Welcome to Brothers and Sisters, the weekly meetup for prayer* and community at Daily Kos. We put an asterisk on pray* to acknowledge that not everyone uses conventional religious language, but may want to share joys and concerns, or simply take solace in a meditative atmosphere. Anyone who comes in the spirit of mutual respect, warmth and healing is welcome.
As the seasons turn winter is generally regarded by most faiths as a time to turn inward, a time for introspection as we mark the beginning of a new year with the ending of another. Personally speaking I have always thought that the Winter Solstice marks a more logical end point than what most people choose but really that's just details. The question becomes how do we achieve this stillness? Again personally speaking I generally tell people I am Buddhist as that is true but as always the truth is much much more complicated. Some of that truth is that I found Buddhism in probably the hardest way possible out of the ashes of my faith as a Roman Catholic and after a very long time trying to find well something to believe in, something to put my faith in. As such I can say that I've experienced a pretty wide range of faiths and practices some of which I have now incorporated into my own practices.
This is perhaps most evident in my meditation practices and really that is what I wish to offer the community tonight. When you think of meditation what do you think of? For the longest time I can say that I personally thought only of either silent, motionless contemplation or motionless chanting. To be honest the first really just does not work for me. I have gotten better at it the older I have gotten and the deeper my Buddhism has grown but even today silent meditation is not my preference. When I found mantras that actually was my first feeling of accomplishment as a Buddhist. It however has not been perfect probably because I have never really been part of a Sangha (community) before for a host of reasons and thus am left trying to speak a language I know nothing about. Still listening to mantras, chanting along with mantras allowed me a glimpse of stillness and actually was what lead me to stay with Buddhism instead of say a branch of Paganism.
What really lead me to find stillness was Yoga and Tai Chi and a book entitled Walking Meditation by Thich Nhat Hanh whom I had honestly just stumbled upon (a story for another time). This was just monumental and the book lead me to seek out Yoga and Tai Chi and experience what I had been reading about. This in turn lead me to be more confident about my own practices and do something I had not dared to do, namely experiment. This experimentation lead me to realize that I could find stillness in music too. And that leads me to what has become my end of the year celebration either on the Solstice or as close as I can get.
The ritual itself is fairly basic and bare bones. It revolves around an album entitled Beethoven's Last Night which is the story of Beethoven's last night on earth as he is confronted first by Mephistopheles offering to save Beethoven's soul in return for his just completed 10th symphony and how Fate and her son Twist help Beethoven.
That is the album in it's entirety. At almost an hour and a half it's rather long but I would encourage people to listen to it when they can find the time as it is quite beautiful and moving. However if you can't listen to that than I would humbly ask that you at least listen to the song that hooked me so completely that it lead me to using it as a meditation focus and then frustrated with the short length of the song using the whole album.
Anyways enough about me please tell me how you meditate.
Namaste my friends