Meditation

“Through meditation, people reach the divine experience of realising the Atma within themselves. Through meditation, spiritual aspirants are able to cast off sheaths of ignorance, layer after layer. They withdraw their sense perceptions from contact with worldly objective experiences. The process that aims at this holy consummation deserves to be called meditation. For this process, one must be equipped with good habits, discipline, and high ideals. One must be full of renunciation toward worldly things and their attractions. Whatever the situation, one should conduct oneself with enthusiasm and joy. Whatever is done must be dedicated not for the eking out of a livelihood but for earning Atmic bliss (Atma-ananda).” – Sathya Sai Baba (Dhyana Vahini, chapter II)

What is meditation?

There are three stages: concentration, contemplation, and meditation.

Concentration – The moment you are fixing your gaze on this form
Contemplation – When this form moves away after sometime, you still look at this form with your mental eye
Meditation – This form gets imprinted in your heart permanently.

As you go on meditating thus, the form remains in your heart permanently. At present, you are confining your spiritual practice to concentration and contemplation only. These two stages are only transitory. It is true that the first step in your spiritual practice is concentration. Concentration has to be transformed into contemplation and later into meditation. In this final stage of meditation, you will continue to visualise the form of God even if you close your eyes.

– Sathya Sai Baba (Sathya Sai Speaks, Vol 42, Ch 5: 23 February 2009)

What are the benefits of meditation?

“Just as soap is necessary to make this external body clean, repetition of the divine name, meditation, and remembrance (smarana) are needed to clean the interior mind. Just as food and drink are needed to keep the body strong, contemplation of the Lord and meditation on the Atma are needed to strengthen the mind. Without this food and drink, the mind will just totter this way and that. As long as the waves are agitating the top, the bottom cannot be seen. When the waves of desire agitate the waters of the mind, how can one see the base, the Atma? The tottering causes the waves and is caused by want of food and drink. So, clean the mind with contemplation of the Lord. Feed it with meditation on the Atma. Only meditation and spiritual practice (sadhana) can clean the depths of the mind and give it strength. Without purity and strength, the Atma recedes into the distance and peace flees.”
Sathya Sai Baba (Dhyana Vahini, chapter V)

Types of meditation

Sri Sathya Sai Baba has outlined two different types of meditation practices and you can access these on YouTube via the links provided below.

Light (Jyoti) meditation – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3gKSl82olc
Soham meditation – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJWkUs6aXeU

Best practice for effective meditation
The best time for meditation is the quiet hours before dawn, between 3 and 5 am
A shower is not necessary unless that is the only way to feel awake
The place for meditation should be a little elevated – an inch or two from the ground and covered with a cloth or a grass mat with a cloth on top
Sit in the lotus position
The hands should rest gently on your lap
The eyes must be half open or fully closed

– Sathya Sai Baba (Dhyana Vahini, chapter I)

 How to get involved?

Many Centre, Regional and National programmes include some form of meditation, whether that be a minute’s silence after group devotional singing to absorb the divine vibrations created or jyoti light meditation. All are welcome to take part in these meditations. For details of the Sai Centre or Group nearest to you, please click here [ADD LINK].