Body of Light Visualizing

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This is an advanced meditation. Sit comfortably with your back straight, breathing naturally. When your mind is clear and calm, visualize the space above your head as a sphere of white light slightly smaller in size than your head. Try to see it as pure and transparent, and spend several minutes concentrating on it.

See the sphere of light as representing goodness, wisdom and love-as the fulfilment of your own highest potential. Then visualize that it is getting smaller and smaller until it is about two centimetres in diameter and that slowly it begins to descend through your head towards your heart, then begins to expand once more until it spreads to every part of your body. As it does so, see it dissolve all the organs and solid parts of your body until they too become pure, formless white light.

Concentrate on the perception of your body as a mass of light and believe all your problems, negative emotions and the things that hold you back have vanished. Let any thoughts or distractions dissolve in the light, and with practice you will achieve a joyful serenity and reach a state of wholeness and perfection. Purification visualizing

Purification is a recurring theme in Buddhist meditation. When we see ourselves as impure or negative, that is what we become. With our self-esteem at a low ebb we feel limited and inadequate and don't give ourselves a chance to change. Believing we are pure in essence is the first step to becoming pure in practice. This simple meditation contains the essence of purification, banishing problems and mistakes, trying to see them as temporary instructions, not as part of our nature.

Begin by settling comfortably into a suitable position, then concentrate on breathing normally and observing how long each exhalation and inhalation lasts. After a minute or two, imagine that all your negative energy, the mistakes you have made in the past, the things that are holding you back are leaving your body in a cloud of black smoke each time you breathe out. When you inhale, visualize that everything positive in the universe is entering your body in a stream of white light, as radiant as it is pure. Visualize it flowing to ever}' part of your body, bathing it in its intensity.

Banish distractions by seeing them as black smoke and exhale them along with the other negative aspects of your experience.

Bubbles of thought meditation

Sitting in a comfortable position, visualize your mind as the smooth, calm surface of a pond. As thoughts enter your mind, see them as bubbles rising from the depths of the pond. They should be observed, not pursued, so that the conscious and deliberate following through of each thought is avoided and you become detached from it as you watch it bubble to the surface. Note the thought and then gently return to contemplating the smooth, rippleless surface of the pond.

As time passes and you pass into deeper layers of consciousness, see yourself sinking under the surface of the pond, becoming one with it. After about 10 minutes, refocus your mind on your surroundings to bring the meditation to an end.