Dear friends, now I would like to address some commonly asked questions
about guided meditation in Plum Village.
The first question we might be asked is
how do we apply Plum Village guided sitting meditations
so that we can benefit from the meditations?
You realize that on this app
we have a number of guided meditations for you to practice.
The main thing to remember is not to try to use our intellect
when we are practicing guided meditation.
The words of the guided meditation are there to touch seeds,
we call them seeds.They are potentials in the depths of your consciousness.
When those seeds are watered by the words,
then you can concentrate on that particular feeling
that comes up in association with the word.
If you try and think too much, the guided meditation will not help you.
In guided meditation images are usually more helpful than abstract ideas.
So be aware of that.
A word can water an image. You can use the image in order to
realize some insight that you may not have ever had before.
Every time you use a guided meditation, the insight will be a little bit different.
There is no perfect insight that goes with a particular guided meditation.
The second question: what can we do if we don't understand the exercise,
or we cannot experience the exercise.
For example, we hear, 'Breathing in, I feel joy', and we don't feel joy.
So that is just an example.
We should not ever try to experience something,
some words that we hear. If we don't have an experience we can let go,
but the next time when you want to do that meditation
you may like to prepare yourself a little bit.
You may like to remember times when you have felt a deep joy
that came not from things going on around you
but came from your own consciousness.
And you may remember the incident or the event
that triggered that sense of joy in you, and you can feel that joy again.
In our daily life, it is important to recognize
when we have moments of joy,
and to help those moments of joy to last,
because the depths of our consciousness are like a ratatouille, like a stew,
and we put many ingredients in that. They all, the taste of each ingredient
goes into the other ingredients.
So that just by watering the seed of joy every day in your consciousness,
it will transform some of the suffering,
by penetrating the suffering without you having to make an effort to do that.
What can we do when we haven't realized the exercise
but then the next exercise is already coming?
That is a difficulty that many of us may experience,
because everyone needs more time than or a different amount of time
for realizing an exercise. So if you need more time, the best thing
is to try to remember the guided meditation,
and then to practice it on your own.
You may like to note it down,
what the different stages of the meditation are.
And when you do it on your own,
then you can take as long as you like for each part of the exercise.
Actually, that is really the way for you to use these exercises on the app.
It's not every time to have to listen to the app,
but be able to remember the exercises,
and then practice them for yourself in your own time.
Are Plum Village guided meditations visualizations?
What is meant by 'Breathing in, I see myself as a flower,
breathing in, I see myself as a mountain', and so on?
These are images. 'Flower' is a word, and when you hear the word 'flower'
and you let it sink into the deep levels of your consciousness,
then a flower image will appear in your mind.
The same is true of a mountain image.
So you allow any image that comes up, to come up of a flower.
And going with that image there is a feeling,
The feeling going with the flower image is a feeling of freshness,
and the feeling going with a mountain image is a feeling of solidity.
So the image and the feeling, they go together,
and they keep watering each other.
So it's like a feedback. You have the image and then the feeling,
and the feeling leads to the image again, and so on.
Should we stay in one chapter, if you're using the book 'Blooming of a Lotus',
until we understand before we move to another chapter?
We need, if we're using a book of guided meditations,
what has helped me is to be able to know all the guided meditations.
And then, depending on my state of mind, or my need,
then I will choose the suitable guided meditation for that particular day.
If there are days when I feel tired and not so well,
then I need to do meditations which will help take care of my body,
help relax my body, calm my body. And in relaxing and calming my body,
I will relax and calm my mind. And when I feel strong and well,
I will do some meditation like a meditation on impermanence,
to be able to see that I am of the nature to die, and so on.
But if I am not in good health and it is not so, or in my body or my mind,
I don't want to do meditations like contemplating my own death,
or contemplating the death of my loved ones.
Why in Plum Village is there such an emphasis
on breathing and the body in guided meditation?
The breathing is the basis.
The breathing is like if you have a truck, and that truck can carry things.
It can also be empty of carrying things.
And it can take them from one place to another.
So the breathing is like that, it can take your mind from one place to another.
And the thing about meditation is that sometimes,
if we haven't got guidance in our meditation
our mind just goes along in one track.
Or it's like a train. The train goes from Bordeaux to Paris,
and then it goes from Paris to Bordeaux. It goes back and forth on the same track.
But guided meditation is to try and get our mind out of its normal tracks,
and go in a different direction.
So we need our breathing. When we come back to our breathing,
and just concentrate on our breathing,
then we can let go of the normal ways of thinking that we have,
and allow the meditation to guide us in thinking in a different way
or in feeling in a different way, which can bring us insight and transformation
And the reason why we begin often with mentioning your body
is because mind and body are not two separate realities.
In fact, what we do is we alienate a little,
we alienate our body from our mind,
because we may feel that our body is a source of suffering.
So we take our mind out of our body, away from our body.
But in fact, our mind is not at its best when it is separated from our body,
it is not its true self when it's separated from our body.
So it's very important to bring our mind and our body together.
And that is what the breathing can do,
because the breathing is a function of our body and the breathing is also spirit.
So, we feel our body.
And we stay in our body.
Throughout the meditation exercise. And if at any point,
you feel that your mind is gone out of your body,
then it's very important to open your eyes
and bring your mind and your body back together again.
So, all meditation in Plum Village is about,
is meditation that is done with the mind and the body together.
Thank you.