If your spontaneous
response was “a water bottle,” look at it more closely, and
at greater length. Try studying it, or something like it,
intensively for five to fifteen minutes a day. If you are
able to do this, enjoy the challenge, and find it fruitful,
you might find samyama meditation of interest. It may have
particular attraction for the artistically or musically
inclined (the object in question can be aural as well as
visual, but it is better to begin with the visual). Samyama
meditation is discussed in Book III. 1 – 55: Vibhuti Pada
of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras. The Prabhavananda/Isherwood
translation and commentary, How to Know God: The Yoga
Aphorisms of Patanjali (Mentor) is a good introduction to
this text. Adapted for a Judeo-Christian audience, this
particular rendering often translates the term Purusha,
which refers to an advanced state of consciousness, as
“God.” It is strongly recommended that you read the entire
text through slowly and systematically, from beginning to
end.
|