One method I have used in the past is to look at each thought that come up in your inner dialog, and then just let it float away. I kind of visulised it floating off in my mind. If you try to push the thoughts away they just get stronger. You do want to get to a state where the dialog is gone.
That said, this is not very easy for most people, and can take lots of practice, so keep at it.
don
I think you just need to focus on your breath. Don’t worry about whether you’re doing it right or whatever, just focus on your breath.
“Access To Insight” is a good website on Theravada Buddhism. It has lots of information on meditation if you look around.
“Audio Dharma” has free recordings of meditation lessons.
[mod]Direct links towards vendors are not allowed on the forum. I deleted them and just let the name.[/mod]
Sorry, didn’t realise they sold anything.
I think everything they offer is free actually, I just had another look, did I miss something?
I think that’s the difficult bit for most people, it certainly is for me.
To try and answer literally: “blanking your mind” is possible by letting every thought (the chatting of the inner voice) that comes up drift away, or end it, or stop thinking it. (I hope one of these phrases makes sense.) In my case, there’s a new thought coming up half a second later, and then I have to let go of that thought.
Each time you practise you can keep your mind blank for a little bit longer. In the beginning “a little bit longer” is one or maybe a few seconds, but don’t let it discourage you - you’ll get better!
To concentrate on one’s breathing is simply a help: Concentrating on one thing is supposed to make it easier to let all the other thoughts drift away.
As for books: I don’t think you need a book (wikipedia is usually a good source of information, but if you want to buy one, browse in a library first, and see which book you’re comfortable with. Buying one you haven’t looked into makes no sense (IMHO), and I’d keep away from books who promise too much.
Centering Prayer is very practical too. It also improves your awareness and self-reflection also.
Hi guys. I just started getting into meditation, and at the moment i’m working on building concentration. By counting my breaths, then when i’ve done that for a while, i’ll move to following my breathing which is slightly harder. After I build concentration, I don’t know where i’ll go then.
I can see how meditation can be useful in the WILD technique especially, because you develop the concentration which is needed.
I know that whenever I do my specific brand of meditation, I usually have an LD that night. This may just be me, but I try to do it once a weekend.
Problem is, it takes time. Probably a few hours of delving into the realm of conscious thought. Afterwards, though, I feel like I’ve expanded my cosmic self, and that’s always a good time 
Mindfulness meditiation linked to melatonin increase.
…and there are a bunch of other results if you google “meditation melatonin.” I won’t try to theorize the mechanisms involved, but regular meditation right before bed should increase your nightly melatonin levels, and melatonin being what it is I can only assume it would lead to, at the least, better sleep and more interesting dreams, if not an outright LD.
I do CP for the minimum time of 20 mins every day.
I have had a very realistic level LD since I’ve begun it.
Just out of curiosity, has anyone ever tried meditation in a dream?
Back on topic: Zazen meditation was mentioned earlier and not much was said about it, but zazen meditation is an excellent way to build up concentration. And with better concentration other meditation practices, and probably WILD, become that much more fruitful.
I don’t believe I’ve ever tried meditation.
You should give it a shot. It is an excellent tool for the spirit and everyday life. And seems to help with lucid dreaming.
I don’t even know the methods. Is it just sitting still and focusing? Like the counting in MILD?
Such as a lucid dream? Once after reading about that elsewhere on the forum, I managed to remember it during a lucid dream of mine. Unfortunately, I never got around to it, since I shortly woke up afterwards. Since then, I’ve never been able to remember to meditate during a lucid dream.
In a sense, yes. However, you need something to focus on, and you were very close when it comes to the counting part. In one form of meditation, Mindfulness of Breathing, you count your breaths, in and out, to ten. There are also other forms of meditating, and although I try to meditate daily, (that doesn’t always happen) 
I’m not close to being a meditation teacher. I learned all I know about meditation from Wildmind. 
Some people tried, for instance Flo. She said she had greater effects with mantras during LD’s. A friend of mine just tried some days ago repeating mantras in the lotus position. He didn’t notice something special but it was just his first try.
I think a dream would be the only way to get myself into a full lotus position.
Cool, I figure since you are in SP already and your brain makes more unusual connections forgetting the body would be extremely easy, like once you entered the realm of the mind your character and all others would just cease to exist, and the latter would lead to just that much more insight and creativity of the mind. If I could only get more LD’s in I would give it a try myself, soon hopefully.
I honestly just let loose all my interset and knowledge in meditation over the past months. I don’t know how or why, but lucid dreams just come to me now. Sort of like my desire to lucid dream and have a more peaceful mind was recognized by my subconscious.
There are a lot of different types and depths of meditation. I’ve combined a few different techniques that I have picked up into a sequence that I usually follow when I meditate. I’ll describe it here in case anyone wants to try it out:
First I prepare my body for meditation by lying down and flexing each set of muscles individually while breathing in and then relaxing the muscle with exhalation. I start with my toes, then feet, then calves, et c. and end with exagerated facial expressions, like smiling really big and squenching my forhead.
Breathing should always come from your stomach before filling up the upper lungs and should be slow and full.
After this I usually do some leg stretches so I can slowly work into full lotus position. Then I sit up straight and focus my mind for meditation by practicing a type of meditation where you basically observe your thoughts. Instead of trying to repress your thoughts to clear your mind, what you do is listen to or observe your thoughts as they become conscious. Once you acknowledge a thought it will return to the void on its own. At first I would have fairly long trains of though before I noticed my mind had been wandering, so when this happened I would think back to the origin of that train and then the whole train of thought is seen and you start to learn about how you think and how much time you spend thinking about things that are really not worth thinking about. Eventually the thoughts will scarcify themselves and your mind will become much more clear throughout the day as well as directly following the meditation.
Once the mind is relatively clear I practice awareness meditation. The way I practice awareness meditation utilizes somatic memory, which is basically memory that is stored as bodily sensations. This stage of my meditation directs attention to different parts of the body waiting for different bodily sensations and when they happen, observing them. I usually start off this segment by focusing on the breath and its sensations because they are easy to start with. Then I will notice tremors or maybe heat on an area of the body or tingling sensations. Some of these will evoke somatic memories, which should be explored and connected with your explicit(biographical) memory. If a sensation isn’t directly attached to some memory it is best to feel the sensation fully and try to expand your attention to areas surrounding it. Eventually this can lead to being aware of your entire body at once and even being aware of your subtle body.
After sustaining bodily awareness for a while I somtimes expand to environment awareness. This involves listening to the sounds happening all around you as well as being aware of any changes happening in the light on your eyelids, et c. Other times I will go into meditating on the chakras instead of environment awareness. I won’t go into chakras because it’s a pretty extensive topic. There is plenty of information online and in books however if you are more interested in them.
Hopefully some of that was helpful to someone and sorry about the lengthiness.
hi 
so anyone can help me?
i am not very newbie to meditation…
i think i dont want to meditate, despite its totaly awsome…
i fear that if i meditate i will loose many many things:
habits, ye, 
bad habits and so on… stupid tv, and i wont waste time to pc, and games, and doing nonsence…
what could you suggest?
oh… so no one wants to answer me, and i registered just for this question…
no one met similar experience and fear to loose something ? or no one meditates?
hey okay7, give it some time 
also your question isn’t very clear, what exactly do you want to know?
to LD4all