Salle Merrill Redfield - The Joy of Meditating: A Beginners Guide to the Art of Meditation

Copyright 1995 by Salle Merrill Redfield

All rights reserved.

Warner Books, Inc.,

Hachette Book Group

237 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017

Visit our website at www.HachetteBookGroup.com.

First eBook Edition: June 2009

ISBN: 978-0-446-56255-3

ALSO BY SALLE MERRILL REDFIELD

The Celestine Meditations

For my grandmothers,
Ruby Bray Merrill and Louise Caton Waller,
whom I have not been with in twenty years,
except in my meditations

My heartfelt thanks to: Gail Nelson for her unconditional love and encouragement, Albert Clayton Gaulden, who intuited this book long before I understood its reality, and most of all to James, whose constant support has been invaluable.

SALLE MERRILL REDFIELD is the author and narrator of The Celestine Meditations and lectures on meditation internationally. She lives in Florida with her husband, James Redfield.

Meditate upon these things; give thyself wholly to them; that thy profiting may appear to all.

1 TIMOTHY 4:15

by James Redfield

We live in a time of accelerating change. The normal pace of life, at work, in our communities, at home, continues to increase almost beyond our ability to cope. For many of us life has become a series of rapid, even frenzied readjustments, as we try to keep up with and sort through all the options and demands of modern life, both for ourselves and our children.

At the same time, we live in a period of high expectations. We seem to sense inside that life isnt meant to be that way, that a mental approach exists in which we can more easily handle these responsibilities and sudden challenges. We want to be in the flow, on top of our day-to-day lives, instead of constantly feeling behind and scrambling to put out fires.

For an increasing number of people, meditation is becoming an important tool for altering how we handle stress and for improving our ability to enjoy the pace. I dont know that anyone can adequately convey just what spending minutes a day in calm mindfulness really does. Certainly the research has shown that meditation leads to the bodily changes associated with deep relaxation and removal of tension. But the perceptual changes are even more dramatic.

Because the mind is cleared of the meaningless chatter and redundancy, we seem to have more time and clarity to tend to the necessary details. Time seems to slow down, and we can not only stay ahead of the game but also stop to smell the symbolic flowers. We can reflect and be. Of course, all these changes are experiential. No one can actually comprehend such a shift until one has felt the effect personally. This book is for those who are ready to give it a try.

I began to understand the full importance of meditation when I experienced a major life shift in 1989. During that year, I ended a seven-year marriage, sold my home, and moved away from my friends to another state. Due to the suddenness of this transition, I found myself living with a high degree of stress and anxiety. While I had meditated occasionally in the past, at this time I began to meditate on a daily basis.

After I moved, I learned of a group of people in my new town who met weekly to explore the technique of meditation and prayer. The group was led by a very intuitive woman, who helped us relax, feel loved, and connect with a higher aspect of ourselves. My sense of well-being and comfort with the visualizations steadily increased. I looked forward to the weekly meditations and developed a bond with the members of the group.

Each week when we came together, we joined our meditative intention in order to help one another find solutions to current life questions. Some of the time we would gain insights immediately. Other times we would feel the residual effects of the peaceful evening later as we gained more clarity. No matter how we felt when the meditation began, we all felt a great sense of well-being when it ended.

Later, through a series of synchronistic events, I was asked to become this groups meditation leader, a preparation, as it turned out, for the meditations I would lead two years later for thousands, as my husband, James Redfield, and I traveled internationally, speaking about his book, The Celestine Prophecy. It also created the foundation for the meditations I recorded on the audiotape, The Celestine Meditations. It was during this book tour that I discovered just how popular meditative practice had become.

Once associated with Eastern religion or esoteric Western schools of thought, meditation is now understood as an extremely relaxing and beneficial mental state, achievable by virtually anyone and on its way to becoming thoroughly established by science.

In Bill Moyerss now classic book and PBS special, Healing and The Mind, he explores the work and research of two nationally recognized leaders in the growing field of mind/body medicine: Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D., and Dean Ornish, M.D.

Jon is founder and director of the Stress Reduction Clinic at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center and has developed an international reputation for using yoga and meditation to help medical patients suffering from chronic pain and stress-related conditions.

Jons research through the Stress Reduction Clinic has shown the effectiveness of meditation in treating high blood pressure and anxietyand, more important, in helping to prevent these problems. Positive effects have included heightened sensitivity, increased control of emotions, and expanded creative ability.

Dr. Ornish is an assistant clinical professor of medicine and the director of the Preventive Medicine Research Institute at the School of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco. His research has demonstrated for the first time that coronary heart disease can be reversed by a disciplined program of improved diet, walking, and meditationwithout the use of drugs or surgery.

In my daily life, the time I take to meditate is vital. When I slow down, become mindful, and remember to breathe deeply, I discover a sense of peace within myself. One of my favorite ways to meditate is by walking in a natural environment. I find that as I walk through wooded areas or along the ocean shore, I feel a deep connection to a Divine source. I also gain mental clarity and experience an increase in my creative flow.

With the benefits of meditation becoming more known in our society, many individuals are expressing interest in exploring meditative practice for themselves. The purpose of this book is to make this goal easier by introducing, in a very general way, meditation that emphasizes relaxation and the art of imagery and visualization.

The following four meditations are intended to be user-friendly and adaptable regardless of your life situation. They are organized sequentially, so it is important to practice the first meditation before moving on to the others. Each meditation will take about fifteen to twenty minutes to complete. Take time to fully visualize each thought.

I suggest that you keep this book by your bedside. Use it when you wish to relax and focus your thoughts. But remember, to be effective the meditations must be read with mindfulness and positive intention. Open your heart and there you will find the joy of meditation.

T his meditation is designed to relax the muscles of the body and to reduce tension and anxiety. In the meditation experience, it is important that the body be relaxed before clearing the mind and opening ourselves to higher awareness. I recommend that you sit in a soft chair or stretch out on a bed or the floor. Very often, because of the stress most of us face in daily life, our bodies tend to develop tight, sore muscles at various locations.