I Am A Beginner To Meditation And I Am Looking For Some Help

[Clayton]

Hi everyone! For the past year, this goal has been sitting in the back of my mind, and yesterday I said you know what, I am going to make a commitment to meditating every day. After taking notes on Leo's "Meditation for Beginners," I have a few questions for anyone in the forum:

1. Do you think that I should start with the do-nothing technique or just keep it simple and be aware for 20 minutes?

2. Do you think that it is a bad idea to meditate in a noisy environment?

3. If someone were to interrupt me during my session, do you think that I should start over or just continue from where I left off?

4. Is there anything else that I should know about meditating? Anything that you wish you knew when you started?

Edited June 29, 2016 by Clayton

[Dragallur]

Hi,
good you want to start it the first place!
1) This entirely depends on you, I personally do the "do nothing method, simplest meditation possible" and I think it is good to start with.
2) Depends probably on you again, I would not choose environment where people would talk to me but park in town could be quite ok with some cyclists around or so.
3) I wondered this one too. Try to keep the conservation radically short (Friend even made me a card: "do not disturb") then, well if you feel as though the session was "killed" by this conservation and that you want to do it whole in one run, do so.. but when you will meditate for 60 minutes at some point and 1 minute before end someone would interrupt you, it would not really change much I think to continue with one minute, not 60. The important thing is the long run, so you do not want to be disturbed often.
4) Be completely sure that you will do it always, even if your close one die, do it... Otherwise also enjoy it as much as possible, you will find out after some point that meditation is good, very good! Also even if you do not want to so much, try out at least one more technique, you may find surprising when one is better for you than another.
 

[Leo Gura]

@Dragallur Do NOT be having conversations in the middle of meditation! What nonsense is this?

When you meditate, people around you should know not to approach you. If not, make it known! And be strict about it. Treat meditation like it's the most important aspect of your life.

[Dragallur]

3 hours ago, Leo Gura said:

Do NOT be having conversations in the middle of meditation! What nonsense is this?

Thanks for correcting me Leo, I will do as you advise  

[TSH Chris]

16 hours ago, Clayton said:

1. Do you think that I should start with the do-nothing technique or just keep it simple and be aware for 20 minutes? Either

2. Do you think that it is a bad idea to meditate in a noisy environment? Define noisy! Factory probably not good idea, light traffic is okay for me.

3. If someone were to interrupt me during my session, do you think that I should start over or just continue from where I left off? Continue. Observe your reaction to an interruption. I let people know I am about to meditate but it does not bother me if I get interrupted (it used to though!).

4. Is there anything else that I should know about meditating? Anything that you wish you knew when you started? Don't expect anything. Thoughts are fine (just observe they come without judging). There is no target. 

Just my opinions. Different for everybody.

[charlie2dogs]

16 hours ago, Clayton said:

Hi everyone! For the past year, this goal has been sitting in the back of my mind, and yesterday I said you know what, I am going to make a commitment to meditating every day. After taking notes on Leo's "Meditation for Beginners," I have a few questions for anyone in the forum:

1. Do you think that I should start with the do-nothing technique or just keep it simple and be aware for 20 minutes?

2. Do you think that it is a bad idea to meditate in a noisy environment?

3. If someone were to interrupt me during my session, do you think that I should start over or just continue from where I left off?

4. Is there anything else that I should know about meditating? Anything that you wish you knew when you started?

many times i have said this here,  forget about a practice of meditation, for most it goes no place, instead do this and dont make it a practice, just do it, and often.    be still and quiet and experience the life force within you deeper and deeper, you will awaken a master in there, work at functioning in the present moment and i mean in a real way, completely present, completely aware, until there is nothing but the moment, that will take you to the deeper part of yourself,  and this can only happen if there is enough desire present within your for liberation from the human identity and its issues.  if your desire for liberation is not sufficient to take you there, then practice meditation and do personal growth work until you are ready for real liberation.

[Clayton]

Thank you all for the help! I am combining all of the tips in this thread and from Leo's videos to create the best meditation experience that I possibly can! The first technique that I am trying is do nothing, and there are plenty of workarounds that I have for meditating in a quiet environment (sometimes my family is loud). 

[Zephyr]

On June 29, 2016 at 0:16 PM, Clayton said:

 

4. Is there anything else that I should know about meditating? Anything that you wish you knew when you started?

If I can go back in time I would tell myself not to think of meditation as a doing as it is more about feeling rather than something you 'do' 

I would tell myself to stop thinking too much about "wow, can't wait till meditation will give me results X and Y." "I've meditated for 30 days straight 20 minutes a day. Where are my results?"

 

What meditation means to me now is just being mindful. I wash dishes slowly. I wash the car slowly. To go deeper, you actually might want to stop moving physically and sit down. From personal experience it is way easier to be mindful of thoughts flowing while sitting physically still. Though laying down can be distracting. Also have something to lean back on. Talking to someone? I tried talking, you almost have to talk really really slow. It's just too distracting. I'd say don't talk to anybody while meditating. 

[diamondpenguin]

Yea. You need to isolate yourself. Cant on the family coach in the middle of a gathering.