Mormon Stories Podcast is a production of the Open Stories Foundation. All donations to Mormon Stories are fully tax deductible and go directly towards keeping the podcast alive and towards building a community of support for Mormons like you.

To support the podcast or to join the community, please become a monthly subscriber today at MormonStories.org.

So Phil, why don't you, before I get you started talking about meditation, I thought I better make something very clear up front for our listeners, many of whom may not be familiar with meditation in the Eastern sense of the word.

I know in the Western sense of the word, we use the word meditation to mean to think deeply about, to ponder something.

We might even use that in our church services or in spiritual discussions, we Mormons.

But when we talk about meditating about something, it seems like we really use that as a synonym for pondering to simply think deeply about something.

And when you think about where Mormons might practice meditation or at least the Western definition or meaning of meditation, we might think about sacrament meeting where we're supposed to be thinking deeply about the Savior.

And we might consider that to be meditation, really pondering, thinking about the Savior.

We might think about meditation occurring in the celestial room in the temples when we are wanting to commune with God.

And there that, again, that word meditation might mean to us a deep prayerful attitude, maybe a very intimate dialogue with God.

But maybe you can help us understand what does meditate and what does meditation mean in the Eastern context that we're going to be talking about.

Sure.

I think you're exactly right. I think many folks, particularly in the church, see meditation as deep thinking, careful thought about spiritual or significant things.

And in the pure sense of meditation, meditation is awareness beyond thought.

So if you're thinking, even though it's careful pondering kinds of things, and there's an appropriate place for that, that's not really meditation and it's not really transformative.

For a person to experience what I would call a transformative spiritual growth, where there is a purification of the subconscious and the elimination of obstacles to soul nature unfolding, you have to be able to rest in a state of higher awareness that is above thought, that is beyond thought.

Some people think they're meditating if they get into a semi hypnotic trance. That's actually a state of awareness below thought.

And although it has benefits as far as stress reduction and relaxation and just kind of tuning out from problems, that again, doesn't result in spiritual awakening or spiritual transformation.

So meditation in its truest sense is pure conscious, awakened spiritual awareness that is above thought beyond thought. Thought is a very limiting form of perception.

Okay. And before we go and talk about exactly how we arrive at that state of mind, which I think many of our listeners who are unfamiliar with meditation will have even a difficult time grasping the concept of what you're talking about.

Before we circle back to that, let's talk a little bit about where does meditation come from in the eastern sense? What traditions or schools of thought really gave birth to the eastern practice of meditation?

Well, it came from India. And some people don't even realize that Buddhism originally started in India.

...