6. MEDITATION 2 (Ten Fingers & the Jesus Prayer)

[Mysti]

6. MEDITATION 2 (Ten Fingers & the Jesus Prayer)




THE TEN-FINGER MEDITATION


The ten-finger meditative technique is adapted from a method presented by John Gray in his excellent book: How to Get What You Want and Want What You Have. You may recognize him from his very instructive earlier book: Men Are From Mars, Women Are From Venus. John Gray has an interesting background. As a young man he spent nine years in a monastery in Switzerland. Now, he is married with two daughters.




Preparation:


This meditation works better if you are seated in an arm chair. As outlined in the earlier lesson on the 4x4 Meditation method, you want to remember to be seated in a comfortable chair, to make sure your neck and body are comfortable, to be in a quiet place without bright lights and without distractions. It is recommended by Dr. Gray that if you perform this meditative exercise, you do it for fifteen minutes, twice a day. Be sure to have a seed-question as described in the 4x4 Meditation lesson. In preparation for this meditation, you will first want to write down the mantra you are going to use. Have this mantra written down where you can read it if your mind slips and forgets it. You may also need a cloth in your lap if there is the possibility that your hands, when resting in your lap, would otherwise touch bare skin (your legs). You may also want to decide on a seed-question, as described in the 4x4 meditation. You do not need to have a seed-question as this mantra works well without using a seed-question.




Preliminary Thoughts:


It's good to turn the palms up, like you are ready to receive something. It's a good psychological ploy to use on your mind–on your subconscious. The mind becomes expectantly open to receiving. Remember that the mind is like a receiving station in the whole ocean of human thought.


I sat for training for a period with a mystic who had studied under a guru in India. He urged us to meditate each morning about dawn. He warned us that at dawn we would probably receive impressions from the communications traffic of a nearby airport control tower. And, of course, we were instructed to disregard that input. Sure enough, I did sometimes become aware of the control tower messages to the planes landing and taking off while doing my meditations at dawn. This mind interference is one reason why

monastics and yogis into the meditative paths do tend to select rather remote spots for their monasteries and ashrams.


St. John of the Cross says that when going into deep meditation you have to push through the cloud of human thought into the clear "air" above or outside that cloud of general human thought. When you are meditating on something on the earth-plane, like finding a new job, wondering how to relate more effectively with your employer, etc., you are seeking answers from within that human thought cloud. Eventually, you will want to develop the ability to push through the cloud of human thought to more spiritual levels, but it is well to develop the ability to meditate, to receive answers to the more earth-level issues before attempting to push on to the spiritual levels.



Seed Questions:

Remember, in choosing your seed-question, that your inner child, the subconscious does want to please, does want to give you the right answers, does want to help you as much as it can. But it's suspicious as to whether you really want the answers and, as I’ve emphasized before, the child does not understand negatives. So, you don’t want to ask as a seed-question: "How can I convince the judge not to put me in jail?" The inner child sees "jail" in your mind and doesn’t see or understand the "not." It would be better to ask "How can I convince the judge to find me innocent?" Here, the child sees, "Find me innocent." Always form your seed-questions in a positive way. Instead of "How can I stop fighting with my spouse?" you might ask "How can my spouse and I live together more harmoniously?" Never put into a seed-question any word or phrase that has a negative connotation. Don’t ask: "How can my spouse and I stop bickering?" The inner child picks up on the word "bickering." But, asking "How can my spouse and I discuss matters in a loving, harmonious way?" would be a winner. Your inner self sees and catches onto the words "loving" and "harmonious."



Mind Chatter:

Mind chatter is the biggest problem for all who meditate. That's why the ten-finger meditation is so effective. You keep the mind occupied with the constant repetition of a mantra: "Oh God, my heart is open to you. Come and dwell in my heart." Then, there's not much opportunity for the mind to chatter nor to wander in its thoughts. And, at the same time, you can be aware of what's going on behind the repetitive mantra–your seed-question. Eventually, the mind will give up, sometime in the next 1,333 years (hopefully much sooner) and accept being quiet. Actually, we do want to get to the stilled-mind state, because there are all sorts of exciting things to do when we can achieve that state quickly and easily–maybe, astral adventures or remote viewing. And, you will develop the ability to consciously attend astral classes on spiritual progress, classes which will be much more advanced than anything I can teach.

The Mantra:

In this technique, you will use a mantra, a short affirmation that you repeat over and over again throughout the meditation. The mantra is first said out loud and then silently. The mantra takes this form as John Gray presents it:

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Oh God [or your Power Name] my heart is open to you. Please come and sit in my heart.

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Now, you can use any Power Name or phrase that you are comfortable with. The Power Name might be "Divine Mother," "Heavenly Father," "Lord Christ Jesus," "Christ Light," "Lord Buddha," "Great Spirit," "Spiritual Light," "Krishna," "Universal Source," "Allah," or any other of the one hundred names of Allah or any of the ten names of God in the Torah, or any of the titles of the Buddha. Use whatever works for you. An atheist could use "Future of Humanity" or "Infinite Consciousness," "My Inner Light," etc. The Power Name you use is your choice. Also, you might want to change the wording of the mantra. I find that the word "sit" does not work comfortably for me. So, I substitute the word "dwell." "Reside" or "live" might be acceptable substitutions too. One form that a Christian might use is:

<DIR> <DIR>
Oh Lord Christ Jesus [or your Power Name] my heart is open to you. Please come and dwell [you can use "sit" or "live" or "reside" or whatever feels right to you] in my heart.

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Repeating "Lord Jesus come dwell in my heart" might tend to suggest to the inner child that Jesus [or your Power Name] is not yet dwelling in your heart. So, you may want to change the mantra to something like "Lord Jesus [or your Power Name] dwell in my heart forever." Be sure to write down in your Spiritual Journal whatever form of this affirmation that you are comfortable with.



The Meditation Process:

Seated in your chair, with your elbows resting on the arms of the chair, elevate your forearms so that they are perhaps almost vertical, say 15 to 30 degrees forward from the vertical. Spread your fingers apart so no finger touches another finger. Turn your hands so that you are looking at the palms–so the palms are up. You may alternately stretch your arms forward and somewhat elevated without resting the elbows on the chair arms; the palms should be turned somewhat palm up–whatever is comfortable for you. Then you begin to recite the mantra aloud with the Power Name you have selected. Allow the mantra’s rhythm, as you recite it each time, to harmonize with your breathing cycle. Hint: Wearing thin cotton gloves or interlacing your fingers with pieces of tissue may help keep the fingers isolated from each other.

Each time you recite the mantra, you will focus on one finger of your left hand, starting with the thumb (assuming you are holding your hands with palms up). As the fingers are elevated, you will become aware of a psychic energy in each finger. You recite the mantra, focusing on, first, the left thumb and feeling the energy that seems to issue toward the tip of the thumb. Then as

you say the mantra the second time, you focus your attention on the forefinger. It may help to envision the mantra as vibrating inside the finger you are focusing on. Then successively, you move your attention sequentially to each of the remaining fingers on your left hand, reciting this mantra once for each finger, finishing with your little finger. If it helps, you may slightly move the finger you are focusing on while you are reciting the mantra for that finger. When you have recited the mantra for each finger in the left hand, you move your attention to the fingers of the right hand. If your palms are up, continue the mantra with the little finger of the right hand and recite the mantra for each finger, moving sequentially finger-by-finger across to the right thumb. John Gray suggests that you think of the picture in the Sistine Chapel which portrays Adam reaching his finger out to God and think of the finger you are meditating on as reaching out like Adam’s finger to touch God. When you are finished, you will have recited the mantra ten times, once for each finger

[Mysti]

Here is a simple exercise that should convince you that psychic energy is real. Put your two forefingers together at the tips. Then think of, sort of mentally push, energy flowing down the left arm as you exhale and returning through the two touching fingers up the right arm as you inhale and mentally pull the energy up the right arm. Repeat this several times until you actually feel something going down your left arm and returning up your right arm. See that energy beginning at and returning to your heart chakra, a point in the center of your chest. Then very slowly and gradually, while continuing the breathing and "pushing" and "pulling," start pulling your fingers apart. You will see a faint ribbon of light or energy between these two fingers. See how far you can pull your fingers apart, still seeing that ribbon. You should be able to keep that ribbon out to, perhaps, three or four inches separation of your finger tips, maybe even more. If you want to experiment, think of the energy going down the left arm as having a color, say orange. Then see if the ribbon of light appears in that color or hue.

John Gray recommends that you do this ten-finger sequence aloud at least twice. After doing the sequence twice, twenty times (twice for each finger), if you have not yet felt a tingle in each finger as you said the mantra for that finger, go back and repeat the ten-finger cycle again. You might have to repeat this the ten-finger cycle a number of times before you recognize that special tingle in each finger as you say the mantra. You should by this time feel energy at the tips of each finger of both hands.

After you have recited a few ten-finger cycles using this mantra (at least two or more complete cycles), and felt the tingle in each finger, you may rest your hands, palms up, in your lap. Do not allow the fingers to touch each other and do not let them touch any bare skin. If needed, you should place a cloth in your lap before starting your meditation so that the fingers will make no contacts with bare skin. As you begin to rest your hands in your lap, do not break the rhythm of the mantra and your breathing. You now continue saying the mantra, but now silently (internally), and in harmony with your breathing.

Now, maybe your mind will wander or you will forget or get tangled up with the wording of the mantra. If you forgot the wording, open your eyes and look where you have it written down, in front of you. Do not be overly concerned if your mind wanders, it is a normal experience for

beginners. Just pull your mind back to your attention on your fingers and continue reciting the mantra. Now, this is hard to describe, but you do take a seed question into your meditation. You decided on the seed-question before you started the meditation. Now this continuing mantra runs continually: "Oh God, my heart is open to you, come dwell in my heart" over and over. Whenever your mind strays, pull your mind back to mantra and your fingers. You should feel or see the seed-question as just being there behind the mantra. The best I can describe this is that it is as if each repetition of the mantra becomes one picket on a picket fence and the seed-question becomes an object in the garden behind the fence. You sort of "see" the seed-question through or between each gap as you recite the mantra over and over again.



Results:

Again, do not expect instant results. You are implanting both the seed-question in your subconscious and the content of the mantra itself as well. Your answers will probably come some hours or days later, usually during a time when your mind is preoccupied with some mundane task. Often the answer will come during a time that you are doing some routine task that requires not much thought, when you are doing something dull and uninteresting like washing the dishes, mowing the lawn, driving your car, etc. You have to keep mind focused enough so you don't drop the dish or run the lawn mower into the flower bed, or bump into the car ahead of you, etc., but really the mind is not working very hard. And, there is the chance for your subconscious to say "Wow, I found the answer; now I can slip it into the conscious mind." The answer pops out at an unexpected moment. Not infrequently, the answer will come unexpectedly in something someone else says to you. So, you have to be alert. The answer seldom, if ever, comes with fire works or a flashing sign saying: "this is your answer."

Don't keep looking for the answer: You've planted the seed, don't keep digging it up to see if it's putting out roots and a stem. Or see it this way: The seed-question is the bait on a hook that you've put into the ocean of consciousness. If you keep pulling the hook out of the water to check the bait, you'll never land the fish. Now, should you try to fish with two fishing poles, each baited for the answer to a different question? Well, in the beginning, you are training your subconsciousness to do this work, to get these answers. I think (strictly my opinion) that it's better to concentrate on just one seed question at a time until your answer comes. And then, be grateful. Send all sorts of thanks, praise to your subconscious: "Wow, you did a wonderful job there!" Sending gratitude to your inner child makes the child eager to work with you.





A TECHNIQUE FOR SPIRITUAL GROWTH

A spiritual meditative technique which has been used by contemplatives in the Eastern Orthodox Churches, especially in the Russian Orthodox Church, is to recite what is called the Jesus Prayer: "Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy upon me" over and over again, continuously all day long, during all of their daily activities. Eventually, the starets or spiritual counselor will instruct you

to say this prayer a certain specific, exact number of times every day, perhaps 6,000 times a day. So, you have to count carefully each repetition, up to the exact 6,000. My own theory is that, in counting each repetition so carefully that you do accomplish exactly 6,000 repetitions, no more, no less each day, you are alerting the inner child to the importance of the Jesus Prayer or affirmation. I would, however, if using this technique, be inclined to pick a more positive affirmation. Perhaps, "I am in attunement with the Universal Source" or "Oh Lord Buddha, come into my heart." Other possibilities might be: "I am a Warrior of Light" or "The Light of the Christ shines brightly within me" or "The Great Spirit guides me on my path." These are just illustrations to give you an idea of what you might develop as your own personal mantra.

This technique may be found in The Way of a Pilgrim and its companion sequel, The Pilgrim Continues His Way, translated from the Russian by R. M. French. These two books are very much adventure stories and are quite easy and interesting to read. These two works are usually found bound together in one volume. .







HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT

1. Adapt the Ten Finger meditation technique to your own words. Be sure to write down the meditation affirmation, as you have adapted it, into your Spiritual Journal.

2. Try the ten-finger meditation technique for a few times this week. See if it works better for you then the 4x4 technique. If it does, then switch to this ten-finger method. Otherwise, continue with the 4x4 technique or one of its variants. Or, if you have your own technique and it really works for you, continue use that meditation technique.

Extra Credit: Try the Russian Orthodox affirmation technique, but using this technique with your own mantra.





SUGGESTED READINGS

John Gray: How to Get What You Want and Want What You Have.

R. M. French, translator: The Way of a Pilgrim and its companion sequel, The Pilgrim Continues His Way (translated from the Russian). Both books will be found together, published as a single paperback volume.





Copyright © 2001 Quinten Lance Corbenic