There are many forms of meditation. Some involve mantra recitation, some staring at an outside object such as a Buddha/Deity, some involve directing your awareness in a formulated manner. Meditation of calm abiding stated here is quite different to these other forms of meditation. The practice stated here is simply "SIT, BREATHE, RELAX" is designed to bring your body and mind into full harmony, to quieten the mind naturally over time, through repeated practice and not using any kind of force, and to improve and deepen your level of concentration. This form of meditation is for any one who seek to become less stressful in the modern day lifestyle and to help them accomplish more in their daily jobs and careers without the need to identify with any brand of "ism".
It is the gate through which you gain the solid basis of a calm, stable, concentrated bodymind able to further investigate the reality in which you live (internally and externally).
Once seated in a quiet place, upright and comfortable take a few deep breaths to centre yourself and start quieting yourself. The core of the practice are:
i) Breathing and Relaxing.
ii) Let thoughts be. Let them pass. Do not cling.
iii) Always return to the sensations in the body as you breathe and calming the body as you breathe.
iv) How much you benefit from this practice is deeply correlated to the time you invest in it.
Summary of the practice:
Sit comfortably: spine erect but comfortable, a sense of being awake and aware.
Breathe in and out naturally: paying attention to your bodily sensations and calming bodily tensions.
Let thoughts be: without following them and without suppressing them.
When you find you have got caught on the "thought-train" return awareness to bodily sensations and calming the body: do so without guilt.
Remain aware and awake: if you feel sleepy it is often because your body posture has leant forward and your breathing become shallow.
Try and find as much time in the day as you can practically find to undertake this practice and undertake the practice on a daily basis.
Science researched that the practice has a solid foundation identified in neuro-physiology. Neuro-Physiology is at work behind the scenes. Scientific research has begun to document these quite widely:
"In this modern world we are trained from an early age to identify with our intellect and thinking. We all, to a greater or lesser extent, "live in our heads". The furniture we use, the ways we use it and the habits of body and mind we accumulate add to this imbalance. This practice of paying attention to bodily sensations as we breathe in and out, and calming the body as we do so, whilst learning not to identify with thoughts has a strong backing in Neuro-Physiology.
One of the most important features and reasons for the success of the practice is that it re-embodies us: that is to say that it reconnects our body and mind - our bodymind.
The brain has twelve pairs of nerves that enter directly into the brainstem bypassing the spinal cord. Most of these nerves serve functions in the head and face: smell, hearing, sight, etc. The tenth "Cranial" nerve, the Vagus nerve or "wanderer", exits the skull through the Jugular foramen, a hole in the base of the skull. It is one of only two of these pairs of Cranial nerves that enters the body.
The Vagus nerve has branches that connect to the ears and larynx and it plays a significant role in speech and language comprehension through these. It then travels down the neck inside the back of the throat and enters the chest cavity. It provides feedback to the brain from the lungs and heart including blood pressure, oxygen and carbon dioxide content of the blood (via the Aortic receptors). The Vagus also provides feedback to the brain from all the internal bodily organs in our abdomen and plays a pivotal role in controlling the stomach and the pancreas. It has strong links to all of the main nerve plexuses (groups of nerves like mini-brains) in the body.
It is clear to see that with connections to language and thinking (through the branches to the ears and larynx), breathing and heart (including bodily stress-levels) through the branches to the lungs, heart and Aortic receptors, emotions and feelings which actually arise in the body when we become aware (through the strong links to abdominal organs and especially stomach - hence the expressions such as "gut feelings"), that the Vagus nerve is the information super-highway that links body and mind into one: bodymind, that links the physical to the intellectual through it's expression of feeling, animal instinct and involvement of language.
This practice revitalises and fully activates the Vagus nerve in a very direct manner. It is the principal Neuro-Physiological mechanism through which the practice works due to the nerve's connections to the functions the practice changes: bodily and mental stress levels (or level of calm), thinking, awareness of the bodymind as one connected entity - as opposed to the sense of the body being separate from the mind. Additionally, and over time, many other positive changes will occur to brain function and Neuro-Chemistry as a result of this practice."
