Let us Chant – A Way for Active Meditation

Meditation

Meditation is the process to calm our mind and remove all unwanted thoughts from it. According to Law of Attraction, when we have positive thoughts, we attract positive things into our lives. Having negative thoughts attracts negative or unpleasant things and experiences in our physical manifestation. And of course, we do not want any negative or unpleasant things or experiences!

Hence, Meditation is the answer to calm our minds and stop our minds from moving towards the negative train of thoughts. In general, when we Meditate, we will remove the negative thoughts from our mind. We are then left with less time to go back to the negative place and with so much more positive thoughts that we do not stray to the negative thoughts even more.

Different forms of Meditation

Whenever we think of Meditation, we think of sitting silently in a pose. This is the simple form of meditation or the most famous form of meditation.

In the simplest form of meditation, you need to find a quiet environment and sit there comfortably. You need to close your eyes and then focus on something simple. You can focus on some noise in your surrounding like the sound of the fan or AC, some sentence or word in your mind, some visual in your mind or a random positive thought. You need to keep focusing on the same and ensure that while you are focusing, no other thought enters your mind.

This is however a very difficult task for people like myself. I have thousands of thoughts in my mind running wild, every moment and sever second. These thoughts are not necessarily positive or negative but out of curiosity. It is even more difficult to silence the mind of these curious thoughts. This is where we consider methods of Active Meditation.

Active Meditation is the same as simple form of Meditation in essence and yet different in process. The end result is to come to a place where the mind is free of negative thoughts but instead of driving the negative thoughts away, in Active Meditation, we fill our minds with several positive thoughts. The idea is to make sure to fill our minds with a positive thoughts so much that there is no space available for anything negative.

There are several ways that you can use to practice Active Meditation. For example, working with complex art designs such as Mandala designs. While one is busy working on the design, there is a very less likely chance of getting any negative thought in the mind. Thus even when the creator is exhausted after creating the piece of art, they are left with a very positive feeling.

Similarly, chanting is another way.

Chanting

Chanting is another Active Meditation Technique. It is something that is very dear and close to me. I came across chanting in 2010 and it has impacted my life greatly ever since.

The first thing we need for chanting is again an environment where you can comfortably sit. Now, I have tried to do this while walking or lying down and it does not work for me. If you are able to achieve desired results, then it is your choice to choose the way you would want to proceed.

The second thing we need is some word or a mantra that you want to repeat or chant. It can be name of a God that you believe in; it could be a positive affirmation or it could even be a song that makes you hopeful.

Finally, we just need to sit down and play the word or the mantra over and over again. Initially I would suggest to have a recorded version available for you to listen as you have to still do the task of getting involved with the word. Once you start hearing the chant, keep repeating it. You may want to repeat it loudly (if it is fine with everyone around you) or you can simply keep repeating it in your mind. But now this is your point of focus. You need to ensure that every time you repeat the chant, you are focused on each and every word of it. Slowly as you practice it for longer period, you will start feeling positive and the power of the chant. This is when you need to choose to focus on the feeling rather than the words alone. After some practice, you would be experienced enough to say the words yourself to come in the positive feeling place from where you start.

Repeating this practice every day for a couple of minutes helps you stay positive. Now the amount of time that you need to practice Active Meditation or chanting is depending on a couple of things. Foremost, the point when you start feeling positive or come in the positive feeling zone, that is the time when your meditation starts. It is then suggested that you stay in the same positive feeling or the positive zone for at least 10 minutes every day. If the time allows you, feel free to stay for more duration.

There are two important things here. Foremost you need to meditate for the time it takes for the positive feeling to fill you completely. It starts with a positive feeling in your but as long as you continue to meditate, the feeling will grow and become a great force that will take control of you. It will become a force strong enough to make you move. You would feel your breath being cool and your mind becoming wider and more accepting of new and fresh ideas and positives of life. Then, the idea is not to meditate for 60 mins on one day but to be consistent. Even if you get only 10 minutes to practice, but do practice everyday, consistently.

Recommendations

There is no correct or incorrect way to meditate. Something that helps you relax, rejuvenate and connect with the positive force within you – is your meditation. It could be a complex activity such as walking, playing sports, practicing music or just staring at a blank wall. Never let your path or your way be defined by anyone else. For my personal meditations, I listen to Krishna Das (popularly known as KD) chants. He has a wonderful voice and takes religious mantras and creates small chants with them. He adds in music. His music and voice is soothing. It has such a calming effect on me. He also increases the pace of his chants as you go along, allowing the positive energy to grow slowly and then rapidly as you go deeper in the meditation.

I am also writing this post (or started writing this post) on Krishna Das’s birthday, as a tribute to him and as a token of gratitude for so much I have gained from his chants.

If you have a problem like me (uncontrollable mind) or you tend to explore further, I do suggest you to listen to his chants. Here is one of my absolute favorites.