Buddhist Schools

What are the Nature of Meditation in the Buddhist traditions and why it is Important?

2500 years ago in India Buddhism began and till date in the East it is the most dominant religion. Worldwide, Buddhism has over 360 million followers. In USA solely one can find over one million Buddhist followers. The concept of Buddhism has influenced even the western cultures of the world through its teachings in distinct areas such as in meditation practices. Buddhism promotes the belief of non violence. In 500 BCE in India there was an Indian price and his name was Gautama. The young price was in internal turmoil to see the sufferings of the life outside the walls of the palace he lived in. He went out to seek answer to many questions he had about life. He succeeded in finding the answers and preached his teachings f or the rest of his life (Gethin, 2015).

There are many forms   of Buddhism. Some believers believe in deity worships while others believe on rituals. There are many schools of thought but the main teachings of all the different schools of thought remains to be the same and that is ending life’s sufferings and ending the rebirth cycle of life. After Gautama Buddha died eighteen different schools of Buddhism emerged. All of them were different representations of Buddhist teachings. Slowly with time all these different schools were merged into two primary schools- Theravada and Mahayana (K and Thera, 2005).

Theravada school- As per this school of Buddhist teaching the potentials inside a person to attain Buddha hood can be unleashed only through effort and hard work.

Mahayana school – The Mahayana Buddhism considered every individual possess the potential inside themselves to attain Buddha hood. Hence they must seek towards salvation using Superior beings known as Bodhisattvas.

People are often having the misconception that a spiritual life is one which exists somewhere in the sky. Our daily life is just mundane manifestations of our own selves. Many people also think that to be spiritual one has to leave their normal Earthly life and be alone somewhere away from friends and family. There cannot be anything more wrong than this concept. To be spiritual mean to be kind and to be a humble human being, to be kind to one’s own self and to others as well. The question is how can one cultivate kindness in their heart? Just saying the self to be kinder does not always work out properly. For developing this kind of a thought process meditation is recommended. This is also known as deep thinking in Buddhism. The teachings ask people that when they wake up they should start a deep thinking habit. Such a meditation practice must be done before leaving the bed when one has just woke up and the mind is empty of any worldly thoughts (Chodron, 2013).                                                  

Meditation Mindfulness

Meditation

Meditation is a course of action of the mind and the body which is used by an individual for separating themselves from their feelings and thoughts and emptying themselves to increase self awareness. Meditation not necessarily has a religious element associated with it. It is a human activity which at times is used as a therapy for ensuring good health and improving the human immune system. A person who successfully meditates will not think or judge everything which comes across. They will just be in peace and awareness and will believe in living in the present. Meditation is an integral part of Buddhism. But, one who is meditating in Buddhism is not trying to contact the Divine. In Buddhism a human has duality inside them as they have a mind and a body. Uniting these two elements for gaining eternal peace of mind is meditation (Anonymous, 2009).

Theories of Meditation Techniques Researched

All the different forms of meditation require the individual to sit straight up erect.  In such a posture the best results are beloved to be achieved. Different theories of meditation helps people in curing varied kind of problems. The aim of all these theories are however the same. The achievement of peace and internal happiness is the main aim of all meditation styles.

Zazen or Zen Meditation –The term “Zazen” means a form of “seated zen” or meditation in the sitting form. This form of meditation practice originates back from the Chinese form of Zen Buddhism. Indian monk named Bodhidharma from 6^th century CE can be the traced to be the source of this form of Buddhism. Generally, in this form of meditation the individual sits over a mat or a cushion on the floor by crossing the legs. Also it was conventionally called as the lotus or the half lotus posture. Today people also practice this on chair.  The most significant element of this posture is sitting straight so the back is absolutely straight (Shaw, 2016). Eyes are kept lowered and mouth closed and one looks at the ground two to three feet distance on the floor.

Vipassana- This form of meditation comes from Pali and the word “Vipassana” means clear vision. This is another conventional Buddhist practice coming from the Theravada school of Buddhist traditions. Vipassana meditation involves two stages. The first stage is where an individual meditates and tries to stabilize the mind on one point. This makes considerable improvement on the concentration level of the individual. In the second stage the meditating person clearly sees with closed eyes every sense in every parts of the body. It is as if the mind is focusing from one cell of the body to another without resting on any particular point (Chen, 2014).

Literature Review

Mindfulness Meditation

This is a mix of the conventional meditation practices of Buddhism and other styles such as Vietnamese Buddhism Zen meditation practices. Mindfulness while breathing in and out during meditation is the primary focus area of this type of meditation practice. This meditation is also a part of the Vipassana style of meditation in Buddhist traditions. The primary focus area is the present time and not being judgmental to thoughts, feelings and senses forms important elements of mindfulness meditation (Neale, 2006).

Metta or the Loving Kindness Meditation

Metta means love, kindness, humility, goodwill and benevolence in Pali language. The Tibetan and the Theravada school of Buddhist traditions started this form of meditation style. Here the main focus is to increase the gesture of empathizing with others, positive emotional development, development of compassion involving positive and loving approach to one’s own self as well (Liveware, 2015).

Benefits of Meditation

There are endless benefits to mediation practices. For the purpose of simplified understanding the long list is bifurcated into physiological benefits, psychological benefits and spiritual benefits (Horowitz, 2016). There has been a lot of research about the various advantages meditation causes to the human mind and body. Although this is a very ancient form of practice today it is fast becoming a scientific process which proves that with mindfulness while meditating people can create significant impact even on their brains just the way that can on their bodies (Corliss, 2014).

Increased levels of concentration – Meditation can effectively improve the level of attentiveness, concentration or focus in individuals. Amongst all the techniques used for improving concentration meditation is the most effective one. Meditation has an impact on improving the energy level of the body. While meditating the body and mind gets connected with the energy power source which in turn helps the person do a lot of multitasking with the same focus. Using holy beads while meditating is one great technique which helps neutralizing all blockages which occurs in the energy level of human begins. Concentration levels are not just enhanced with intensive meditation but it is sustained, enhanced, focused and well directed.

A natural stress buster – Complexities of modern life has made everyone stressed. Such stress is in fact increasing at a fast rate. It can lead to many health problems and affect people physically. Stress can cause mental and physical illness both. Meditation has been witnessed to be having a great deal of psychological effect. It has an effect on the stress, depressions, anxiety, restlessness and pain of the human body. With regular meditation practice one can become emotionally stabilized. Negative thoughts can be kept far as meditation helps the human brain to focus on positives only. To reduce stress there cannot be any better solution than meditation

Theories of Meditation Techniques Researched

Helps break away from unhealthy habits – Fastness of the modern life makes people develop many unhealthy habits on a daily basis. Eating junk food is one such example. People are aware its health impacts but still do not have the conviction to change their unhealthy habits. By practicing meditation one can quit such unhealthy habits very easily. This is because with regular meditation practice it is believed that one will be able to detach oneself from the emotional attachments associated with the practice of any unhealthy habit. This sense of freedom is heavenly and will help one be determined to break away from every kind of unhealthy habit one has nurtured since years.

Helps improving decision making and critical thinking- The power of the human brain can be enhanced with meditation. Numerous research studies showcase that people who are engaged in practicing mindful meditation on a daily basis tend to be having better memories. They seem to be reasoning much better than others. The cognitive functioning of the human brain is made more efficient through meditation. Meditation focuses on better breathing techniques which enables more amount of pure oxygen to go inside the human system. As a result the brain performs much better. So, when frustrating situations come cross the brain remains calm and takes the best suitable decisions.

Meditation improves interaction with the self- One can attain a much better level of awareness and consciousness if they can connect with their own self better. But today in the hectic fast modern world seldom do we interact with our own selves. Meditation practice helps one to become more aware of their own self.  One is aware about the presence of the mind and the body. One is also aware what kind of cravings and urges one has and what one must do to reduce it. Meditation helps understanding the self first. When one is absolutely aware about their own strength and weakness one can make better choices in life (Healthproblog, 2016).

Stable emotions –Unstable emotions can cause deadly outcomes. People can loose relationships, respect and even jobs if they indulge into emotional outburst every now and then. Such emotional instability is caused by the stress in the physical and psychological aspect of the human body.  All these are connected together. With regular meditation practices one can experience an enhancement in their positive mood. The mind becomes strong to face sensitive unwanted situations.

Zazen or Zen Meditation

Interpretation

Mindfulness essentially means to be complete aware of something. In relation to meditation mindful meditation is a total awareness of the human body and mind. It can be interpreted from the above research made of meditation that there are no religious elements associated with meditation. Such meditation practice makes an individual focus more on the present real moment and makes people engage with their current senses to come up with solution of various questions or problems. Mindful meditation erases automatic reactions from the human system. It also is found to be having positive impact on human habits, auto cognitive reactions of the brain, biases etc. There are endless evidences in the literature which shows how meditation has helped individuals heal. This genre of breathing techniques and mind exercise helps bringing a control over the unconscious brain as well.

The unconscious human brain makes beliefs about others and surroundings. Based on this a reaction is created inside every individual which makes them act or not act.  Based on such actions or inactions an entire life is formed.  Such kind of biasness of the human brain can be erased off completely through meditation.  Hence the entire perception one has over other things changes. This gives a new perspective to look at things or at people. Hence the reactions made are different.  Today varied forms of meditation practices are fast gaining importance. This which was once used as a self help technique today is used all over the world as psychological therapeutic purposes. Such enormous use of meditation would not have possible had there not been any positive outcome received from the entire effort. Hence there is definitely a scientific interpretation of the same on curing so many ailments of the human mind and the body.

Methodological Reflection

Secondary data sources such as journals, books and published websites has been used to gather data in the above essay. Researches made by other researches on the subject were also referred to.

Critical Interpretation

As per this research made what is found mainly is that meditation is helpful to individuals on a therapeutic perspective. All the different schools of Buddhism confirm it. The world today is the biggest practitioner of meditation as a means of well begins. But of late there has been critical thought process being developed in many such communities which practices meditation. There is one group of critiques which believes that the link between Buddhism and mindfulness is broken and hence performing such kind of meditation can prove to be dangerous to the mind and the body.  There is another critical acclaim made that meditation has become so outrageously popular that a misconception has prevailed in the world that Buddhism is not existing anymore. Out of these two the second one is the main reason for undergoing this present research.

Vipassna

Pierce Salguero a Buddhist scholar primarily associated with meditation in a guest blog post in a website Patheos.com discusses this in details. He has a Phd in History of Medicine from the Hopkins School of Medicine. He has huge interest in researching and analyzing exchange of ideas in medicine in different cultures. As per Perce Saguaro that in all the readings of historical Buddhist documentations on health of humans and well being little mention has been, made about meditation.  Moreover when he studied in Asia or temples in USA which were Buddhist temples even there he found that meditation was not a very prominent features of Buddhism (Whitaker, 2017). It all began in the19th century. Colonial era along with its various reforms, policies and sensibilities gave rise to meditation. Very little in the world is said about Buddhism and meditation as an integral approach. Mindful meditation  is nothing but helping an individual shift away his focus from problems to their inner self and make their inside strong enough to combat the outwardly concerns.

Conclusion

The end question remains to be same that why then people must practice meditation. Many people end of the day prefers meditation or starts their days meditating as they receive beneficial effects by practicing it daily. The critiques have eliminated the reasons why one must meditate. In front of a religious criticism saying that mediation has helped remove stress is an outrageous comment.  Buddhism teaches people to be at the present moment and perceive it as a source of light to enlighten their lives. If people can see meditation as that same source of life then the question of such criticism erases away.

Buddhism faces similar problems which Islam or Christianity experiences. Whatever is known to the humans about these religions are from human sources. Moreover the writings and scriptures on these studies made in the earliest times had many contradictions in themselves.  Many of the teachings, beliefs and practices are transmitted orally from teachers or older generations to students of younger generation. Connecting meditation with Buddhism goes back to these transmitted messages passed on from one generation to another. There is no written documentation that specifies that to perform Buddhism one must be an avid practitioner of meditations.

References

Anonymous. (2009). Meditation. Available: https://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/buddhism/customs/meditation_1.shtml. Last accessed 9th August 2017.

Chodron, V. T. (2013). Practicing Buddhism in daily life. Available: https://thubtenchodron.org/2013/09/everyday-dharma/. Last accessed 9th August 2017.

Chen, T (2014). The Fundamentals of Meditation Practice. London: Buddha Dharma Education Association Inc.p182.

Corliss, J. (2014). Mindfulness meditation may ease anxiety, mental stress. Available: https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/mindfulness-meditation-may-ease-anxiety-mental-stress-201401086967. Last accessed 10th August 2017.

Gethin, R (2015). On the Practice of Buddhist Meditation. India: Sage Publication. p22.

Horowitz, S. (2016). Health Benefits of Meditation. ALTERNATIVE AND COMPLEMENTARY THERAPIES . 16 (4), p30-35.

Healthproblog. (2016). Benefits of Meditation. Available: https://www.healthproblog.com/2016/10/14/meditation-benefits-for-health-mental-growth/. Last accessed 10th August 2017.

K, V and Thera, S. (2005). Two Main Schools of Buddhism . Available: https://www.budsas.org/ebud/whatbudbeliev/59.htm. Last accessed 9th August 2017.

Liveware. (2015). Types of Meditation. Available: https://www.southernct.edu/counseling-services/Week%201%20Types-of-Meditation-LiveAndDare.com_.pdf. Last accessed 9th August 2017.

Neale, M. I (2006). MINDFULNESS MEDITATION. California: Pearson Education. p30.

Shaw, S (2016). BUDDHIST MEDITATION. UK: Routledge. p200-256.

Whitaker, J. (2017). A Roundup of Critical Perspectives on Meditation. Available: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/americanbuddhist/2017/05/a-roundup-of-critical-perspectives-on-meditation.html. Last accessed 9th August 2017.