Stillness

Divine Life Society Publication: Meditation and Its Utility in Daily Life by Sri Swami Premananda

Om Sri Sadguru Paramatmane Namah

Modern man is unfortunately plagued by a nervous tension that makes it almost impossible for him to be quiet. If he actually wants to learn to pray he must first learn to be still, to quieten himself. In fact, this very quietness and stillness frequently becomes prayer when God manifests Himself in the form of STILLNESS.

Repeat the exercise of becoming aware of sensations in your body—whole body. This time start with the top of your head and end it with the tips of your toes, omitting no part of the body. Beware of every sensation in each part.... You may find some parts of your body completely devoid of sensation.... Dwell on these for a few seconds—if no sensation emerges, move on......

As you become more proficient in this exercise you will, hopefully, sharpen your awareness to the extent that there will be no part of your body in which you do not feel several sensations.... For the time being you must be content to dwell briefly on the blanks and move on to the parts where you feel more sensations—Move slowly from head to foot.... then once again, from head to foot..... and so on for some fifteen minutes. As your awareness sharpens you will pick up sensations that you hadn’t noticed before.... you may also pick up sensations that are extremely subtle, too subtle to be perceived by any but a man of deep as a whole. Feel the whole of your body as one mass of concentration and deep peace. Now become aware of yours body as a whole. Feel the whole of your body as one mass of various types of sensations.... Stay with this for a while, then return to the awareness by parts, moving from head to foot.... then, once again, rest in the awareness of your body as a whole......

Notice now the deep stillness that has come over you. Notice the complete stillness of your body.... Do Not, however, rest in the stillness to the extent of losing awareness of your body.... If you are getting distracted, give yourself the occupation of moving once again from head to foot, becoming aware of sensations in each part of your body. Then, once again, notice the stillness in your body. If you are practising this in a group, then at occasions, notice the stillness in the whole room.

It is very important that you do NOT move any part of your body while doing this Sadhana. This will be difficult at first, but each time feel the urge to move, or scratch, or fidget, become aware of this as sharply as you can.... Don’t give in to it.... It will gradually go away and you will become still once more........

It is extremely painful for most people to stay still. Even physically painful and you become physically tense, spend all the time you need becoming aware of the tension.... where you feel it, what it feels like.... and stay with it till the tension disappears.

You may feel physical pain, rather severe pain. No matter how comfortable the position or posture you have adopted, your body is likely to protest against the stillness by developing aches and pains in various parts. When this happens, a serious Sadhaka MUST RESIST the temptation to move limbs or read just posture so as to ease the pain. Just become keenly aware of the pain.

Your awareness may wholly be absorbed by the acute pain. You may start sweating, may be profusely. Your mind may think that you are going to faint with pain; at such moment firmly decide Not to fight it, Not to run away from it, Not to desire to alleviate it, but to become aware of it, to identify with it. Then you may see that the pain sensation is broken into its component parts and you may be surprised to discover that it is composed of many sensations viz., intense burning sensation a pulling and tugging, a sharp, shooting sensation which may merge every now and then.... and a point which may keep moving from one place to another.... This point you may identify as pain.... as you will keep up this exercise, you shall find that you are bearing the pain quite well—i.e., pain without suffering.

Every Sadhaka has to experience some types of pains, as indicated above, until his body becomes accustomed to remaining perfectly still. Deal with the pain through awareness. When your body finally does become still, you will have a rich reward in the QUIET BLISS that this stillness will bring you. The temptation to scratch is another frequent temptation with beginners. This is because, as their awareness of their body sensations sharpens, they become aware of itching and pricking sensations that were there all along but were hidden to awareness because of the psycho-physical hardening that most of us submit our bodies to and because of the grossness of their awareness. A Sadhaka must resist such temptations during awareness Sadhana.

 Excerpts from: Stillness - Meditation and Its Utility in Daily Life by Sri Swami Premananda