I’ve had an experience been meditating for 4 years in 2023 I was doing breath work meditating and instead of seeing colors and patterns I was flying in a canyon and came up to an ancient temple and started going up the walls and flipped and was in my body all I could say was I’m back.
I relate to your habit of praying for random people who cross your path, like the ambulance, or it could be someone you notice could use some help. Something strange can happen when you do that with a sincere heart. People can come across your path with the same needs as those you prayed for, in your professional work and you will be in a position to help them in a work capacity. It’s as if a higher power brings them to you to share your area of expertise. I thought I was weird for doing that and other people didn’t do it till I heard you say you do it. I don’t feel so weird now, I think I’ll do it more. Thanks.
I do that too! When driving with my son, we would always say have a moment of silence to pray for the people in the accident. I think it set a good example for him
I started meditation last week . I'm now half shaolin monk 😂 . Thanks Ben good advice . My dogs are being blamed by me for distracting me . I will create a pad in my spare room and shut myself away
Very interesting. That explains why it was hard to meditate. I don't do mantras or prayers, because they're from the mouth, and since I'm deaf I can't hear myself. What I can "hear" is just my voice's vibration from within. Another issue I have a hard time is the breathing cuz my right nostril is almost blocked. There's another thing I'm interested to question here. There are, like, 2 meditation stances. Most do the relaxing on the bed. Others like you do the sitting. Which is better? And I know that I should just breath and not move at all. Another thing I have noticed and what someone said in my recent dream, "If you want to acquire this power, return to Nature", is that being in Nature, you breath natural air, which is 10000000000x better than the city's air, so I plan to incorporate it in my daily life, soon.
Great insight... basically, we should aim for making our life a meditation... doing exactly what we love is what we came here for but we are programmed to be good and deny evil and we do not realize by doing that, we are projecting evil and so we see them seemingly outside of us...
Have you heard of the gateway tapes by the monroe institute? They use a patented form of binaural beat technology called hemi-sync that puts the brain into different states of consciousness by manipulating brain waves, even causing out of body experiences like the one you talked about before in a video. The different states are called 'focus levels' and each one is associated with a verbal cue to allow the user to 'reproduce' that brain wave even without the audio tapes. I found success with this in my own 'authentic' meditation practice whereby I can achieve a state of body numbness in a few minutes and even withdrawal of the senses in another 5 or 10. More advanced users can cycle through these states of consciousness at will just by counting through the focus levels, It's pretty cool.
Jayne storey - is a professional meditation performance coach. She has a few books out. I love her approach to golf And her philosophy on why meditation is soo integral for golf performance
Ben, THANK YOU, truly, for this video and your precision in capturing exactly what I needed to hear. I didn’t know I needed to hear it until I did. And it brought things back into perspective. So thank you. I’ve really been struggling with my life over the last decade, and I have been trying hard to turn things around. But I also know I can do better with that as well. And this was the reminder I needed again. Your channel is awesome, I just came across it a day or two ago. Truly valuable content, and I sincerely appreciate it all and you. Blessings! XO
So interesting, Ben. Thank you. Part of the reason I found your channel was that I am on a bit of a mission to really understand empathy. I started training as a counsellor a couple of years ago and I realised early on that empathy is much harder than sympathy. So I wanted to get some more practice in listening. So I am currently a trainee Samaritan. It is a completely different challenge when you don't have any visual non-verbal clues and you are trying to suspend judgement when all you have is the words someone is saying and the tone they are using. It is much harder than I ever thought possible. It occurred to me very recently that I needed to pursue a spiritual connection to this, which is why I have found my way here. I have very strong intuition and I believe that it is related to empathy and all of it is related to feeling comfortable creating a dialogue with the divine. (I can't believe I've just written that last sentence, btw). The question is how to learn to open the channels (and keep them open) in order for this to occur. I liked your olympic analogy but what seems to be working for me is using my experience of learning to become a professional oboist. And it all starts with the breath. I really like the idea of really living with mantra-related ideas during the day. It makes perfect sense that thinking about it actively will expand your experience of it and this will feed into meditation. So many wonderful ideas.
Excellent thank you for the reminder. I feel like I have become very distracted with life and have noticed I’ve fallen away from the depth of my practices. I’ve found spiritual music.. Sanskrit playing while I’m home and Watching the type of content I allow very helpful. Definitely putting the devices away have become a must!! Love your channel. 🙏💗
Very interesting. Thank you for your insights and observations and your honesty about your own experiences. May you be be healthy, happy and content, may we all be.
Thank you Ben! I needed this. I spent several years going deep into meditation and having extraordinary experiences regularly- but last couple years the busy mind and stress has taken over. Been trying to get back to more balance. 🙏🏼
Can i have a question Ben? I am learning through your videos as much as i possibly can. I am from Slovakia so attending classes in person is not a possibility for me. I experience often when i meditate that i fall asleep. Atleast i would describe that senssation that way. I dont think i am sleeping,its maybe same meditative state? I am sitting, mind calm, crown chakra tingling usualy, and i starting to loose focus,and my head can drop. Thats why i describe it as falling asleep but k know that i am not. Can someone help me out? I dont think Ben have time capacity to answer to every comment. I am sure he is explaining this in some of his videos but i dont watch all of them yet. Thank you all ❤
Ben, what is the track record of students having the 1st shift (stream entry) in Goenka Vipassana and do the assistant teachers in the same tradition need to have this shift or do they become an AT after completing x number of courses without this first insight?
Assuming you are a total beginner - keep it nice and simple. Find a quiet space, light a candle or incense stick if that helps you to feel calm, sit comfortably on a chair and start to observe your breathing. Do nothing more than follow the rhythm of your breathing. You will likely find it boring / distracting / frustrating / your mind will wonder - this is totally normal. Keep returning back to the breath once you notice that you have become distracted. This is meditation in its most basic and simple form🙂🙏
There’s more too it and there is a hell of a lot going on that I couldn’t explain here - but yes at the very basic level, we are taking the reins back from the mind and starting to control ourselves.
@@bensmithreal I understand. I do not mean to degrade the practice in any way. Just trying to understand. I appreciate your help with this, sincerely. Cheers.
I have one last question, since your other answers seem now to be satisfactory toward the remaining stuff. Since obviously it is a life-long work to never be "completed", and since you've _also_ said you don't _need_ to take it to "Olympic athlete" level , how much _balance_ in your "discipline" or control over the "mundane stuff" in life should one develop before _even thinking to start_ a serious meditation program, and moreover, how much balance is the minimum required level _before_ one turns to the "psych ward risking stuff"? Or if there is no hard/fast _level_ rule, what is the more general _judging criterion_ to "greenlight" each phase?
Hello Ben. I’ve been trying for OBE for some time now. I’ve been meditating for a few months quite well. But I’m confused with obe as I had the impression the body needed to be asleep whilst the mind stayed awake? But how can the body sleep in a sitting position? Because back muscles ect are in use. Not physically fully relaxed. Can you advise me on this please? ❤
Hello, great work for meditating the last few months 👏 To answer your question, unlike sleep, you can meditate whilst holding the body upright, however you will need to find a balance between being relaxed and still sitting upright. You can train yourself with practice to lose attachment to the body, even when it is not “asleep” as such. This feels very much like the body becomes invisible. When you subdue the senses, this becomes much easier. It’s all case of practice 🙏💙
I'm learning the mindfulness as you said. I guess you experienced astral projection during that retreat? I'd like to mention days ago I saw a 10 year old video about meditation that helped me out a lot through simple explanation and true motivation called Spiritual Reality Power of Meditation.
Switch off phone, remove demanding cat from room, ask partner who is working from home to keep the noise down; remove demanding cat - again, and try to ignore the little pr*ck who's modified his motorbike so it sounds really loud. Finally, silence. Then, just 3 mins into meditating I'm startled by the very loud chime of the bell signifying Mass in the Catholic church a few hundred feet away. FFS! Stressed, I get up and resolve to try again tomorrow. I'm beginning to think meditating at home is problematic and that I should probably join a group and meditate somewhere else.
Haha, I feel your pain. It takes practice, I wouldn’t avoid meditating at home because of those things though. There will always be something. Learning to meditate despite them is the trick🧘🏼♂️
The remote viewer Joe McMoneagle intentionally trained himself to be able to calm himself in noisy or high stress environments so that he would be able to remote view in such situations as needed
Me too. Any kind of mystical experience would be amazing. Only thing I've experienced Is the dark nite of the soul without a shadow of doubt its extremely text book.i don't even see colors just black when I meditate very frustrating.
Was this a Vipassana retreat? If it was, you should let people know as Vipasanna centers are everywhere and are often free to no cost for people who are serious about learning to meditation.
@@bensmithreal Not everyone here is familiar with your channel. This video popped into my feed and I have never seen anything else from you to know what you discussed in other videos. Thanks for replying though. I have been considering going to a Vipassana retreat but don't know if I could handle 10 days without my phone in case of family emergency.
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I’ve had an experience been meditating for 4 years in 2023 I was doing breath work meditating and instead of seeing colors and patterns I was flying in a canyon and came up to an ancient temple and started going up the walls and flipped and was in my body all I could say was I’m back.
Something I've learned is how much time you dedicate to it will reflect the outcome.
Awesome. Thank you Ben
I relate to your habit of praying for random people who cross your path, like the ambulance, or it could be someone you notice could use some help. Something strange can happen when you do that with a sincere heart. People can come across your path with the same needs as those you prayed for, in your professional work and you will be in a position to help them in a work capacity. It’s as if a higher power brings them to you to share your area of expertise. I thought I was weird for doing that and other people didn’t do it till I heard you say you do it. I don’t feel so weird now, I think I’ll do it more. Thanks.
It’s a beautiful habit, thanks for sharing 🙏💙
I do that too! When driving with my son, we would always say have a moment of silence to pray for the people in the accident. I think it set a good example for him
Thank you Ben, perfect advice 🙏❤️
I started meditation last week . I'm now half shaolin monk 😂 . Thanks Ben good advice . My dogs are being blamed by me for distracting me . I will create a pad in my spare room and shut myself away
😂 Best of luck!
@@bensmithreal thank you and thanks for your cool helpful tips
Thanks for this information
I really struggle with over thinking xx
All your advice is helpful thank you Ben
Glad it’s helping 🙏
Very interesting. That explains why it was hard to meditate. I don't do mantras or prayers, because they're from the mouth, and since I'm deaf I can't hear myself. What I can "hear" is just my voice's vibration from within. Another issue I have a hard time is the breathing cuz my right nostril is almost blocked. There's another thing I'm interested to question here. There are, like, 2 meditation stances. Most do the relaxing on the bed. Others like you do the sitting. Which is better? And I know that I should just breath and not move at all. Another thing I have noticed and what someone said in my recent dream, "If you want to acquire this power, return to Nature", is that being in Nature, you breath natural air, which is 10000000000x better than the city's air, so I plan to incorporate it in my daily life, soon.
Great insight... basically, we should aim for making our life a meditation... doing exactly what we love is what we came here for but we are programmed to be good and deny evil and we do not realize by doing that, we are projecting evil and so we see them seemingly outside of us...
Have you heard of the gateway tapes by the monroe institute? They use a patented form of binaural beat technology called hemi-sync that puts the brain into different states of consciousness by manipulating brain waves, even causing out of body experiences like the one you talked about before in a video. The different states are called 'focus levels' and each one is associated with a verbal cue to allow the user to 'reproduce' that brain wave even without the audio tapes. I found success with this in my own 'authentic' meditation practice whereby I can achieve a state of body numbness in a few minutes and even withdrawal of the senses in another 5 or 10. More advanced users can cycle through these states of consciousness at will just by counting through the focus levels, It's pretty cool.
Namaskar!
Have you tried the training tapes?
How is your experience?
Jayne storey - is a professional meditation performance coach.
She has a few books out.
I love her approach to golf
And her philosophy on why meditation is soo integral for golf performance
Ben, THANK YOU, truly, for this video and your precision in capturing exactly what I needed to hear. I didn’t know I needed to hear it until I did. And it brought things back into perspective. So thank you. I’ve really been struggling with my life over the last decade, and I have been trying hard to turn things around. But I also know I can do better with that as well. And this was the reminder I needed again. Your channel is awesome, I just came across it a day or two ago. Truly valuable content, and I sincerely appreciate it all and you. Blessings! XO
Thankyou so much!!
So interesting, Ben. Thank you.
Part of the reason I found your channel was that I am on a bit of a mission to really understand empathy.
I started training as a counsellor a couple of years ago and I realised early on that empathy is much harder than sympathy. So I wanted to get some more practice in listening. So I am currently a trainee Samaritan. It is a completely different challenge when you don't have any visual non-verbal clues and you are trying to suspend judgement when all you have is the words someone is saying and the tone they are using. It is much harder than I ever thought possible.
It occurred to me very recently that I needed to pursue a spiritual connection to this, which is why I have found my way here. I have very strong intuition and I believe that it is related to empathy and all of it is related to feeling comfortable creating a dialogue with the divine. (I can't believe I've just written that last sentence, btw). The question is how to learn to open the channels (and keep them open) in order for this to occur. I liked your olympic analogy but what seems to be working for me is using my experience of learning to become a professional oboist. And it all starts with the breath.
I really like the idea of really living with mantra-related ideas during the day. It makes perfect sense that thinking about it actively will expand your experience of it and this will feed into meditation.
So many wonderful ideas.
Excellent thank you for the reminder. I feel like I have become very distracted with life and have noticed I’ve fallen away from the depth of my practices. I’ve found spiritual music.. Sanskrit playing while I’m home and Watching the type of content I allow very helpful. Definitely putting the devices away have become a must!! Love your channel. 🙏💗
Very interesting. Thank you for your insights and observations and your honesty about your own experiences. May you be be healthy, happy and content, may we all be.
Thank you Ben! I needed this. I spent several years going deep into meditation and having extraordinary experiences regularly- but last couple years the busy mind and stress has taken over. Been trying to get back to more balance. 🙏🏼
It’s great that you know what you are capable of. I’m sure you’ll get back to that level again if you really want it 🙏
As you revealed the different points i was thinking ...yeh, that makes sense!.....so how come i didn't think of them? 😂😂😂
Sounds like vippassana. Im doing another vippassana course next month
I definitely enjoy meditating and I am somewhat new to it. However, if I did have an out of body experience, it might possibly freak me out a bit.
Thankyou Ben
🙂🙏
Thank you. Great advice
You are very welcome!
I'm loving the videos Ben!
So good to hear, thank you!
That is exactly the way the place I work is …. A Silent Retreat Center 🙏🏻😊
Can i have a question Ben? I am learning through your videos as much as i possibly can. I am from Slovakia so attending classes in person is not a possibility for me. I experience often when i meditate that i fall asleep. Atleast i would describe that senssation that way. I dont think i am sleeping,its maybe same meditative state? I am sitting, mind calm, crown chakra tingling usualy, and i starting to loose focus,and my head can drop. Thats why i describe it as falling asleep but k know that i am not. Can someone help me out? I dont think Ben have time capacity to answer to every comment. I am sure he is explaining this in some of his videos but i dont watch all of them yet. Thank you all ❤
Does not matter if u have thoughts just focus on the silance of the mind behind it all and over time thoughts will lessen and not even matter
Ben, prayer and meditation are similar???
Quick question, does the schuman resonance affect sleeping patterns?
Great video
Thanks🙏
Ben, what is the track record of students having the 1st shift (stream entry) in Goenka Vipassana
and do the assistant teachers in the same tradition need to have this shift or do they become an AT after completing x number of courses without this first insight?
Any advice on how to meditate? Thanks.
Assuming you are a total beginner - keep it nice and simple. Find a quiet space, light a candle or incense stick if that helps you to feel calm, sit comfortably on a chair and start to observe your breathing. Do nothing more than follow the rhythm of your breathing. You will likely find it boring / distracting / frustrating / your mind will wonder - this is totally normal. Keep returning back to the breath once you notice that you have become distracted.
This is meditation in its most basic and simple form🙂🙏
@@bensmithreal Thanks. So we are essentially just taking back control by silencing the mind?
There’s more too it and there is a hell of a lot going on that I couldn’t explain here - but yes at the very basic level, we are taking the reins back from the mind and starting to control ourselves.
@@bensmithreal I understand. I do not mean to degrade the practice in any way. Just trying to understand. I appreciate your help with this, sincerely. Cheers.
Are there any meditation retreats for women?
I have one last question, since your other answers seem now to be satisfactory toward the remaining stuff.
Since obviously it is a life-long work to never be "completed", and since you've _also_ said you don't _need_ to take it to "Olympic athlete" level , how much _balance_ in your "discipline" or control over the "mundane stuff" in life should one develop before _even thinking to start_ a serious meditation program, and moreover, how much balance is the minimum required level _before_ one turns to the "psych ward risking stuff"? Or if there is no hard/fast _level_ rule, what is the more general _judging criterion_ to "greenlight" each phase?
Hello Ben. I’ve been trying for OBE for some time now. I’ve been meditating for a few months quite well. But I’m confused with obe as I had the impression the body needed to be asleep whilst the mind stayed awake? But how can the body sleep in a sitting position? Because back muscles ect are in use. Not physically fully relaxed. Can you advise me on this please? ❤
Hello, great work for meditating the last few months 👏
To answer your question, unlike sleep, you can meditate whilst holding the body upright, however you will need to find a balance between being relaxed and still sitting upright. You can train yourself with practice to lose attachment to the body, even when it is not “asleep” as such. This feels very much like the body becomes invisible. When you subdue the senses, this becomes much easier. It’s all case of practice 🙏💙
I'm learning the mindfulness as you said. I guess you experienced astral projection during that retreat? I'd like to mention days ago I saw a 10 year old video about meditation that helped me out a lot through simple explanation and true motivation called Spiritual Reality Power of Meditation.
Fantastic, thanks for sharing 🙏
Switch off phone, remove demanding cat from room, ask partner who is working from home to keep the noise down; remove demanding cat - again, and try to ignore the little pr*ck who's modified his motorbike so it sounds really loud.
Finally, silence. Then, just 3 mins into meditating I'm startled by the very loud chime of the bell signifying Mass in the Catholic church a few hundred feet away. FFS! Stressed, I get up and resolve to try again tomorrow.
I'm beginning to think meditating at home is problematic and that I should probably join a group and meditate somewhere else.
Haha, I feel your pain. It takes practice, I wouldn’t avoid meditating at home because of those things though. There will always be something. Learning to meditate despite them is the trick🧘🏼♂️
The remote viewer Joe McMoneagle intentionally trained himself to be able to calm himself in noisy or high stress environments so that he would be able to remote view in such situations as needed
I'm so desperate for an experience.
Yair sagy
?
What does that mean?
Me too. Any kind of mystical experience would be amazing. Only thing I've experienced Is the dark nite of the soul without a shadow of doubt its extremely text book.i don't even see colors just black when I meditate very frustrating.
Not hard; just fall sleep each and every time.
Sit up cross legged if u have to lay put a pillow under ur knees. That for some reason helps u stay awake more.good luck
Was this a Vipassana retreat? If it was, you should let people know as Vipasanna centers are everywhere and are often free to no cost for people who are serious about learning to meditation.
It was, I’ve mentioned it lots in other videos 🙏
@@bensmithreal Not everyone here is familiar with your channel. This video popped into my feed and I have never seen anything else from you to know what you discussed in other videos. Thanks for replying though. I have been considering going to a Vipassana retreat but don't know if I could handle 10 days without my phone in case of family emergency.
Seriously? It's not his job to cater to you.
@@Hansel783 Seriously? It's not your job to be the hall monitor of the comment section.... yet here you are. Get bent, clown.
@@Hansel783 Seriously? It's not your job to be the hall monitor of he comment section..... yet here you are. Get bent, fooI.