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Kirtan Kriya (Sa Ta Na Ma Meditation)

2017-03-24T00:00:00Z

In Kundalini Yoga, there is an exercise known as "Kirtan Kriya". This is also known as a meditation technique called "Sa Ta Na Ma." The reason why it is called "Sa Ta Na Ma" is because that is what the meditator chants throughout the meditation. It is a very easy and quick meditation that anyone can do. Its also a very symbolic meditation, where every chant and mudra (finger position) represents something.

The Technique

This meditation is a tad different from the techniques on this site. The other techniques, for the most part, have you sitting still in silence while you meditate. In this technique, you chant out loud during the majority of it, and move you fingers.

To begin this meditation, sit comfortably and put your hands in what is called gyan mudra. This is where you rest your hands on your knees and have the thumb and index finger touch. Close your eyes, and have your eyes focus to the center of your forehead.

Next, take in a deep breath, and on the exhale, chant "Saaa Taaa Naaa Maaa". When you chant "Saaa", touch only your index fingers and thumb stogether. When you chant "Taaa", touch only your middle fingers and thumbs together. When you chant "Naaa", touch only your ring fingers and thumbs together. Lastly, when you chant "Maaa", touch only your pinky fingers and thumbs together. Inhale, and repeat the cycle over again.

After a period of time, instead of chanting out loud, you now whisper "Saaa Taaa Naaa Maaa". The whisper should be soft, but still audible.

Then, after another period of time, you chant "Saaa Taaa Naaa Maaa" in your head and do not say it out loud. Eventually, you'll start to chant in a whisper again, and then you finally end the meditation by chanting out loud. All throughout this meditation, you are touching one finger with your thumb, depending on where in the chant you are.

How long you do each of the 5 stages of the meditation depends on how long you decide to meditate for. Below is a table of suggested times.

For beginners, 12 minutes is probably a good duration starting time, while more advanced practitioners can increase their time.

What does it all mean?

Sa Ta Na Ma is Sanskrit. When translated, each word means:

Sa - Birth
Ta - Life
Na - Death
Na - Rebirth

The three types of chants represent three languages:

Out Loud - Human, the world.
Whispering - Lovers, the longing to belong.
Chanting in Head - Divine, infinity.

The four hand positions represent:

Gyan Mudra (Index finger and thumb) - Knowledge.
Shuni Mudra (Middle finger and thumb) - Wisdom, Patience.
Surya Mudra (Ring finger and thumb) - Vitality, energy of life.
Buddhi Mudra (Pinky finger and thumb) - Communication.

Guided Meditation

Into guided meditations? Below is a good 32 minute guided meditation from YouTube user Sat Nam Europe.

Happy Meditating!

-Seth

Introducing Meditation Enthusiasts Sites!

2017-03-04T00:00:00Z

Long-time viewers of Meditation Enthusiasts may remember many years ago, there was a spin-off site of Meditation Enthusiasts called Spiritual Blogs. Spiritual Blogs was a site where members of the Meditation Enthusiast community were able to submit their website about Meditation, Yoga, or Buddhism, and their website would be added to an online directory of similar sites. Each site got their own page, which showed the latest posts, social media links, and site information. Meanwhile, all the submitted site's RSS feeds were merged into a single RSS feed. Every new post was tweeted out on the official Spiritual Blogs Twitter. Spiritual Blogs was, in the end, retired when we changed domains.

Now, after a few weeks in the making, we are excited to announce its successor: Meditation Enthusiasts Sites. Meditation Enthusiasts Sites allows owners of websites about Meditation, Yoga, Buddhism, etc. to submit their website. If the website is accepted, a page containing information about their site will be added, which will include a description of the site, the site logo, links to social media, a comments section, and the most recent posts from an RSS feed. Their site's RSS or ATOM feed will also be merged with the global RSS feed, which is mirrored on our Twitter and https://www.reddit.com/r/MeditationSites/.

If you own a site about Meditation, Yoga, Buddhism, or something similar and wish to submit, here's how. If you want to see what your site's page would look like, take a peek at ours.

The way our site is generated is completely Open Source; you can view the source code and contribute to it here: https://github.com/MeditationEnthusiasts/sites/.

We're excited to finally have a maintainable way to carry on Spiritual Blog's legacy. I hope everyone learns something new from the new site! Know someone with a cool meditation site? Don't forget to show them!

Happy Meditating!

-Seth

What causes hallucinations and sounds while meditating?

2015-07-18T00:00:00Z

If you spend any amount of time on any meditation forum, you will see posts such as the following:

On very rare occasions I start hallucinating during meditation.
Does everybody experience hallucinations, replayed memories and imagery during meditation?
Does anyone here experience visual hallucinations while meditating?
I experienced a few moments where my whole body started to vibrate. Thoughts?

(All of these were topics from /r/meditation)

So seeing or hearing things while sitting in meditation seems pretty common. But why?

In my years of meditation and running this site I have seen many explanations. Here's a few possible explanations:

The meditator's third eye is opening to a higher plane.
The meditator's /posts/interesting-stuff/my-experience-with-kundalini-yoga/ is rising, causing visions and sounds.
The mind uses these images or sounds to distract the meditator from their meditation.
The meditator's body released DMT.
The meditator is about to leave his or her body via astral projection.
Demons are infiltrating the meditator's mind.
The meditator is one step closer to achieving enlightenment/nirvana/samadhi.

Now most of those explanations seem a tad... outlandish... especially to those meditators who do not believe in such things. In my opinion, I believe the explanations is much simpler than that.

The meditator is falling asleep.

Wow, that's kind of boring compared to the other possible explanations. But, hear me out, it will make sense.

The Hypnagogia State

The hypnagogia state is the transitional state between being awake and being asleep. According to the Wikipedia article on Hypnagogia, this state can include a "wide variety of sensory experiences. These can occur in any modality, individually or combined, and range from the vague and barely perceptible to vivid hallucinations." Below are a few different kinds of hallucinations people can experience in this state.

Sights

Sight is one of the more commonly reported hallucinations. They can range from being a bunch of lines and shapes to faces to full blown landscapes. Movement through a tunnel is also sometimes reported as well. My boyfriend has told me that he has seen tigers in a forest during some of his meditation sessions. For me personally, I don't have sight hallucinations during meditation or falling asleep. Clearly I need to open my third eye more ;)

Tetris Effect

The tetris effect is one I have experienced. You know the feeling when you spend the day in a wave pool or in the ocean go home and go to sleep it feels like you're still in the waves? That's the tetris effect. Any repetitive task done while awake can trigger it such as jumping on a trampoline, or even working at a checkout counter for 8 hours moving stuff over the scanner. This is one I have personally experienced while falling asleep, though I'm not sure if I've experienced it during meditation.

Sounds

Hearing sounds is another hallucination that can occur during this state. These can range from static, to voices, to loud bangs and pops. While falling sleeping, I have heard my name called out to me and various other voices (younger me was kind of freaked out by this).

And More!

However, there are some more creepy experiences that can happen as well. Sleep paralysis, which is a state where your body is asleep and paralyzed but your mind is awake, can occur. During this state, you are awake, but can't move your body. You might be able to feel "tingles" or "vibrations" during this state. Some people report seeing and old hag or witch or demon sitting on their chest or feel a very dark presence while paralyzed. Luckily, I've yet to experience sleep paralysis. My boyfriend has, but he's never seen anything scary while paralyzed; he usually just falls back asleep. However, taking a stroll to /r/sleepparalysis and you'll see some of the scary experiences people may have during this state. If you do end of in sleep paralysis, just remember, anything you see is not real (though from what I've read, thinking that is easier said than done).

Conclusion

So there you have it! A logical explanation as to why you may be seeing or hearing things during meditation. You are simply in the hypnagogia state while meditating. No demons or third eyes awakening or anything like that. That's not to say that those other explanation's aren't possible. They might be! I personally don't believe in it, but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't if you do believe.

But what should you as the meditator do during this state?

Interestingly, for both the "outlandish" explanations and this one, the general consensus from what I've seen is the same. They are a distraction. Acknowledge it, and return to your meditation technique. So regardless of what you believe in, its recommended to simply ignore it and refocus on whatever you were meditating on. And that's why meditation is awesome! Different backgrounds, different techniques, different beliefs, all leading to the same thing.

Happy Meditating!

-Seth

P.S. Have a site about Meditation, Yoga, Buddhism, or similar topics? Submit your site to Meditation Enthusiasts Sites!

My Experience with Kundalini Yoga

2015-07-09T00:00:00Z

During my final semester at college I decided to sign up for a Kundalini Yoga class. I always wanted to take a yoga class, but never had the opportunity. I picked Kundalini Yoga since it fit in my schedule. I knew going in it was a mostly mental/meditative form of yoga compared to the other kinds of yoga as my boyfriend took it the previous year. For those who were curious about Kundalini yoga, here's my experience with it.

What is Kundalini Yoga?

If you already know what Kundalini Yoga is, feel free to skip this part.

Kundalini Yoga is the Yoga of awareness. It makes you more aware of your physical and mental bodies. This is done through chanting mantras, pranayama, meditation, and yoga asanas.

If you believe in such things, the Kundalini is said to be a life force that is coiled at the base of the spine like a snake. Kundalini yoga can awaken it. Your energy body (again, if you believe in such things) consists of energy channels known as nadis, which are small tubes that move energy. There are seven pools of energy known as chakras that exist at the base of the spine, the genitals, just below the navel, the center of the chest, the back of the throat, the center of the forehead, and the top of the head. The central nadi, the sushumna, connects all the chakras together. When the Kundalini awakens, it travels up the sushumna to the top of the head.

So basically Kundalini yoga prepares your body for a Kundalini awakening.

The standard class

The class was once a week for 15 weeks for about an hour and twenty minutes. There were about 30 or so students that entered the college's dance studio. We all signed in, took off our shoes (bare feet required), grabbed mats, and picked a spot on the floor. I being the tall guy was always in the back. The class composed of mostly girls, but there were 6 guys counting myself. If I recall correctly, the instructor was a Sikh. She wore a turban and was dressed in all white. She was awesome, and had a good sense of humor.

The class would always start by us "generating energy" by rubbing our hands together, and then chanting. One thing about Kundalini Yoga is there is a lot of chanting. Being a bunch of "cool" college students, it seemed like many students didn't want to chant or were shy about it (myself included); especially at the start of the semester. As the semester went on, the shyness went away.

We'd then do an energy reading to see how our "internal" energy was flowing. After, we usually did a warm up, which involved some stretching while standing up. After the warm up, we'd do another energy reading and compare it to our initial one.

Next usually involved some kind of breathing exercise known as pranayama. The most common exercise was the breath of fire, where we would inhale and exhale quickly, but evenly (think of a dog panting, but through the nose, not the mouth). Other pranayama included alternating nostril breathing, where we would inhale through one nostril and exhale out the other; and the 10 second breath, where our inhales and exhales were 10 seconds long.

Then we did a Kriya. Kriya in Sanskrit means "action, deed or effort", which is supposed to achieve a specific result. Mostly, these were physical yoga asana exercises. Every week was different. One week focused on preparing the body for meditation, another week was core work, and another week was for healing the body. Compared to other types of yoga classes, this Kundalini yoga class was much more tame in the asana department. The were no headstands, inversions, or legs behind the head. It wasn't terribly difficult (minus core week, that was tough). Some of the poses we did were archer, boat, cobra, rock pose, and easy pose. There were also days where we would slap the floor and clap our hands while chanting "har". To be honest, it looked absolutely ridiculous, but it was a lot of fun.

After the kriya, we would lie on our backs in corpse pose for about 10-15 minutes, and then we'd do a meditation. Like the kriya this also varied every week. Some weeks was meditating in silence, while others involved chanting and moving the hands in a certain way.

After, we'd do one last stretch and ground ourselves. Grounding was done by pounding our hands and feet on the floor. Lastly, we would sing one more chant before putting our shoes on and leaving.

And that was my Kundalini yoga class in a nutshell.

Conclusion

Kundalini Yoga is the yoga of awareness. If you are looking for an epic workout where you sweat and are out of breath at the end, this is probably not the yoga you want. In the 15 weeks, there was perhaps only two classes that were really taxing physically.

Meanwhile, if you want a meditative experience that gets you more in tune with your body, this is the experience for you. Even if you don't buy into the whole chakra thing (I'm skeptical myself), its still a good way to destroy stress and become more in tune with yourself. This class made my stress levels zero when I left it. I felt extremely calm for hours after I left the class. My instructor told us the theory behind chakras and what not, but didn't force us to believe it, or expected us to.

Although you probably won't get a six pack doing Kundalini Yoga, you will learn more about your physical and mental body. I recommend all meditation enthusiasts at least give it a shot.

Happy Meditating!

-Seth

Motionless Meditation

2014-06-26T00:00:00Z

Introduction

In my middle school days, I used to hang out on a Forum called PsiPog.net. For those of you who are unaware of it, it was a site that focused on Parapsychology; that is stuff like telekinesis, remote viewing, psi balls, astral travel, etc. Although I have since stopped believing in stuff like telekinesis, PsiPog was instrumental in getting me started down the meditation path. This meditation technique was one of the first ones I tried. The technique was created by PsiPog forum user MartialArtist.

The Technique

The technique is very simple.

Set a timer for a predetermined time. For beginners, 10-20 minutes will suffice.
Get into a comfortable position; one that can be maintained easily.
Sit in meditation, and DO NOT MOVE YOUR BODY AT ALL until the timer goes off.
If a desire to move your body comes along, take note of it, and let it go.

That's it. No really, that's it. Sounds simple right? But, in Step 3, when it says "Do not move your body at all," it means "DO NOT MOVE YOUR BODY AT ALL." That is, no blinking, winking, moving the big toe, adjusting the body, scratching an itch, etc. You pretty much must become stone.

When your body is not moving, you mind will try to make it move. You might get itches, cramps, limbs falling asleep, the desire to move or to get up. However, once the mind realizes it is not going to get what it wants, it will eventually quiet down and relax. To quote MartialArtist:

If you sit quietly for that long, and you stay focussed and conscious while meditating, you will automatically become aware of the demands of the mind. The desires it throws at you. It will recieve outside stimulants, it will react to that by creating a desire, so that you complete the demanded reaction. For example the mind will percieve a tingling sensation in your feet, accordingly it will try to make you move the feet. Or it will smell some nice food and create a feeling of hunger and it will demand you with its desire to get some food. But remember, the mind can never complete this process without the body. It needs the body to go and do something somewhere. So if you control your body by not moving for a long period of time, eventually the mind will just have to obey you. It will become quiet and you will be master again.

The most important part of this meditation is that you do not stop meditating until the timer expires. Do not give in to your mind's desires. It will try its hardest to get you to stop, but you can do it!

The original PsiPog forum has since disappeared from the internet. However we have archived the post! The link below will take you to the original forum post regarding this technique if you want more information:

See Archive.

Happy Meditating!

-Seth