{"id":18465,"date":"2023-01-28T12:12:31","date_gmt":"2023-01-28T11:12:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/kennethsorensen.dk\/?p=18465"},"modified":"2026-01-17T17:26:01","modified_gmt":"2026-01-17T16:26:01","slug":"meditation-contemplation-enlightenment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/kennethsorensen.dk\/en\/meditation-contemplation-enlightenment\/","title":{"rendered":"Meditation – Contemplation – Enlightenment"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

Contemplation implies a silence of all faculties \u2014 a special state that on the one hand is intense concentration, and on the other is complete receptivity to what is contemplated.<\/span><\/span><\/h2>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

By Roberto Assagioli<\/span><\/span><\/strong> , Year IV – Lesson XXI – July 21, 1931. From the Assagioli Archives in Florence. Doc.#13567 <\/span><\/span>[1]<\/span><\/span><\/a> Transcription from Handwritten Notes by Istituto di Psicosintesi, Florence. Original Title: <\/span><\/span>Meditazione – Contemplazione – Illuminazione<\/span><\/span><\/em> . Translated with Notes by Jan Kuniholm.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Various objects of meditation and contemplation.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

At the last meeting we talked about meditation and saw how a complete exercise of meditation involves the use of all our normal inner faculties. In fact, meditation requires the successive or simultaneous use of :<\/span><\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

    \r\n
  1. Memory<\/span><\/span><\/li>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
  2. Thinking<\/span><\/span><\/li>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
  3. Imagination<\/span><\/span><\/li>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
  4. Feeling<\/span><\/span><\/li>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
  5. Desire<\/span><\/span><\/li>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
  6. Impulse<\/span><\/span><\/li>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n
  7. Will – purpose<\/span><\/span><\/li>\r\n<\/ol>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

    And the cycle is fulfilled by action.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

    But there is another inner exercise by which higher levels of consciousness are reached, deeper and more valuable energies are aroused, yielding more powerful results as much in inner transformation as in efficiency and radiance in life. This inner exercise is <\/span><\/span>\u201ccontemplation.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/em> Since, however, even this word has been given different meanings, it is good to specify how we understand it, even though it is something that can hardly be expressed in words.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

    When in the practice of meditation one has reached the highest and most vital point; that is, of arousing the feelings pertaining to the theme of meditation, one can pause and rise even higher. With a burst of aspiration we can try to almost get out of ourselves and to single-mindedly contemplate the chosen object until we come to empathize with it, to become one with it. This implies a silence of all faculties \u2014 a special state that on the one hand is intense concentration, and on the other is complete receptivity to what is contemplated.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

    In that state we forget ourselves; or more precisely, we forget our ordinary personality with its usual states of consciousness (memories, thoughts, images, feelings). But this does not mean that we become unconscious and idly passive. On the contrary, one is extremely alert, but in a whole different, more subtle, more vibrant sphere of consciousness and inner life: One has at one and the same time a sense of stillness, of perfect peace, and a sense of intense work going on spontaneously within us. Because of the first feature it has been called by the mystics \u201cquiet prayer.\u201d<\/span><\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

    They also call contemplation, to use the words of St. Francis de Sales “… a loving, simple and permanent attention of the spirit (we would say of the conscience) to divine things.” <\/span><\/span>[1]<\/span><\/span><\/a> And the one who works in us in this state of stillness, in this silence, is the superconscious, the Spirit.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n