Podcast 3: Using Visualization To Achieve Deep Rest 177545
Podcast 3 Using Visualization To Come To Deep Restbeing Willing To R
Podcast 3: Using Visualization to come to Deep Rest Being willing to rest, to stop seeking is a simple process but it is not necessarily easy. And our culture and the popular mindset can often misguide us. How to simply learn to trust and be open to a deepening silence? How to stay focused when one's mind seems to be caught in spinning unhelpful stories and your mind acts like an echo chamber? There are an infinite number of ways and there aren't any one-size fits all templates.
We each have to find our own way. But if one is a beginner, or one wishes to have a set practice they can use to help in times when it is tough sitting in patient waiting, a common practice of imaginative visualization based on our memory can help. Preparing for this practice: Spend some time recalling people from your childhood that you enjoyed spending time with. Recall people who made you smile. You just felt good to be in their presence.
It can be a favorite relative, a teacher, or even a pet. It can be multiple people. But the important thing is to remember just that moment or moments of feeling joy at being in their presence. It need not be a holy person, nor should it be someone you think you SHOULD like. It can be a person currently in your life or someone who no longer is in your life.
It is just a person that brought that feeling up inside you and that their memory is one that makes you smile when you think of them. These persons are your personal benefactors. Begin the Meditation: Sit in quiet bringing to mind your benefactors: the people or pets that evoke the feeling of deep enjoyment. Try to recall in your mind's eye, what this person or pet looked like. Make it as real as you can recall and imagine.
Sit in the presence of that person you call to mind and rest in the enjoyment of being with this person or pet. For a few moments, sit in a relaxed position, breathe deeply and slowly and imagine that you are sitting in the same room with this person. Imagine them looking at you and smiling. Smile back. Notice the deep feeling of contentment and well-being as you look at this person and see them smiling at you.
Rest in that feeling. If the feeling begins to fade or not feel intense, bring your imagination to focus deeply on their face again. Look into their eyes. Recall the feeling. Allow your body to rest and relax.
Do this visualization for at least 5-10 minutes every day. Try to spend some part of your time every day sitting and resting in the joy of being in this person's presence. You may notice over time that you begin to recall faces of persons from long ago that you forgot of people who gave you great joy. Allow these faces to be in front of your eyes as the days go on. Be grateful for these people and/or animals that gave you the gift of their presence in the past.
Part Two of Visualization Practice: We are recovering the memory of people (or pets) that brought us great joy as a child. They made us smile just by being with us. We aren't manufacturing feelings that are not true. We are not trying to feel joy or anything. We are just recalling the presence of someone in the past who gave us great joy. We are remembering something true and profound. There should be no faking or struggling to feel something for someone. In the beginning, we may not be able to remember anyone and we can sit in quiet trying to recall a time of joy of being in someone's presence. Eventually, a face will appear to us at its own pace. No need to worry or stress if no faces appear at first.
The memory will come. It is important to realize now that the person or pet who we remember as giving us great joy was deeply loving us. That presence, even if it was just brief and only once, caused us joy because in a simple way they were declaring their love for us. It is time to remind ourselves of this. So return to your relaxed position. Take a few deep slow breaths and then turn your attention to the person(s) or pet you remember that gave you joy just because you were in their presence. Recall their face. Allow yourself to feel the contentment and joy of being in their presence. Now imagine them saying to you, "I wish you nothing but complete joy and well-being. You are truly loved." Imagine them sending this love to you and allow yourself to receive it.
It doesn't matter if you think you deserve it or not. Allow them to send you love. See them smiling at you and feel their love. If it helps, imagine rays of light or warmth traveling from them to you and bathing you in a healing embrace. Let yourself be held in this love. After a while, see if you can recall other faces of people over the years that also spark this same feeling in you. Imagine that now gathered in front of you there is a group of ones who have loved you. Imagine them speaking words of love and sending their wishes to you. Hear them speak your name gently and then the words: "You are loved. We wish nothing but deepest fulfillment and joy for you." If you are a practicing Christian or interested in trying this, you can add “spiritual benefactors”—see Christ, Mary, angels, a saint you have a devotion to— all manner of holy peoples appear with your group of loved ones.
See Christ looking at you. Hear Him say: "My child, I love you deeply. I sent these ones to love you on my behalf. I only wish you complete joy and the deepest fulfillment of who you are created to be." If you are another religion – you can add spiritual benefactors from your tradition, like Yahweh, Allah, or the Dalai Lama, or the Hindu God Krishna or Vishnu and receive the love they radiate to you. Feel the warm embrace of that love as if you were bathing in the sun on a beautiful spring day. If at any point the feeling and the sense of that loving presence fades or if your mind begins to wander, focus precisely on one of the faces of the people you remember loving you and feel the power of their presence surge into you again.
After a while, slowly let the visualization dissolve. Watch the loved ones gently disappear from view. And now for a few moments just sit in quiet. Sit still, breathe deep, and rest in quiet attention. Just be here at rest. Try to do this entire visualization for at least 5-10 minutes and see if you can build your time up to about 15-20 minutes of visualization and rest. Notice that as the days go on, more and more people who have offered you love—even if it was briefly—like strangers smiling at you on the street, a person who holds the door, or goes out of their way to be helpful. Notice the small acts of kindness and friendship in various places and times even among strangers. Notice that there are people wishing each other well-being and joy quite often. Notice those moments!
Part Three of Visualization Practice: This is the last stage in the beginning exercise. Do the above exercises. After a few moments, imagine the group of benefactors merging together and turning into a ball of light. Let that light of love send its rays on to you. Bathe in the light as if sunbathing. Let the light shower you completely. Allow yourself to keep remembering this embodied love as the rays of light shine on you. In a little while, imagine that ball of light gently moving towards you and entering your heart. As your heart beats, feel the embodied love flow out from your heart. It's as if your own heart now has the voice of the benefactors calling your name and then saying: May you have deepest joy, peace, and well-being for you are truly loved. Slowly, dissolve the visualization. Let the light in your heart fade. Notice that the feeling of love remains. Rest in it.
Sit in quiet attention breathing deeply and slowly. Drop all frames of reference. Just enjoy being at rest. After listening to Podcast Two: A Journey Within, spend some time in quiet. You need not be alone but it has to be a quiet space, unplugged from phone, TV, laptop, radio. Silence the phone for the length of this exercise so as not to be distracted. Don't engage others at all. Spend 5-10 minutes in a comfortable position and return to how the podcast ended. Try to limit movement, let go of control and tightness in the body and do not engage the thinking patterns that arise. Let go of thoughts, cutting the kite string of thought and just sitting at rest.
Writing prompt: In a 500-word response, double-spaced in Times New Roman and 12 pt font and remembering the rubric, write a response to only ONE of the following: 1) Describe your experience of the podcast. Be detailed and explain. To help you get started, here are a list of questions that may get you to think about how to describe what happened. Feel free to answer these or come up with questions of your own. You can answer in whatever way you feel will allow you to describe with depth: Could you do the visualization well? Were you able to pay attention without your mind wandering? Did you feel a shift in attention while listening to the podcast from having to stay in control and directing your body, breath, mind to a space where you were no longer in control but still very much awake? Were you relaxed or anxious? Why? Did you feel like the sacred space in the woods was a bit more real with the love you were remembering?