In this day and age it is well known how beneficial meditation can be to our mind, body and spirit. It has been proven that meditation can make us happier, improve our concentration, lower our stress levels and blood pressure, and even decrease chronic pain. More importantly however, the practice of meditation brings us inner peace and freedom, two tools that are often overlooked in our over chaotic modern society which we all desperately seek.
Through the regular practice of meditation we find that we need fewer outward distractions to keep us happy. This is because we begin to identify more and more with our inner self as opposed to our physical appearance. This is because meditation is powerful tool for spiritual growth and essentially takes us beyond the limitations (and therefore obsession) of the body as well as the mind.
Despite there being different "schools" and therefore techniques surrounding meditation, the end goal is the same - for the practitioner to reach the ultimate state of "bliss". This state of "bliss" occurs when the various layers (also referred to as "subtle bodies") that make up the body become completely aligned. Within various metaphysical teachings these bodies include the physical (of which we are most aware), the etheric, the emotional (or astral), the mental, and the causal (or spiritual).
Within Theosophical thought, the etheric body is the body closest to the physical and the one in which is termed as a "vehicle of prana" (or life energy). The emotional or astral body is the vehicle for our desires and emotions, while the mental body is the vehicle of what is termed as the "lower mind", that aspect of ourselves that works mainly in physical reality with facts, reason and logic. Finally, the causal body, which is the vehicle for the "higher mind", that aspect of ourselves connected with intuition, soul and spirit, our higher consciousness.
When all five of our bodies are aligned, the life energy, prana, flows freely between them, thus allowing us to experience a heightened state of joyfulness. Such a state is actually extremely natural however for many of us it appears somewhat overwhelming due to the fact that our subtle bodies are rarely completely aligned on a regular basis.
In order to be able to live our potential, we need to create a balance. We are, after all, spiritual beings living within a physical form. Meditation is one technique that has been proven to enable the alignment of our subtle bodies and thus enabling a more enriching balance between the "lower mind" and the "higher mind" that we can then use to benefit those around us.
Monday Night Meditations offer a great way to achieve this, allowing you to feel focused in the "here and now" and centred at the start of each working week. Taking place at The Goddess House every Monday evening (except for public holidays) the primary objective of these open meditation classes is to allow the attendee to develop and perfect the sacred art of meditation that will enable the alignment of their subtle bodies and therefore allowing the experience a heightened state of joyfulness to occur.
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