A Buddhist Meditation on Abiding with God
Hosted by Sangha Live
Transcribed, edited and adapted from the first of 60 minute sessions of five sessions on Liberation of the Heart between Monday 9 December to Friday 13 December 2024. See link to recordings at near foot of page.
A warm welcome. I will offer a guided meditation, secondly a talk on the theme, and respond to questions. This is how we will explore the hour together. Let me give a brief introduction to the Guided Meditation on the Brahma-Viharas.
We will start with a minute or two of silence together.
The word Brahma literally means God. This is the word in Sanskrit and Pali used at the time of the Buddha. Brahma is Allah in Arabic, Jehovah in Judaism and God in Christianity. Vihara means to Dwell With or Abide With. This is Brahma-Vihara. The Sanskrit word is also parallel in meaning To Enter the Kingdom of God.
Buddhists often translate Brahma Viharas as Divine Abidings rather than Abiding with God. Brahma indicates the Immeasurable. You can use the word Immeasurable if you wish.
Guided meditation on Abiding with God, with the Immeasurable.
A 20 minute or so meditation.
I will say a sentence or two followed with a pause of about 30 - 45 seconds (between paragraphs in text) before the next sentence or two.
Your physical presence is a significant contribution to your inner, emotional feeling, mental presence. Sit with a tall, upright posture with two feet firmly on the ground.
Your eyes may be closed or open or half open. Give a real sense of presence to the immediacy of life, not as a goal, not as the End, but as a step towards clarity and realization.
Experience stillness, presence, stay calm and steady.
Breathe in mindfully. Breathe out mindfully. Be a conscious human being. Be conscious of stillness, silence, and the voice of the speaker, as words move through the silence to your ears.
In this immediate experience, as the Buddha pointed out, we are also mindful of what is not present, not relevant. We were born. Our parents, schooling, past experiences, knowledge, have little significant relevance right now. There is no shape to consciousness, age or size. Silence is primary
The voice passes through the silence. You experience subtle heat element such as warmth, coolness, light on the eyes, saliva in the mouth, shape of the body.
There is no superficiality and absence of indulging in the self - what I was, what I am now or what I might be or will be. This guided meditation reveals a receptivity, a quiet abiding.
If you are comfortable with religious language, like the Buddha , you become closer to abiding with God, with the Immeasurable.
The formations of our mind, construction of our thoughts, are measurable, a constant state of change, as well as views of the past, present and the future.
We compare thoughts dwelling in the field of measurability, judgments, approval and disapproval. There is identity with the nation state, work, family as well as comparing, and measuring ourselves.
Right now, all of this is quiet, not relevant. There is an abiding closer to God where consciousness sees the emptiness of all the agitated stuff going on in heart and mind.
You cannot measure how deep you are abiding. Why is that? The deep is Immeasurable. You might ask the inner life a beautiful question. “Where is the love?”
We believe we find love in the heart. This sets a boundary to love. Love includes the heart but also goes deeper than feelings and emotions.
We cannot limit the immeasurable, nor love, nor confine ourselves to pleasant feelings of love. Love reveals in silence stillness and receptivity, so we become authentically conscious human beings.
In total stillness, in total silence, we lose our will power, organically, naturally. God moves closer to us so we know a genuine sense of the Immeasurable.
Free from the spell of identification with mind-body, feelings-thoughts, we know the deep significance of Brahma-Vihara confirmed in the processes and outflows of our daily life.
The experience of God communicates to us a confirmation of the deep.
Immeasurable love, active compassion, appreciative joy and the capacity to stay steady to abide in equanimity confirm the Immeasurable. Abiding with God, we stay well established amidst immense challenges or none.
We dwell grateful for the presence of God in our life.
The Immeasurable abides close at hand. The truth of that never changes.
To listen to recordings
www.mindfulnesstrainingcourse.org