by Om Swami
The practice of letting go starts with identifying what you love the most and then picking one to begin with, deciding to let go for a certain period. It can be one week, a month, one year or any other duration you decide. Please see the chart below:
The complete practice of tyaga means abandoning consumption, desire, contemplation and thoughts of the object of attachment. In line with the framework tabulated above, let me elaborate the practice with an example.
Let’s say you love drinking coffee. Your favourite is cappuccino. For the last so many years, you have been routinely having your double shot cappuccino. You have gotten used to it. On days you cannot get your hands on your coffee, you miss it. Perhaps, you even get a headache if you are unable to get your dose of caffeine. This is attachment; it strips you of your freedom and makes you dependent. One day, committing yourself to the practice of tyaga you decide to give up coffee for a period of forty days. During those forty days, if you:
Consuming coffee even once (consumption row in the table above) is a breach of your practice. The impact is red. It is an instant failure item. You need to restart.
Keep longing for coffee, this means you are unable to take your mind off coffee. You are curbing your desire. Your practice continues but it brings down the overall quality by twenty percent.
Keep contemplating on coffee, the desire for coffee will arise automatically. If only you remember to gently take your mind off and focus it elsewhere each time you think about coffee, you are doing good.
Think about coffee, which may emerge even at the sight of a cafe, or seeing someone drinking it, etc., is okay. The key is to drop the thought when it emerges. Having thoughts is natural. When you stay mindful of your practice and resolution, thoughts become feeble and harmless; they disappear as soon as they emerge.
When you let go, you gain freedom. It further leads to a state of independence, peace and fulfilment. Ultimately, if you can let go of everything that gives you grief, every agonizing emotion, every discursive thought, you can well imagine your blissful state.
When you learn to let go, you are effectively learning to let yourself go free.
Self-Awareness Journal
Often we lose sight of the good in our lives simply because we are not consciously aware of it anymore. In facing our challenges and daily struggles, we forget that there’s more to our life, more to us, than merely living from one day to the next. This self-awareness journal is to help you see where you are going (and if you want to go there) and what all you already have to be grateful for.
This simple journal has a powerful way of building self- awareness, positivity and gratitude in your life. You could fill it every day for 40 days or less as per your convenience. You can use the template above to put it in your diary or you can download a soft copy from my website (omswami.com).
For each day, there are five sections.
I am grateful for: There are two rows in this section. Think about the two things you are grateful for in your life and jot them down here. Try to list two new things every day.
I can be a better person by: Once again, there are two rows. Write down two habits you wish to develop. Even if you pen down the same two habits every day, you’ll end up being more mindful. Gradually, your mind will start shifting towards those actions that are in line with your priorities.
I love myself because: Two reasons why you love yourself. It sounds easy but this section is where most participants have trouble in the meditation retreats I conduct. If you can list two new reasons every day, that will be simply marvellous.
I would love to learn: One skill you would love to learn. A skill you’ve always wanted to but never found the time to learn–playing piano, swimming, dancing, anything.
If I could be I would be: How would you live your life if there were no barriers? Who would you be? It’ll be an insightful exercise, one that’ll tell you what it is that you really want out of life.
Please fill this journal every day and review it at the end of your practice. It will bring about a subtle change in you as you’ll find yourself more positive, calm and focused. The benefit of maintaining this journal is multiplied when you meditate regularly.
Meditation Journal
For months, during my own intense practice, I meticulously maintained a journal of my meditation. It helped me see a pattern and understand if I was progressing on the path. At a glance I could see which hurdles bothered me more than others and if I maintained my state even when I wasn’t meditating. This journal has three charts. The first one is to measure the quality of your meditation sessions. The second is to mark which blocks or hurdles are impeding your growth. And the third one is to see if you are maintaining virtues at other times even when you are not meditating. The charts here are merely templates and you can make your own guidelines from this or download a soft copy from my website.
Please see the first chart below:
It lists six aspects of meditation for each day and session.
Each day has three sessions, M = Morning; E = Evening; and N = Night (just before you go to bed). You are welcome to put only one or two sessions every day. Your session can be as long as you want but it’s important to be consistent. To begin with you could do two or three 15-minute sessions.
The important thing to learn is how to mark yourself. For each aspect, at the end of your meditation, just reflect on it if you could maintain it and give a score accordingly. For example, throughout your session what was the quality of your concentration. If it was superb, give yourself a 7 out of 10, for instance.
The same goes for posture too. If you moved your limbs even once during that one session, deduct at least 4 marks. If you turned your head, deduct another 3 marks against posture. If you simply couldn’t keep your gaze still but kept your posture intact, deduct only two marks. The same goes for mindfulness and alertness too.
If you had sit down thinking that you would’ve meditated for 10 minutes but got up after 5 minutes, it means that the ‘duration’ aspect was compromised. Deduct at least 5 marks for this.
Pay attention to your mood and reflect on it after you complete the session. Could you maintain a smile, a joyous disposition? Score yourself based on how positive you were throughout your session.
Mark yourself at the end of each session.
At the end of 40 days, for example, or even two weeks, you can do a total of each segment and see what your strong points are.
Just like we ranked each session of meditation for its quality, we need to do the same for the various hurdles. It’ll help you see what’s been causing the most problems in your session. Please see the chart below:
Feel free to modify the template. If you only meditate twice or once a day, you can change it accordingly.
After each session of meditation, reflect on the quality of your meditation and mark which hurdles caused greatest distraction.
The bigger the hurdle, the greater the mark. For example, if your meditation was affected on account of feeling lazy, sleepy, dizzy, heavy or torpid, give yourself a high score under ‘dullness’.
See the table immediately after this chart to see how to ascertain which hurdle you should mark against.
It’s critical to fill this journal diligently because this is the easiest way to monitor and measure your progress.
See the table below to see which hurdles affected your session the most.
Maintaining a meditative state even when you are not meditating is just as critical as doing it when you are actually in meditation. For this reason, a good meditator maintains certain virtues at all times. This is where you really know if you’ve been meditating correctly. This is how people will notice any change in you.
Please see the chart below:
Unlike the other two charts, this one does not have morning, evening and night but morning, afternoon and evening.
It lists five key virtues a good meditator ought to practice.
At the end of each day or after completing your session of meditation, you could reflect on the past few hours and see if you generally acted mindfully, compassionately, gratefully and with humility. Reflect and see if you practiced silence by refraining from engaging in pointless gossip or telling lies.
Every time you practice a virtue, it’ll take you a step closer towards the final step.
Let’s say you sit down at night to see if you lived your day according to the virtues today. If you spoke harsh words or acted recklessly (road rage, for example) in the morning, afternoon or evening, deduct marks accordingly against that aspect. If you found yourself complaining about your life, for example, you were not being grateful. If you were boasting, you did not practice humility and so on.
Meditation is pointless if it doesn’t inspire you to lead a virtuous life.
I’ve also put some guidelines in dos and don’ts for you. Please see the table below. You could also maintain a journal for each of the seven yogic practices. It really helps in ascertaining how sincerely we’ve been carrying out the practice.
The Two Paths
A master instructed his disciple to meditate for six hours every day and do so for 10 years.
“What if I meditate for 12 hours every day?” the disciple asked. “How long will it take to reach the goal then?”
“Twenty years.”
“Really? And what if I meditate for 18 hours in a day?” “Thirty years.”
“How can that be?”
“With one eye on the goal, you only have one left to focus on the task,” the master replied.
A sprinter must run with all his might and focus. He can’t afford to look at the finish line while running. If he remains on track and doesn’t stop running, he’ll cross the finish line. It’s not very different on the path of meditation either. Your goal is not to reach some state, that’ll happen on its own if you persist diligently. Your only goal is to ensure that you practice correctly.
The more sugar you put in, the sweeter it gets. When it comes to meditation, intensity in effort equals immensity in rewards. To that effect, you have two paths of meditation: the ordinary and the extraordinary.
The Ordinary Path
Ordinary does not mean that it’s not fruitful or effective. By ordinary, I’m simply referring to the traditional path. Once again, it entirely depends on the quality of your practice. Not everyone can leave everything behind and go into a Himalayan solitude to walk the path of self-realization. Not everyone can be a Buddha or a Mahavira in terms of their life choices. In any case, you won’t know till you walk the path. The day the spark of realization ignites in your heart, your life will change forever. For those who have responsibilities and other commitments, there is the traditional path.
There are scholars who enrol in PhD on a full-time basis. Completion of their doctorate is their only focus. They are done with their coursework and dissertation within three years. Receiving their testamur and medal, they move on to apply their knowledge in the real world. And then you have some scholars who take five, even seven years, before they submit their thesis.
There’s nothing to say or prove that the one who completed it in three years is qualitatively better than the other one. It boils down to individual temperament, priority and resources. On the ordinary path of meditation, a seeker can’t devote all his or her time to just meditation. They are scholars from the latter category. They have other things to take care of –maybe a job, family, parents, or all of them. On the ordinary path, there are two types of meditators.
First is an average meditator, who holds three sessions of meditation in a span of 24 hours. Each session lasts about one hour. If they have been following this regime for a minimum of six months, they can be safely classified as average meditators.
The second is a mild meditator, who holds one or two sessions of meditation in a span of 24 hours, generally at dawn and dusk. The length of an average session of meditation for a mild practitioner is between 30 minutes to an hour.
If you put things in perspective, you’ll realize that we spend over six hours in school for more than 12 years before we secure a place in a university. We spend another three or four years at the university to earn an undergraduate degree. After 16 years of continuous effort, we get a job that starts to provide a reward for our work. To earn that reward, however, we must work another eight hours at least five days a week.
When it comes to meditation, most people have unrealistic expectations. You can’t start earning within six months. Like any other field of study or practice, this too has a specific path that requires years of effort. The only good news is that if you practice routinely as a matter of discipline, you’ll start to see subtle changes in you within a span of six months.
The Extraordinary Path
Bill Gates once said, “I never took a day off in my twenties.” The extraordinary path is for those who have found their calling in meditation, or for those who can’t wait any longer to discover their own truth. These are the scholars who drop out of school and just go for it. It was the path of Buddha, Mahavira, Ramana Maharishi, Jesus Christ and even their disciples who dropped everything to serve their cause. Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, who was a householder, walked the extraordinary path because with each passing moment all he did was to immerse himself in the glories of the Goddess.
Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Albert Einstein, Thomas Edison, Issac Newton, Van Gogh – they all walked the extraordinary path in their respective fields. Nothing other than a single-minded pursuit of their vision (not necessarily goal) mattered to them. On the extraordinary path of meditation, there are two types of meditators: intense and keen.
An intense meditator is someone who holds an average of six sessions of meditation in a span of 24 hours and does so on a regular basis, minimum period being six months. Average session of such a meditator lasts between 60 and 90 minutes. Anything more than that is considered supremely intense.
A keen meditator is the one who meditates an average of four times in a span of 24 hours, each session lasting a minimum of one hour. A meditator who meditates unfailingly with this discipline for at least one year can be called a keen meditator and not just someone who does it for a few weeks.
This has been my own experience too, that, ultimately, if you are serious about experiencing the supreme bliss through meditation, sooner or later, you will have to intensify your practice.
You may ask, who has time to meditate for that long in this day and age? Just to give you some context, at the peak of my practice, for roughly seven months, I meditated for nearly 22 hours every day. Out of everything I had ever tried in my life, it was the most difficult and most exhausting endeavour I had ever undertaken. It was also the most rewarding, I may add. Naturally, I didn’t start putting in the long hours from the word go; rather, built it up over several years. Clear results come through according to the quality, duration and intensity of your practice.
From Ordinary to Extraordinary
Most of what I’ve stated above applies to the practice of concentrative meditation, the kind that requires you to sit down in a specific posture and build your concentration. As you know by now, this is not the only type of meditation. There are many other options. And this is where I share the incredibly powerful practice of a mindful day.
In the practice of a mindful day, you could realize the benefits of intense and keen meditators without actually leaving for the Himalayas. You can elevate your consciousness to a degree beyond imagination for the average mind, all the while holding your job and comforts. This is the only practice I know on the path of meditation that transforms an ordinary life into an extraordinary one. It is walking the ordinary path in the extraordinary way.
How to Do It Right
It’s very simple but it’s only with practice that you
can perfect it. You don’t have to sit in any yogic posture. Instead, carry on with your normal routine. It’ll be like any other day but with one great difference – you’ll do everything, every little act, with utmost mindfulness.
When you get up in the morning and brush your teeth, do it mindfully. Watch how you wet your brush, put the toothpaste on and brush. Feel every single stroke, realize how peppermint bursts against your taste buds and how you feel this freshness in your mouth.
When you step into the shower, experience the living energy in every single drop of water. Bathe mindfully. When you apply shampoo, facewash, conditioner and soap, etc., feel it. Be present in the moment. Think that you are bathing a divine body, as if you are offering ablutions in a sacred ritual.
When you sit down to have your breakfast, eat as if you are doing a yajna, as if you are making fire offerings to the divinity in you. When you work, drive, walk, talk, listen do so with mindfulness, by being present in the moment. Ask yourself the one most important question to bring yourself back into the present moment, “What am I doing right now?”
Initially, you’ll keep forgetting that you are supposed to do everything mindfully. You may brush mindfully but by the time you reach breakfast, you maybe grabbing the sandwich, gulping scalding coffee and rushing through your front door. You may be agitatedly flicking FM channels while waiting in the peak hour traffic. It’s alright. You can’t change your lifestyle overnight, but you can be mindful. Every time you remember that you are not being mindful, you just ask yourself, “What am I doing right now?”