Fire Up Your Life Through Meditation

One of the main causes of many ailments in our modern world is stress. A great way to relieve stress, and ensure continued good health and quality of life is through meditation. Meditation is a mental state through which the practitioner makes an effort to get beyond the thinking mind into a state of relaxation which, contrary to popular belief, is not suspension of awareness, but heightened awareness. Through meditation we are able to get in closer touch with our bodies and mind and with the environment.

Research indicates that meditation probably dates from prehistoric times when ancient peoples used chanting and offerings to appease the gods. It has even been suggested by some that the ability to attain the focused attention that comes with meditation could have possibly been the trigger that brought on the final phase of human evolution to the modern Homo sapiens. While meditation was known by the ancient Greeks and Hebrews (the word comes from the Latin root word meditatum, which means 'to ponder,' it was in the Far East that meditation such as we know it today was developed.

Some of the earliest written records of meditation date from 1500 BC in Hindu texts describing Vedantism. Taoists in China and Indian Buddhists developed techniques for meditation as early as 600 BC.
Ancient meditation practices were religion-based, but in the West today forms of meditation have been developed outside a religious context as a means of promoting mental and physical health. Medical studies have shown that the relaxation and altered mental states brought on by meditation can cause biochemical and physical changes in the body such as better metabolism, heart rate, respiration, and lowered blood pressure. It has been found useful in stress and pain reduction.

Effective meditation requires a point of focus, allowing the mind to relax and better process sensory inputs. While this might seem counterintuitive, focusing on a single object, such as the flickering flames of a fire pit can enable more awareness of other sounds, sights and feelings. Allowing the body to relax, while looking at (but not staring at) fire pits, like sitting in a quiet place chanting, can relax the body and mind. Instead of bringing on a state of unconsciousness, this will actually enable the practitioner to see, hear and feel more than can be achieved in a state of ordinary consciousness when we are trying to sort out all the inputs that constantly bombard us. Seeing the fire without actually looking at it will bring on a state of mental and physical well being that will lead to a healthier, longer, and happier life.