Q&A:The hour of meditation

If you stayed up very late the previous night and are very tired when your alarm goes off, is it better to sleep longer and meditate after your accustomed time?

You have to know how often you do it. If you are doing it every week, this is not good. But once in a blue moon it is all right. In school you study for months, and then you get a holiday. But if you want to take a holiday every day, then how will you make progress? If you have meditated for months at a particular hour and one morning you are exceptionally tired, all right. But if you go to school at a different hour every day, then how can the teacher be pleased?

Opportunities do not come every day in your life. Spirituality is like an opportunity. If you miss one meditation, you have to feel that you have really missed something, that you have travelled one step less than you could have. When you do not meditate regularly, your consciousness loses some of its capacity, and the road becomes very long. Once you relax, ignorance covers you. If you fail to get up once, then on that day ignorance has conquered you.

Suppose you go to bed at three o'clock, and when it is time for meditation you are not able to get up. But who asked you to go to bed at three o'clock? You will say it was unavoidable; you had to do something most important. But while you are up late doing that important thing, please make yourself feel that at six o'clock there also will be something unavoidable and important that you will have to do: you will have to get up to meditate. If the thing that you did late at night was so important that you could not avoid it, then I wish to say that your meditation is infinitely more important; nothing can be more important than meditation.

Sometimes our fatigue is real; sometimes it is all mental. Even if you sleep for ten hours, sometimes you feel extremely tired. Many people sleep much more than they actually need to. Often it is your mind that makes you feel you are tired and exhausted. The mind is so clever. It will make you feel that if you can sleep for only five minutes more, then you will feel much better, If you are supposed to get up at six o'clock, the mind will tell you that if your body can sleep one minute more, then you will feel better. But if you give that one minute to the body, immediately the mind will ask for five or ten minutes more, and before long it will be seven or eight o'clock. So the best thing is not to listen to the mind at all.

Q&A:The hour of meditation

If you set a time for your meditation and are able to get up earlier, should you still keep your original time?

Yes. If your time to meditate is five-thirty in the morning, at that hour your soul will knock at your door, so you should be prepared. Choose the time that you feel is best, and stick to it. If you want, you can get up half an hour earlier in order to shower and get ready, but then you should start to meditate at your appointed time.

Q&A:The hour of meditation

If we tend to feel sleepy, is it all right to exercise before our morning meditation?

Certainly. Doing a few exercises can make you feel more alert. It is fine to do a few minutes of hatha yoga exercises before beginning meditation.

Q&A:The hour of meditation

If I meditate too little, I don't have spiritual energy throughout the day. If I meditate too long, I can't maintain my aspiration.

The problem is that you are going to extremes. Sometimes you overeat and you cannot digest what you have eaten; sometimes you don't eat at all and you feel weak. When you don't meditate enough you feel miserable, and when you meditate beyond your capacity you feel worn out. But you don't have to pull or push. You only have to discover how much capacity you have. If you meditate for only five minutes, then naturally you will not be inspired throughout the day; but if you meditate for an hour or two, you will strain your capacity, and your body will revolt. So meditate devotedly and soulfully for twenty minutes in the morning and twenty minutes in the evening, and in the afternoon if you have a chance you can meditate for five or ten minutes more. That will be ample in your particular case.

Q&A:The hour of meditation

I try to meditate for fifteen minutes a day, but I find that it takes me almost this much time to actually settle down into meditation. What would you suggest?

If you want to meditate for fifteen minutes, try to set aside half an hour. During that half hour, you will spend some time in preparation, which is necessary if you are to have fifteen minutes of good meditation. Some people may find that they do not need fifteen minutes extra. Once they start, they can run. They do not have to take a few preliminary starts. But if it is necessary for you, then take a few practice starts. If it is not necessary, right from the beginning you can enter into your soulful meditation.

Q&A:The hour of meditation

I am a housewife with small children. What advice do you have for me?

Even a housewife with small children can easily meditate, provided you are willing to do first things first. Early in the morning before your family wakes up and you have to enter into the hustle and bustle of life, you can offer a few minutes to God. If you know that at a particular hour your children will require food or attention from you, then you can easily get up ten minutes earlier.

Then, during the day while you are taking care of your children and working in your house, you have to feel the presence of the living God inside them and all around you. Unfortunately, most people do not do that. They look upon their children and their responsibilities as their possessions and their burdens instead of seeing them as God-given opportunities to love God and to serve God. If you can feel that you love your children precisely because God is inside them, then there will be a spontaneous flow of joy and divine love. At that time your children will also feel that their mother has something special to offer.

So please try to feel that between you and your dear ones there is a bridge, and that bridge is God. You are loving your dear ones precisely because God the eternal Beloved is inside them. You are showing compassion to someone because the eternally compassionate Mother is inside you. In that way you can remain in a soulful and spiritual consciousness even while dealing with your children.

Q&A:The hour of meditation

How long should I meditate? Is fifteen minutes enough, or should I try to meditate longer?

It depends on the individual. If you are able to meditate for more than fifteen minutes, do so. But it has to be absolutely sincere and soulful. To sit for an hour just to make yourself feel that you are an advanced seeker will be a mistake. The soul will not be there. You may meditate for five hours, but the meditation will not give you any joy. It will not be fruitful at all. You will only give yourself a headache. If a person can meditate for fifteen minutes most soulfully, and after that, if he feels that he has the capacity to continue, then he can continue. But if he doesn't have the capacity, then it will be a waste of time.

The best thing is to meditate for as long as you can without creating any mental tension. It depends entirely on your capacity. Increasing your spiritual capacity is like developing a muscle. Today you may exercise and become tired after five minutes. After two months | you may be able to exercise for half an hour or even j more, because you have developed your muscles. There is also a spiritual muscle, which is aspiration. How long and how sincerely you can cry for God depends on the strength of your inner muscle.

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