Listening requires entering actively and imaginatively into the other person's situation and trying to understand a frame of reference different from your own.
MEDITATION does not itself accomplish the tasks of life but provides spaciousness, bringing the great background near, so that whatever we do, rising in the quiet, has force and beauty. In meditation, we take time, sit down, watch, while the silence accumulates -- which is how the spirit gathers to a vessel the soul has prepared ... then, spiritual silence can appear in the midst of any concentrated activity. Meditation is a fasting of the heart in which, for a time, we do not go with our wanting and fear. We cease to attach so strongly to the things of our lives. When the heart fasts and we don't pursue the world, the world begins to come to us.
The silent mind, cultivated in many different forms of meditation, is the matrix of intuition. When you are in touch with the stillpoint at the center of your being there is no need to use imagery or verbal exercises to activate intuition. It flows by itself, unimpeded by fears or preoccupations.
From the brokenness of our humanity we can learn the healing and transcendent wisdom of self-acceptance and the non-judgmental acceptance of others. Meditation makes more sense to the broken or humbled parts of us than to the well-defended, successful or public poses that form the more assertive parts of our identity. Simple and pure awareness, without judgment or evaluation, such as we practice in meditation, is always compassionate.
The modality of my prayer has changed radically. In place of discursive meditation, I have begun the practice of sitting in silence, making myself a capacity for an outpouring of God's love. ... It is my experience that our awakening to the Sacred in the world of everyday is fed and nurtured by our silent journey to that "space" within where all things are ONE.
Mindfulness is meditation in action and involves a "be here now" approach that allows life to unfold without the limitation of prejudgment. It means being open to an awareness of the moment as it is and to what the moment could hold. It is a relaxed state of attentiveness to both the inner world of thoughts and feelings and the outer world of actions and perceptions.
~ from MINDING THE BODY, MENDING THE MIND by Joan Borysenko
Our task in meditation is to allow our unity to be restored and for our scattered parts to move back into their proper harmonious alignment to the center of our being. To do this we must not scatter ourselves further. We concentrate to move towards our center. When our consciousness truly awakens to that center, in silence, then a power is released which is the power of life, the power of the Spirit. In that power we are reformed, reunited, re-created.
"The mountains, the rivers, the whole earth, the entire array of phenomena are all oneself." If you can absorb the essence of this message, there are no activities outside of meditation: you dress in meditation and eat in meditation; you walk, stand, sit, and lie down in meditation; you experience joy, anger, sadness, and happiness in meditation.
I believe in the influence of silent and radiant people and I say to myself that such people are rare. They, nevertheless, give savor to the world. ...Nothing will be lost here so long as such people continue to exist. Let us wish that out of our meditation we might see in ourselves the beginnings of contemplation, which introduces us to the very heart of creation.
Contemplative life is the putting together of vision and action. Vision alone, meditation alone, is not true contemplation. We must put vision into action. Not just monks, but all of us are called to contemplation in this full sense. If we want to live healthy lives, we have to build into our daily life moments of vision, and let our actions be formed by that vision.
