The 'common sense' guide to meditation - Part 1

[Music] this conversation with John Butler is going to take a slightly different format although we are in the same venue they call parish church it's not so much a conversation as a walk through step by step beginner's guide to meditation or what we might call John butler's common sense guide to meditation and it's prompted by the comments on the YouTube channel by far the most requested content that you've been asking for is just such a simple guide for beginners so just to put it in context John before we get into this sort of ABCs perhaps I it from your own experience just just let's put it in context by asking what is the purpose of meditation at the school of meditation in London where I was first taught the practice where over 50 years ago now we were told this wasn't at the beginning mark you this after this was after we'd already been practicing for some time the aim of meditation is Union well I didn't know what that meant at all and I didn't to be honest care for the answer because there was a lot of things in life I didn't want to be unified with so I didn't pay much attention to the answer so if he doesn't make much sense to you who I wasn't worried what is the purpose of it well if I was to asking what you really really want deep down in your heart more than anything else I wonder what you dodged and thought everybody gives the same answer of course but if you just bear in mind what that answer would be for you it might point you in the right direction perhaps I'll come back to this later on well I can prompt you and spoiler alert it seems to me that there are two obvious responses to that obvious to us one is it's it's a good mental practice you know it's akin to mindfulness meditation is good for you what allowed whatever level you choose to take it the the other dimension is what you have already alluded to is more of it shall we say a spiritual union with with who or what makes the question there are many answers that one can give to this and I won't attempt to give one preference over the other but this approach that I'm going to introduce to you today is something that would be appropriate for almost everyone and I'm going to start with my old friend that you heard before please don't switch off with boredom keep your feet on the ground now I cannot stress too highly the importance of this first step the other day someone had come to meditate with me and rather an agitated person and I said to her keep your feet on the ground and she immediately launched into her next question you see she said I am I said keep your feet on the ground I hope you did well she said all right and what do you think of well like yeah you need a bit more than that so let me please bear with me patiently I'll come on to bigger things in a moment just seriously feel your feet on the ground wearing shoes wiggle your toes and just move your feet of it sure that you engage with the ground and feel the movement of your feet against the stillness of the ground now many people ask me how do you find stillness well this is a good start isn't because the ground is still so do it again just with your toes once again connect with the ground and become aware of the depth of stillness that is beneath our feet which supports us which bears us through all our trials and tribulations in sorrow and in joy is always there who sure help from the cradle to the grave without fail mother earth even if you're in a high-rise apartment doesn't matter the principles the same the floor beneath your feet of the ground or the naked earth beneath your feet is still at least in relation to the agitation which is such a feature of our of our minds newfies on the ground immediately it stabilizes you doesn't it it brings in some confidence sort of your feet on the ground and here no doubt you'll encounter the way the the problem with meditation is that when one has a simple requirement to keep your feet on the ground the mine finds it extraordinarily difficult for more than a few seconds to just do that off it dogs in some direction or what other what's it mean what's he asking me to do any fool can do this well it's quite true any fool can there's nothing complicated about meditation oh yeah so simplest league in the world so come on come back no if it's five seconds before let's try and do six or seven seconds which time shall we or even ten seconds some other people asked for a guided meditation well this is how it starts we have to we have to gradually bring this rocked a mind of ours under some sort of discipline we have to give it something to do and to start off with I'm gonna do that for ten seconds that's very good well done don't many people can do that first time and from the feet you might go to the bottom sitting on the chair and your hands the weight of your hands wherever they happen to be once again just try to hold your attention there for one second [Music] why six and maybe you already find that your mind is a little bit under control it's a bit quieter now and just stay with that and I'll introduce two more little ways of helping yourself the first is to look oh just look at what's in front of you and the furniture in the room look at the floor that is holding you so kindly just aware of your surroundings now most of your surroundings will probably be still but some of them will be moving a listers latter just look and note some are moving some are still but that even even than the moving bits are held by that same stillness that creation gets from Earth from which it rises and now I've introduced a third one which is listen now as I speak now there's quite a gale shaking the church in which we sit already quite a blustery day yet here where I sit with my feet on the ground just looking at that the furnishings of the church I could hear that's that movement of the wind in stillness now you could keep one finger at it we're connected with that stillness you'll then see that all the movement in the world comes to pass common sense tells us that it is self what is common sense just the commonest things that you have listening looking and feeling common sense and yet with simple simple common sense we can access some of the profoundest understandings of which we are capable let me take it a little bit further feet on the ground listen and look it really means being open doesn't it look if you're interested in higher knowledge or spirituality consciousness it comes from on high doesn't and here we are beneath it now imagine my hands were a bowl if the bowls turn that way the radiation of grace which is like spiritual sunshine beaming down upon us can't get in Kennan cuz I'm living under this bowl on dries we're a little broad brimmed hat which stops it getting in but if I just do that turn the bowl the other way up it becomes a receptacle doesn't it to receive and in this case we might say a receptacle for receiving the vibrations the radiation that comes from on high so supported and see how these simple basic techniques of a feeling seat on the ground listening and looking recently open our receptivity Delta to receive what is here they receive probably first of all the the wonder of the things around us because of those simple things are wonderful if we look at them with attention and then with more attention and then even more diligently so the very point of your pencil or your fingernails or sterling on the ground becomes a miracle if we played a garage there was something to one direct okay no you look oh you listen the more you feel more is opened up now true knowledge they say it's not something we read in books it comes by revelation who tells you that something's wonderful who shows you that something's beautiful moves you so deeply the tears come to your eyes behold what is revealed to you well that goes part of the way towards explaining what meditation is for it opens up something of what we may not have realized before it opens up a fullness of experience we may have simply miss why because you hadn't got to observe people at the street to see how few people are actually paying attention to where they are everybody is is I call it looking like bananas they're sort of bent over what you log what are they getting by what are they going to do ah dwelling on some some real or imagined misfortune but to be actually present as these listening looking and feeling brings want into the present to be present is actually one of the the most significant things we can do and even the glimpse of what it is to be present such as now using these three senses which you realize my god right where have I been all this time I've been absent of course and is this the whole human problem that we are not present we are absolutely absent from the wonderful well what do I mean by wonderful how far do you want to go who has ever thought the end of wonderful one have you thought of it like this one Oh any one full of one I see if we can take it a little bit further shall we how far does wonderful go Oscar silly question they say he's get silly often stuff but perhaps if you followed me this far you will get the sense that we are we are let's say approaching all day in the direction of the influence the infinite potential that is actually so readily available in the most ordinary humdrum situations if only we can just go through the simple basic procedure of common sense of coming into the present and opening our attention to whatever gifts from heaven well I won't try to teach you to run before you can walk maybe that's enough soda do you remember dear dear friends it's so simple it's as natural as breathing if you have a dog or a horse or a so adamant companion just look at how alive they are have they live in the present without all the problems that we fill our absent mindedness with present and absent am i present at this moment are you then we have something in common don't we so often human communication consists of two absent minded people in their separateness and how hard it is sometimes to get on with it there's a simple other thing I could say concerning knowledge just come back again feet on the floor bottom on the chair now there's a certain knowing about that isn't a certain knowing that this is real hello rather difficult to put a label on it we call anything real and whether they're real or not things appear to be real let's come back again feet on the ground and since that infinite presence which is actually a knowing and knowing that this way lies completion fulfillment perhaps all that one really really long haul whereas in contrast what we call worldly knowledge the sort of thing we learn at school they come from books you so often the bottomless pit of ever more ever yes true knowledge is knowledge one of that which is present and it's utterly simplest in fact you could say its simplicity itself you can't measure it can you but you know you don't need anyone to tell you thank you John you focused very clearly on our senses which is to some of us to me anyway a surprise because I I guess I would like many many many others perhaps think that meditation is about not focusing on the physical here and now that's on some otherworldly place you might want to comment on on that focus but secondly could you just touch on you you've not included in this common sense guide any reference to for example focus on the breathing or what we call a mantra I don't want you to go into that in detail but I'm sure our listeners would probably echo that and it might be helpful just to comment on it yes thank you yes well I get the wildered myself by the variety of hot goes into the general box called meditation these days but I learned fortunately there weren't so many methods available so I didn't have this awful choice I'm trying to choose [Music] yes it's a real minefield isn't it what can be the confusion well that's in a way is why I trust evermore simple common sense because really some of these approaches simply miss out these first basic steps and kind of fancy fancy of exotic spiritual language and and everything from candles to wearing special robes to go to India to find especially guru in a cave and all these other things and I very assure you this is sometimes I have dabbled in the good many of these things myself unfortunately eliminated them in the process and come back again to blessing common sense so please don't dismiss too easily what I say because it seems too simple I know we've all along for some high-minded something don't we wearing a special robe or something or sitting cross-legged or something well do those things if you really want to do it but don't forget 1300 your common sense yes mantras well there again it's a there's a great variety of the mantras on offer the core self a mantra can be useful if not essential the thing but I'm not going to launch into that I was taught from a tradition that that requires a one-to-one approach there's nothing written down that's how I receive it it endures how I pass it on and I'm not going to prejudice anybody's spiritual development by trying to explain to thousands of different minded people it he's always been advised to my knowledge by those who really wish to make a lifetime study of this subject to try to try to find a reputable teacher [Music] again if I had to choose among the great number that were offering it today I find it well nigh impossible so I wish you luck in your in your searches but I can give you perhaps the steadying voice for those that are that way inclined and have some faith you can't go wrong with the name of Jesus and for those who are not that way inclined well you can't do worse than stick to breathing which is a a joke tried and tested method which is helpful that's really as far as I'm good to say about mantras but um so many books written but for goodness sake using a common sense when you're choosing those who to follow for those interested in using the name of Jesus by the way there is a getting right back to the beginnings of the faith it's been used for 2,000 years there's a ancient Christian meditation called the Jesus proud and those that wish to research it could find that on the internet you'll get some very good instructions but please I beg of you don't forget your common sense who wants to train their salt it's also not going to get you nowhere a great point of meditation like this one of my favorite ways of describing uses his think was like on a cloudy day clouds are like thoughts are like clouds you see and and often on a cloudy day we just live under this mantle of cloud that we owe under his mantle of thought and we can't see anything beyond they just go from one thought to the next and people get in absolute despair about this especially if the thoughts are negative and doing mischief was they often do beside taking one away from be present because if we're thinking you're not present are you you're absolutely in the mind but order cloudy day what happens when you go to the airport and get in an aeroplane you go through the clouds don't you and what's there beyond the time this is a everyday miracle isn't it but beyond the clouds there's the clarity of the open sky now that's a very precise I think you bought an illustration of meditation which they would show and to do that you need an aeroplane well what in this case the practice of listening and looking and feeling your feet on the ground is in effect like an airplane it's it it's helping to focus your mind through the thinking process it's bringing you into the present into the present moment if you're in the present moment really present feeling your feet listening and looking you're not thinking are you no matter how persistent and dreadful your thought processes are fascinating goes after Pacific love wonderful fantasies we build up in our minds the wise things we can say we don't realize that we are fooling ourselves just as much as if they're sunk into a slough of depression a thought is only a thought and thought occupies a certain structure of consciousness and and and higher consciousness is beyond it just in the way the clear sky is beyond thinking beyond thought [Music]

Channel: Spiritual Unfoldment with John Butler

Views: 1,107,425

Rating: 4.8736277 out of 5

Keywords: John Butler, Bakewell, meditation, guide to meditation, organic farmer, mystic, awakening, self realisation, enlightenment, ASMR, incidental ASMR, spiritual awakening

Id: NJCUckX9s8M

Length: 34min 47sec (2087 seconds)

Published: Tue Oct 30 2018

Reddit Comments

[u/YOUREABOT]

Thank you for giving new insight into something I've been doing for 23 years. Definitely one of the best u've done. Just wanted to add that the way John describes meditation is similar to what one does when one practices Sat Nam Rasayan, a yogic healing technique. When one approaches meditation this way, one can heal others as well as oneself. One's presence becomes healing. Thank u, thank u.

[u/rhondevu]

I use this when I have panic attacks. Feeling the feet on the ground and listening to him is reassuring.

[u/dontforgetaboutme]

Oh my god, instantly love this, thanks so much for posting.