The word dynamic comes from the Greek dynamikós, meaning power. That is exactly what dynamic meditation is about – contacting your inner center of focused will, presence, empathy, and creativity. In these powers, the opportunity for sublime practice is created.
By Kenneth Sorensen.
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Read the introductory article about integral meditation
We live in a time of unprecedented stress and never before in human history have humans been exposed to so many external influences. The pressures and demands of society, media and advertising impose so many external influences on humans that there is a great need for quiet reflection and inner contemplation.
This need is reflected well by the diverse literature on meditation, relaxation, mental training, not to mention the entire range of music for inner peace and relaxation.
The purpose of this article, however, is not to provide a social analysis of current trends; it is primarily an introduction to dynamic meditation.
What is dynamic meditation?
There are countless forms of meditation and often the same meditative principles and techniques are disguised under different names. This is also the case with dynamic meditation, which takes its philosophical starting point from Roberto Assagioli’s psychosynthesis, who studied both Eastern and Western meditation practices. Does dynamic meditation lead to religious worship? No, because psychosynthesis does not take a position on the theologies and perceptions of the ultimate reality of the many religious systems. Its goal is to lead man to the door of the great mystery through contact with what psychosynthesis calls the Self or the soul (defined later). The Self is an integral part of the transcendent reality and our entrance to understanding the great mysteries of life.
Albert Einstein formulated his view of the great mystery as follows:
“The most beautiful and profound feeling we can experience is the sense of the mysterious; it is the source of all true science. He to whom this feeling is alien, he who can no longer be astonished and seized with awe, is as good as dead.
To know that what we cannot fathom really exists, that it manifests itself as the highest wisdom and most brilliant beauty, so sublime that with our dull senses we can perceive it only in its primitive form – this knowledge, this feeling, is the core of all true religiosity. This cosmic religious experience is the strongest and noblest motive for scientific research. My religion consists in a humble admiration of the boundless, sublime spirit as it reveals itself in the smallest details that we are able to perceive with our frail and weak minds. This deep emotional conviction of the presence of a superior intelligence, which finds expression in the incomprehensible universe, constitutes my idea of God.”
Albert Einstein
From Forum and Century, vol. 84 & Living philosophies
Dynamic meditation is largely adapted to Western man. The word dynamic comes from the Greek dynamikós, which means force. That is exactly what this type of meditation is about – contacting your inner center of focused will, empathetic presence and creativity and expressing these in sublime practice. In other words, it is not a meditation that makes the meditation practitioner a passive spectator of life. It is much more oriented towards creating changes in personal character through a process of refinement, and to enable the practitioner to act with greater will, presence and creativity in his surroundings.
In other words, dynamic meditation is about bringing out the best in you, for the benefit of yourself and your surroundings.
I will now try to identify some other characteristic qualities of this type of meditation.
Dynamic meditation induces focused will
There are many motives for starting or practicing meditation. Some people desire inner peace and balance. Others seek the experience of ecstatic highs, spiritual phenomena, a flexible and sharp mind, and personal development.
The essence of dynamic meditation is to enable the meditator to bring out the best in his or her character. “The best” is the inner center of focused will, empathetic presence and creativity. This center is called the higher Self in psychosynthesis terminology. See the detailed definition in the article: Psychosynthesis – psychology with soul, which describes the philosophical starting point for dynamic meditation.
The starting point for dynamic meditation is the psychosynthesis assumption that at the core of our being there is a center and a consciousness of pure dynamic being, which is one with the greater intelligence of which we are a part and which religious people call God, the All, the Creator, etc. There is a long line of testimonies from many people who have experienced this Self, this expanded transcendent state of consciousness. Transpersonal psychology has precisely these peak experiences as its central focus – it examines the higher – if you will – spiritual nature of man.
Dynamic meditation is therefore essentially about penetrating the purpose and meaning of life, for we all have a role to play on the stage of life. Dynamic meditation can uncover how you can bring out the best in your role, and here willpower comes into play as a central factor.
When I talk about focused will in the introduction to this article as one of the core results of dynamic meditation, I am talking partly about the heightened sense of being on the right track, a sense that life is meaningful, that life has purpose. Dynamic meditation evokes or enhances this experience and the ability to navigate safely through life.
Dynamic meditation creates contact with the Self
Dynamic Meditation brings you into contact with your deepest being when done correctly with a higher purpose in mind, such as expressing the best you can become. Psychosynthesis tells us that in addition to our many personal limitations, we also have higher transpersonal abilities, such as will, wisdom, compassion, beauty and insight. These qualities belong to the Self and the higher unconscious. (Defined in the above-linked article).
Psychosynthesis assumes that there is a greater will at play, which wants something in us – with us. It is the recognition of this will, this purpose, which reaches far beyond our own individual sphere, that meaningfulness is experienced. It is of course possible to experience meaning without meditating. But meditation promotes and maintains the experience of meaning and purpose.
Knowing this purpose is knowing the direction our life should take. We all have an inner life that is part of the larger life of which we are an inseparable part. Through dynamic meditation we develop the ability to manage this life in the best way possible, because we know where we want to go and why!
This certainty of direction can also be formulated as knowing what we want. Not knowing your deepest will is surrendering your life to the play of chance. Discovering your will is the same as recognizing where you want to go, but also who you are!
It is of course a continuous process, uncovering deeper aspects of this mystery every single day. Dynamic meditation is moving into the light of the inner Self and slowly unfolding one’s potential. Becoming the best one can be.
In the above I have touched on the more general experience of the effects of meditation, but there are also a wide range of specific benefits of meditating. Dynamic meditation also provides an ability to maintain concentration, to stay focused on the activities we have decided to express our conscious intention in life. Whether these are career or more personal goals. The sustained meditation sharpens attention, concentration and clarity on the essential values and goals, with the result that the ability to make quick and right choices in a complex world is strengthened.
In other words, we become much more efficient, goal-oriented and result-oriented through dynamic meditation, which is a prerequisite for creating top performance.
Dynamic meditation is directional
This means that the meditator has a clear understanding of what is being achieved through the meditation. This makes this type of meditation much safer to practice than the so-called passive (open) meditations. This does not mean that this meditation does not have its introverted receptive and contemplative phases.
The starting point for meditation is concentration on selected meditation topics, which are described below. This concentration gives the meditation a direction as the attention is tied to the topic. You form a ring of attention around a topic that you want to delve into and reflect on. There are no limits to openness to impressions that relate to this topic, but everything that does not relate to the topic is rejected in meditation. There is an incredibly good reason for this, because our attention has a very hard time maintaining its focus on a single topic; it jumps from one association to another, as anyone who begins meditation knows. If there is no focus in meditation, then time is wasted in useless dream states, where the content of everyday consciousness flows into the field of attention. Instead of meditating on our highest human potentials, the content of meditation becomes our memory impressions from the day, for example what we need to remember to buy on the way home from work or reminiscences from arguments we have had with a colleague, etc. etc.
Dynamic meditation is meditation on selected keywords, concepts and transpersonal qualities that function as a door into the world of the self. Will, Insight, Beauty, Silence and Being are examples of psychological qualities and states that are suitable for meditation topics. However, these keywords are always individually selected with the aim of creating completely personal and targeted results in the character.
There are a number of explanations for what happens when you meditate. Brain research has long been aware of the beneficial physical states that are achieved as a result of meditation, see the research article elsewhere.
The psychological connections have also been thoroughly investigated. Roberto Assagioli, in his book: The Act of Will, has presented a number of very exciting ideas regarding the internal psychological feedback system, also called the psychological laws. There are two laws in particular that explain the effect of the meditation process.
” Ideas and images have a tendency to arouse emotions and feelings that correspond to them .”
” Emotions and impressions have a tendency to arouse and intensify ideas and images that correspond or are associated with them .”
In light of the above, we can say that meditation on key words, mental images or symbols will tend to arouse the emotions that correspond to them. This is incredibly valuable information because from this understanding we have the tool to master our emotional lives. We can in the long term and through sustained effort consciously evoke the emotions we want to feel. It is my own experience through daily meditation since 1988 that this statement is true.
Meditation on courage will evoke courageous feelings that we can put into practice. These feelings, according to the second law, will feed back and reinforce the mental images and ideas we already have of courage, which in turn will intensify our experience of courage. A very positive feedback mechanism is set in motion.
Sustained rhythmic meditation on selected qualities will result in “we become as we think”.
Dynamic meditation creates empathetic presence
Dynamic meditation directly creates greater inner awareness and consciousness. In practice, this means an increased ability to be mindfully present in the present moment – to be alert to the inner ideas and impulses that reach our consciousness. But also an increased awareness of the reactions of other people to our behavior and their general psychological state.
A correctly performed meditation will always give a deeper insight into and sensitivity to the needs and life situations of our surroundings. Knowing what is going on in the hearts of other people is a special sensitivity that dynamic meditation promotes. It ensures that we see and appreciate the inner qualities that all people are an expression of. It is an ability to see behind the immediate personality, and ideally, it is an ability to see the other person as a higher Self, no matter how limited that person may appear in a given situation.
This is because the purpose of all higher forms of meditation is to contribute to life, one could also call it social engagement. We develop by taking on responsibility for the development of society and our fellow human beings. Any meditation that seeks to contact the inner supervising Self will therefore evoke an increased presence of empathic presence and emotional intelligence.
Being mindful involves the ability to observe the effects of one’s behavior on other people, and to correct it when the effects do not match the intention.
This means that one is in attentive contact with those to whom one is speaking! This sounds obvious, of course, but in practice it is not. An honest attention to our communication can often reveal that we are not conversing or engaging in dialogue with our fellow human beings. Far more often the motive is to “lecture to oneself” – to hear oneself speak. This type of communication is a very typical expression of a self-absorbed attention, which does not have to be selfish, but is simply an expression of a limited awareness and too much attention to oneself.
Being mindful or present also implies an ability to observe the effects as they occur in our own emotional and mental life, as a result of the exchanges we have with the environment. It is an unbounded attention that is sought to be achieved, which does not necessarily identify with the pain (or well-being) that is aroused. An attention that ideally “encompasses” the pain and seeks to understand the causes and then act with wisdom.
This is of course often not possible because we have not fully developed this attentive ability. But dynamic meditation will often be able to evoke the situation in most people’s minds where we “sin” consciously. Or to put it in the words of Paul: “the good that I want, I do not do, but the evil that I do not want, that I practice”.
At first glance, of course, this does not sound good. But the conscious sinning makes it possible for us to go back and do good, if the good will is present.
Love, awareness, presence and attention are closely related. I hope this is clear from the above. But often the concept of love is burdened with so many sexual associations that it does not make sense to use it in a meditation context. But love is precisely connected with the ability to put oneself in the other person’s place, it requires attention and awareness. Giving love is giving attention, which is why both children and adults so fervently want to receive it.
Meditation increases creativity
The third essential effect that dynamic meditation produces is increased creativity, understood as the ability to translate ideas into practice. The sustained practice of concentrating on the good, the true, and the beautiful invokes these qualities and makes the mind clear, focused, and intelligent.
The ability to get ideas and put them into practice is what our entire civilization and culture is built on. Improving one’s ability to find good solutions to human problems is a noble endeavor, which is at the heart of dynamic meditation, precisely because it is based on the development of a clairvoyant and reflective mind. The mind is like a muscle that can be trained and developed, but all too often memory training is the only challenge the mind is exposed to.
Dynamic meditation trains the mind in three ways:
a. It strengthens the ability to think through a consciously chosen area.
b. It develops the ability to become receptive to ideas through abstract contemplation, which is a quiet, concentrated, and expectant meditative attitude.
c. It develops the ability to create new psychological traits through creative imagination, based on the law that “energy follows thought” and that we become as we think.
Creativity is seen in this light as the ability to get good ideas and translate them into creative activity – be it actions and products that meet human needs.
A big problem for many creative people is finding out where the ideas come from. The good ideas are the brilliant solutions to human problems that, for example, IT technology has contributed to. It enables unprecedented communication between all the people who use the technology. It is an idea that is clearly taken from the transpersonal world – what psychosynthesis calls the higher unconscious.
This world is often contacted by thinkers in politics, science, culture and business, because these good thinkers manage to penetrate the higher regions of human consciousness and bring down good ideas precisely through sustained concentrated thinking (meditation).
Good ideas exist in the world of ideas, Plato discovered this about 2500 years ago and that truth is still relevant. Another way of looking at creativity is that it is an intrusion into the consciousness of the great thinker. The great intelligence that permeates and operates throughout all of creation.
This is how astrophysicist James Jeans expresses himself:
“Today, it is a widely held view, almost unanimous in physical science, that the arrow of knowledge points towards a non-mechanical reality. The universe is beginning to be viewed more as a great thought than as a great machine.”
How to move forward
Here you can receive seven free meditations where you develop different aspects of yourself.
Also read the article Integral Meditation
Source: The mysterious universe.
Hej jeg har tidligere brugt dine 7 meditationer og har været meget glad for dem. De er røget ud af min filmappe, derfor oplowder jeg dem igen.