The rest stage: In the fourth stage, lie down on the floor in shava-asana, the corpse pose to internalize what all you have just done, experienced and assimilated. There’s no music in the fourth stage. You just listen to your own breathing – inhalation, exhalation, inhalation, exhalation.
Follow the steps below to begin the spirited meditation:
Loosen your body by gently shaking your limbs.
Breathe deep a few times to normalize your breath.
Turn on the music and start dancing to its rhythm.
Start by gently swinging and swaying to the music. This is the first stage. Pay attention to your breath. You may not be able to hear your breath since there’s music playing in the background, and that’s fine. Just be aware of your inhalation and exhalation as you dance to the slow rhythm.
In stage two, as the music builds up, follow your heart’s voice (or your body’s movements) and simply just dance. Dance away all that’s stored in you and causing you any grief at all. Release the energy inside you.
Slow down again to a different piece of music in the third stage. Just flow. Follow the six principles of meditation. You are just dancing and flowing with the melody, rhythm and notes of your music.
When the music stops, in the fourth stage, simply lie down on your back. Just rest and watch your breath and it’ll harmonize your energies.
Spirited meditation is a wonderful way of releasing the pent up energy and even excess calories in the most meditative way possible. It is a great way of introducing meditation to youngsters. Even as adults, some days when you feel restless or too full of energy, when you just can’t sit down and meditate, you could do this meditation instead. A wave of joy will wash over you making you feel light both physically and mentally.
No matter the nature of your meditation, walking the path of meditation requires certain virtues a meditator must acquire. Righteous living makes meditation a whole lot easier. For, when we lead a virtuous life, our mind slows down on its own. A noble conduct and a pure heart burns restlessness and negativity in no time, like fire would burn a cottonball.
The Mother of Meditation
A seeker approached a master to learn meditation from him. “There’s one condition,” the master said. “You are allowed to speak only four words every time you cross a milestone on the path.”
“I can do that.”
“Each milestone may take six years.”
The seeker swallowed and confirmed that the master indeed said six years and not six weeks or months.
“Yes, six years.”
He agreed to follow the instructions and began his meditation in the monastery.
At the first chance of speaking after six long years, the first four words he uttered in front of his master were, “Bed is too hard.”
The master said nothing. Another stretch of six years ensued, at the end of which the disciple unable to contain his annoyance said, “Food is always cold.” Once again the master did not reply. Another six years later, the disciple said, “I am leaving you!” “Yes, be gone,” the master said. “All I’ve seen you do in the last 18 years is complain, complain and complain.”
One would think that if the disciple had just one chance of speaking to his master after so long, the four words could or would have had some veneration, reverence or gratitude for his master. It may also seem a little too harsh on the part of his master to act in the manner he did. But the truth is that the master knew something which most of us remain unaware of: a talkative mind. In all probability, that’s all the disciple contemplated on for 18 years – he thought about what wasn’t right. Rather than understanding the essence of meditation, he complained in his mind for eighteen long years.
The goal of meditation is not to sit stiff and become a lifeless serious yogi who fails to smile in the happiness of others or cry in their pain. It is to become an embodiment of love and peace. Love and peace don’t germinate in a compassionless or loveless heart, they don’t cultivate in a mind that is not ready.
There’s a reason why Patanjali put yama (moral injunctions) and niyama (fixed observances) long before meditation. He states in the Yoga Sutras:
ahimsa satyaasteyabrahmacaryaaparigrahahyamah.35
Non-violence, truth, abstention from stealing, continence, and absence of greed for possessions beyond one’s need are the five pillars of yama.
Regarding fixed observances, he says:
Saucasantosatapahsvadhyayaisvarapranidhananiniyamah.
Cleanliness, contentment, religious zeal, self-study and surrender of the self to the supreme Self or God are the niyamas.36
The path of yoga, according to Patanjali, starts with practising restraint and discipline. There’s a good reason for that. To begin with, a virtuous life leads to a calm mind, and it’s much easier to meditate with a calm mind. That’s not all, though.
The sages of the yore realized tens of thousands of years ago that not everyone who sought bliss needed to meditate. Many realized the same state by serving the mankind, or by doing devotional service, or even by leading a simple and meaningful life. Meditation is the means to an end. It is designed to lead you towards a calmer and even state. Such quietude doesn’t mean you become cold and indifferent and only focus on your practice of meditation. On the contrary, it helps you to feel the pain of others so you may share their grief, their sorrows. For meditation to truly work, a serious mediator ought to imbibe certain qualities. For, a virtuous life is the mother of meditation.
Compassion
A young man was mugged, beaten and left for dead on a street. As he lay there bruised, wounded and unconscious, a man passing by, who happened to be a psychiatrist, rushed to the victim. “My goodness,” he exclaimed, “whoever did this really needs help!”
The victim needs assistance and the culprit compassion, either way, they both need help. If the victim is not offered help, he may die and if the culprit is not extended help, he may kill someone else. At any rate, it’s a loss to our world.
Of all the virtues any human being can ever possess, compassion by far is the most important one. It is the seed of goodness. For compassion is love, it is forgiveness, it is at once divine. A path, no matter how good is its system of meditation or how erudite are its scriptures, that does not encourage and inspire you to be compassionate is not worth treading.
When I use the word compassion, I mean it in absolute sense which means that you show it to everyone to the best of your abilities. When we are compassionate or forgiving only sometimes, it means that we are doing so at our convenience, it means we still think that there’s a choice more reasonable than compassion. True compassion is not based on the cause or the action, it is simply a virtue, a response, an emotion, a feeling that we choose over any other.
The lives of the greatest sages have been full of compassion but one thing that stands out throughout the New Testament is the innocence and compassion of Jesus Christ, the messiah who became God’s lamb as he paid the price of compassion with his own life.