
Then, intentionally recite and concentrate on the positive words or phrases. Think of positive words and phrases. Here are some examples. The name of a positive emotion may be compassion or gratitude. The affirmation may sound like I love you. Or I deserve love. A positive behavioral change statement will either go to the gym twice a week or go to bed at 10pm. These are just examples. Choose your favorite word or phrase. Once you’ve settled on the words or phrases, repeat it mentally over and over again. Please don’t say it out loud. Say it to yourself in your mind.
This practice is an example of a family of meditation techniques that I call “nurturing positive.” To cultivate positive practices, you don’t just pay attention to what happened, as you did in the first part of this guidance. Instead, you create positive thoughts and feelings that are intentionally focused. Keep focused on your phrase.
Pause the recording and give it extra time to practice this technique if necessary.
The third approach is to deliberately reduce all sorts of deliberate focus. Here you are not paying attention to anything, but you are relaxing and misaligning. If for any reason you notice your intention to pay attention, then drop that intention. Otherwise, there’s no need to do anything.
This is an example of a family of meditation techniques that I call “autofocus.” With autofocus practice, if you notice an intention to control your attention, you drop that intention. Otherwise, there’s no need to do anything. Your experience may be peaceful, but not particularly comfortable. You may not even seem to practice meditation at all, but no matter what happens, you are completely in the technique.
Pause the recording and give it extra time to practice this technique if necessary.
Note how different and even contradictory the three exercises are. In the first exercise, I purposely chose something to focus on, but didn’t try to change it. In the second exercise, I created something positive that will focus on. And in the third exercise we dropped all our intentions to control our attention.
This is why I say that the word meditation is like the word sport. There are a million different meditation techniques, many with contradictory instructions, but they all share a common thread of development of three core mental muscles: concentration, clarity and balance.
The word meditation is like the word sport. There are a million different meditation techniques, many with contradictory instructions, but they all share a common thread of development of three core mental muscles: concentration, clarity and balance.
When we close, here is the main takeaway I would like you to remember. If you’re obsessed with meditation, you’ll probably listen to all sorts of guidance. If you hear instructions that contradict what you’ve heard before, that’s not a problem. follow me. The teacher will simply guide you with unique techniques you have never encountered before. That’s not a big deal as all techniques develop the same core skills. Hopefully this will allow you to understand and learn a variety of meditation techniques. enjoy.
