.. but not much to say really. So, i’ll just leave a short note on what i’ve been upto recently. The flavor of the season is “vipassana meditation”. When you try to understand the rationale behind this form of meditation, you will inevitably come across at least the basics of Buddhist philosophy. Two books have really helped me understand the underlying philosophy, and a bit of the technique itself so that i can get started on my own before i learn it more formally — “Mindfulness in plain english“, by Henepola Gunaratana ; “Vipassana meditation as taught of S.N.Goenka” by William Hart. Iam very impressed by the Buddhist philosophy, because of its conciseness and as its intensely logical nature. But, as its often said, there’s only so much use reading “swimology”. For the actual swimming, iam devoting couple of hours per day for now. I definitely plan to make this a permanent fixture on the daily menu, rather than passing flavor of the season.
July 30, 2008
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can you suggest how to practice Vipassana Meditation? How to start it?
Comment by raj — August 6, 2008 @ 5:44 am |
Being a beginner myself, i can only give some leads: I found “Mindfulness in plain English” by Gunaratana, to be very helpful. Fantastic introduction for beginners. Its a “nuts and bolts” manual, so a to-do book really, with just enough theory to understand the philosophy behind the practice. Also, there are lot of centers where its taught. Couple of my friends have recommended http://www.dhamma.org which has centers worldwide. I plan to attend their course in few months time.
Comment by Chaitanya Pullela — August 6, 2008 @ 6:18 am |
Raj, the best way is to attend a 10-day course – there are many centers in India and around the world. In general and on average, it takes attending 2-3 10-day courses to get a good grasp on theory and practice, as well as establishing a daily practice. Learning meditation is a lot similar to learning to ride a bicycle – you may fall down a few times before you learn how to ride a bike without falling, and even then, the road may be hilly or rough, it may be raining making an otherwise safe road slippery, or sometimes, the road is downhill requiring little effort.
Comment by Amit — August 7, 2008 @ 9:07 pm |