There are so many meditation practices. None are new. They all have been offered by great and authentic meditation masters down the ages in several different countries. Included in these techniques are seed thought contemplations, shamanic merging, mystical union, plus all the ways in which shamatha (peaceful abiding) and vipashyana (insight) are practiced and accomplished.

Over decades, I’ve experienced all the ones listed, as have those who were in retreat with me. This is said because of the techniques being focused upon in the online practice for a while now. We could return to seed thought-contemplative meditation which was done almost exclusively online about 5 years ago. We could do mantra recitation as we have for periods over the last four years. Each are rich, deep, ans engage the mind and heart in particular ways, and are very worthwhile.

A group of about 20 of us spent 15 years fully immerse in shamanic forms of meditation including Sweat Lodge and the song of the Drum as the heart-song of Mother Earth. Those experiences will remain in our memories and bones forever.

And, through the Holy Days of Christianity, many online meditations have been done using the stories of the Christ-child, the journey up to Bethlehem, the Madonna in various forms, and more from mystical-Christ forms of meditation and contemplation.

I am very grateful for the plethora of meditation experiences and practices, training and excursions that have blessed my heart-mind through my life and have been shared with others.

The focus in meditation training now is just as specific as each of those were. Their purpose or result arose from what was being engaged. The same is so now. Awareness, innate, already present, profound and completely ordinary, in you without a doubt is why we are doing what we are doing. Because Awareness is already present, and completely ordinary, the sitting experience might not include experiences that one would label as “wow.” But, then again, maybe each sitting is. To notice that which is innate and profound, and to realize that it always was present – no conjuring necessary – that’s pretty wow isn’t it.