Blank mind or altered state?

imageI run a regular meditation group. As I explain at the start of each session my mind is a blank. I wait for my Guides to inspire me with whatever meditation is going to meet the needs of the people in the group. It has taken me a long time to get comfortable with this blank mind feeling. Thoughts disappear. There is no logical processing going on. I am speaking in a random, but somehow ordered, string of sentences. I am aware but not fully conscious of my thoughts. They are in the background like a quiet track of information that I no longer pay any attention to.

It’s interesting to recall that it took me quite a while to grasp how to meditate. I remember trying to force my thoughts to stop. My aim was for my mind to be blank, silent, quiet. Yet the thoughts kept coming. I would do my shopping list, my to do list, re-run conversations, make holiday plans and a thousand other things whilst trying to ‘be in the moment’ following the words my mediation teacher was saying. If I did manage to visualise anything that she was talking about I would rush on ahead or be hanging back caught up in the detail of what I was ‘seeing’. I often returned back to the room, so to speak, feeling like meditation & me would never be freinds. How far it seems I have come.

It’s easy to forget those earlier struggles, the amount of time it took me to learn that fighting for the thoughts to go away only brought them closer, and that my own body would take a hand in distracting me too. Mediumship is working in an altered state so that you can access and translate the energy flow that we don’t notice with our physical senses. To work effectively giving messages, healing or channelling, or to tune into the events going on around me but below the surface I have to have a ‘blank’ mind. Now I drop off into that altered state so easily. So much so that I function in an altered state for a lot of my day.

To people who rely on rational, logical though processes (& I used to be one of them) it might sound like a nightmare. Switching off thoughts and being guided by feelings or intuition? There is a part of our social conditioning that encourages us to see the world as solid, with boundaries, and predictability. When I’m waiting for my Guides to speak, or for the creative inspiration to light up my mind, or when I’m accessing information that has been hidden to me, it can feel liberating but scarey too. The fear comes from the logical structured side of me. The feeling of freedom is from my imagination, at last allowed to run wild, flowing wherever the energy goes. Some people never get the hang of meditation. Their concious mind refuses to let go. The idea of a blank canvas upon which to create is too big.

It took me many attempts and three years of practice to really find my way into that altered state of freedom. I’m glad I didn’t give up on meditation. In the space where everyday life takes a back seat I have met & conversed with my Guides, Energy Beings, my loved ones. I have resolved and cleared stuck energy. I have felt wrapped in unconditional love. I have entered the rooms in my mind where fear was squatting and I have chucked fear out the door. Meditation brings about a sense of calm as the tumble of thoughts fades into the background. It is a precious skill that we can all learn if we choose to. Is it time for you to allow your mind to be blank?

Day 108 of my blogging challenge.