During recent decades, various parts of the world and the West may in particular have suffered lots of changes. Political changes took place as well as social and cultural changes, as well as significant changes in technology. We could almost say that in recent decades, the world, and especially the West, has seen more changes than during any other historical period of equal duration.
With regard to human affairs at least, we have seen during this period a constantly accelerating pace of change. It seems that there are more and more changes, fewer temps.Auparavant, when the pace of life was slower and people had time to "grow up", could take over many generations before a change in a particular area of life becomes visible. But it is not so. Now, these changes are noticed in a generation, even in the space of ten years - or five. And we see these changes more rapidly in virtually all areas of life and human endeavors, be they political, social, economic or cultural.
But we consider here only one of those areas that practice to use a term, neutral and generally call the cultural field. In this particular field, one of the largest and potentially one of the most important change of recent concern about meditation.
There are fifteen or twenty years, the West had hardly heard of meditation. Knowledge or interest in this connection that existed was confined to groups and individuals obscure eccentrics. But today we can say that almost everyone has heard the term "meditation". However, although the term is widespread, this does not mean what it means - what meditation really - to be truly understood.
Many times I heard people say "meditate is not to think, create a vacuum. ". Others think that meditation means just sit and do nothing. Sit and do nothing can be - and should not be - a good thing, but it is not meditation. Sometimes you hear so to speak, or even you read that meditation is to sit and navel gazing, perhaps squinting, or that it is "entering a trance" (it is unfortunate that a known author and generally reliable books on Buddhism has to some extent popularized the term "trance" as being synonymous with meditation). Other people think that meditation is just sit quietly and think about things, "things back in his mind." Still others think it is to put ourselves in a kind of hypnotic state. And these are just some of the misunderstandings most popular and most widespread of meditation.
The reason for these misunderstandings seems pretty obvious. Meditation is relatively new in the West, at least in the modern West. There is nothing like it in the range of our experience in recent history at least. We do not even have adequate words, specialized terms adequate to describe the states of meditation and its processes. It is therefore quite natural that initially there is misunderstanding.
With regard to human affairs at least, we have seen during this period a constantly accelerating pace of change. It seems that there are more and more changes, fewer temps.Auparavant, when the pace of life was slower and people had time to "grow up", could take over many generations before a change in a particular area of life becomes visible. But it is not so. Now, these changes are noticed in a generation, even in the space of ten years - or five. And we see these changes more rapidly in virtually all areas of life and human endeavors, be they political, social, economic or cultural.
But we consider here only one of those areas that practice to use a term, neutral and generally call the cultural field. In this particular field, one of the largest and potentially one of the most important change of recent concern about meditation.
There are fifteen or twenty years, the West had hardly heard of meditation. Knowledge or interest in this connection that existed was confined to groups and individuals obscure eccentrics. But today we can say that almost everyone has heard the term "meditation". However, although the term is widespread, this does not mean what it means - what meditation really - to be truly understood.
Many times I heard people say "meditate is not to think, create a vacuum. ". Others think that meditation means just sit and do nothing. Sit and do nothing can be - and should not be - a good thing, but it is not meditation. Sometimes you hear so to speak, or even you read that meditation is to sit and navel gazing, perhaps squinting, or that it is "entering a trance" (it is unfortunate that a known author and generally reliable books on Buddhism has to some extent popularized the term "trance" as being synonymous with meditation). Other people think that meditation is just sit quietly and think about things, "things back in his mind." Still others think it is to put ourselves in a kind of hypnotic state. And these are just some of the misunderstandings most popular and most widespread of meditation.
The reason for these misunderstandings seems pretty obvious. Meditation is relatively new in the West, at least in the modern West. There is nothing like it in the range of our experience in recent history at least. We do not even have adequate words, specialized terms adequate to describe the states of meditation and its processes. It is therefore quite natural that initially there is misunderstanding.
