Follow us on
SUKHITA YOGA METHOD
  • Home
  • About Us
  • Schedule
    • Using Zoom
  • SUKHITA
    • Wholesome body wholesome mind 100hr course
    • Regular SYM Classes
    • SYM Courses
    • Sukhita Yoga Method Teacher Training SYMTT >
      • SYMTT Syllabus
    • SYM Workshops
    • SYM Retreats
    • Private SYM Classes
  • Mindfulness
    • Mindfulness training for Yoga Teachers
    • Mindfulness Courses
    • Mindfulness Day Retreats & Workshops >
      • Guidance for attending the Day of Mindfulness Practice retreat
    • Sukhita Yoga Method teacher training
    • Private Mindfulness Classes
    • Corporate Mindfulness >
      • Professional 1 : 1 programme
      • Allowing Leadership
  • Contact
  • Press
  • Links
  • Public Resources
    • Practice Videos
    • Privacy
  • Blog
  • Corporate Member Resources
  • Public Resources
  • Sukhita resources page
  • Schools Yoga and Meditation
  • New Page

​Calm and clear comprehension, two essential sides of a meditation practice by Hugh Poulton and Sarah Haden

3/10/2021

0 Comments

 
Picture

“Here feeling, thoughts and perceptions are understood as they arise, understood as they remain present, understood as they pass away. It is this way that you exercise clear comprehension. “ (Abbrev from SN 47.35)

Today we are increasingly familiar with popular practices to reduce stress, induce calm and promote wellbeing. They help fix uncomfortable feelings and quieten emotions. What’s often left unsaid and waiting to be explored is how a meditation practice can help us address the underlying cause of feeling out of balance, so we can really change deep seated patterns from a place of understanding and live more easily with what comes along to test us. This path is not so much about getting a quick fix and then needing another, as about an attitude to looking after ourselves through a practice which quietly, gradually and sustainably transforms us towards wholesome experience over time.

The calm we can be looking and hoping for in meditation is just one aspect of practice. Certainly it can give us a mental resting place from the overstimulation we are used to, but importantly it creates space for us to develop the clear comprehension that is vital for the quiet, gradual and sustainable internal transformation we’d find beneficial. When the aspects of calm and clear comprehension are developed together we are giving ourselves the best chance for a natural unfolding of this experience and wisdom.

How does this happen?

As our mind begins to calm we can develop a more subtle awareness around every day experiences. If we are careful we can consciously direct this awareness to observing how aspects of our experience begin, how they persist and how they subsequently fade away. This means paying particular attention to three aspects:

· The first of these is feeling meaning sensation. There is a reflex to sensation which we can learn to recognise as simply pleasant, unpleasant or neither pleasant or unpleasant.

· The second aspect is our thoughts, including images in our mind.

· Lastly our perceptions; the mental process that becomes aware of our experience and identifies through memory.

From this directed awareness the clear comprehension we need to progress can develop and it’s possible to see that all we take personally is actually impermanent. At this stage our meditation practice enables us to begin to address the underlying causes of feeling out of balance in daily life. Each time we meet movements of mind without getting involved, we are guiding our mind to re-balance and re-set to feel steady. It takes a particular kind of effort for this to fall into place with ease and we’ll be exploring what this means another time. When it does, our practice supports us to take the fuel away from the uncomfortable feelings and emotions that drag us down to transform our experience quietly, gradually and sustainably towards the wholesome.
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Authors

    Hugh Poulton SYT and Sarah Haden RYT are developers of the Sukhita Yoga Method. Their outside-the-box approach is fresh, direct & relevant, a product of Hugh’s 30+ years of yoga + mindfulness experience and Sarah’s contemporary perspective.

    Archives

    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    June 2021
    April 2021
    January 2021
    November 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    December 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    December 2018
    April 2018
    December 2017
    September 2017
    July 2017
    May 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017

    Categories

    All
    Beginings

    RSS Feed

Legal Disclaimer
Terms & Conditions 
​Privacy
©  Hugh Poulton, Yogaunlimited, 2019
Website created by Jackie Bradley