Carol E. McMahon, Ph.D., Articles Online
How To Meditate Better Than Your Guru: The Feedback Solution
(THE FREE PRESS, March 22, 2010)
Better than your Guru? No joke is intended. Read this and you’ll know how to meditate better than Gurus past and present. You’ll be free of the problem that limits success: mind’s uncontrollable wandering.
Even Gurus are plagued by drifting and dreaming; time spent wandering when they’d hoped for attention. Now an easy solution makes success a sure thing. The solution is “feedback.” Here’s how it works and how to use it.
Why Meditation Needs Feedback
In meditation, attention is the key to success. Attention makes it work. When you sit down to meditate however, even with the best intentions, your mind wanders. Attention is hard to hold on to.
Why is attention so hard to hold on to? It’s because you lose attention without knowing you are losing it. In meditation, attention slips away unseen. To a research psychologist with an interest in skill learning, the solution is clear: meditation needs feedback.
The Feedback Solution
In meditation the aim is attention, but if you can't see your target you can't correct your aim. Meditation is like shooting darts blindfolded. To excel in meditation (or darts), you need to see what you are doing. You need to monitor attention. You need feedback.
Where can you find feedback? Amazingly, it’s right before our eyes and has been there all along, unrecognized.
Where To Find Feedback? Right Before Your Eyes!
I discovered feedback while meditating with my eyes open. My attention was focused on a spot on the floor when I noticed a small halo of light flickering round it. The light was feedback -- visual proof of attention – the means of self-guidance that assured success. It works like this.
“Seeing The Light:” Precision Self-Guidance From Feedback
This light had often been seen before. It’s seen with Zen’s “open gaze.” It’s reported at enlightenment. Its origin and usefulness however, was never recognized. We missed the fact that this light is caused by attention, making it possible to attend to attention and mind your mind.
Sensations of light are produced when focused attention holds the eyes still. The steady gaze holds the image in the same place on the eyes’ retinas. Retinal fatigue follows, and with it distortion in the form of light.
As long as you attend, you see the light. When your mind wanders however, your eyes wander and the light disappears. Thus the light signals attention and alerts you when you wander off. Light feedback offers precision self-guidance.
Focus on the light and you sustain attention. I did so and experienced the breakthrough so hard to achieve with traditional methods. Meditation with feedback is a whole new ballgame. In place of wandering in circles there’s a straight line to success.
‘A Whole New Ballgame:’ The Feedback Advantage
With traditional methods, mind’s wandering severely limits success. You can expect slow, or even no practice skill development. (You can get even less effective with practice.) Slow, unreliably progress is standard, and there’s no guarantee of return on invested time. Feedback solves these problems. Here’s the how-to.
The New Method's How-To
Focusing discs specially designed to facilitate feedback are available online at StraightLineMeditation.com. (A spot on the floor will do in a pinch.) Simply focus with a gentle gaze on the bull’s eye. Visual distortion (the sensation of light) will appear, signaling attention. Shift your attention to the light. When your mind wanders, your eyes will wander and the light will vanish. That’s your signal to re-focus on the bull’s eye. (Don’t follow the old advice: “Go into the light.” The light is feedback, your anchor for attention. Hold on!) Hold on to feedback and you hold on to attention. Feedback guarantees it.
Meditating in Circles versus Straight Line Meditation
Traditional meditation wanders. When you stop wandering you cover ground fast. Feedback guides you straight to your goal, taking you further, faster than any prior method. You’ll find detailed instruction for all practice levels and self-tests to guide you in STRAIGHT LINE MEDITATION by Carol E. McMahon, Ph.D. with Master Deac Cataldo. See the light. Your Guru will be awed.
Other Articles Online
"Why The Best Meditation Requires Feedback," PositiveArticles.com
"The Sure Way to Happiness: Solve a Prioblem You Don't Know You Have," by Carol E. McMahon, Ph.D. Selfgrowth.com
"Meditation Reinvented: How Feedback Betters The Odds Of Success," by Carol E. McMahon, Ph.D. TheFreeLibrary.com
"The Impossible Made Easy: How Feedback Tames the Restless Mind," by Carol E. McMahon, Ph.D. EzineArticles.com
"How To Meditate Better: Much Better With Feedback," by Carol E. McMahon, Ph.D. ehow.com
"Meditate Like A Rock Star," by Carol E. McMahon, Ph.D. HubPages.com
"How 'Awake' Are You? Seven Reliable Tests Of Enlightenment," by Carol E. McMahon, Ph.D. ArticleSnatch.com
"Is It Really Love? Twelve Eye Opening Tests Of Love In Relationships," by Carol E. McMahon, Ph.D. GoArticles.com
"Don't Waste Time Meditating! Make Every Second Count With Feedback," by Carol E. McMahon, Ph.D. ArticleSnatch.com
"How To Meditate Better Than Your Guru: Why Feedback Assures Success, By Carol E. McMahon, Ph.D. ArticleSnatch.com
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