20th Sept 2013
Just wanted to share a glimpse of what I have experienced and understood on retreats run by Matthew Meinck.
The apparent simplicity of the process which Matthew has developed and evolved through over 30 years of running meditation retreats, has revealed to me an understanding of myself I was grossly unaware of.
I have sat on many retreats over the past 12 years and each one is so unique, giving me a fundamental understanding of how to deal with what is happening within me and in my life.
Matthew's knowing of how necessary it is for us as human beings to just sit still and allow ourselves to feel the immediate sense of our being, as we are in the moment without trying to create a better, calmer, happier or whatever modification we might think is a more desirable state to be in, is from wholeness because the understanding comes directly from the natural intelligence of the body.
You might think, that's easy I can do that myself! Well, that may be true as a physical act of just sitting, but it's the profound and subtle way in which Matthew explains what is actually happening within the body and the nature of thought (our habitual thinking) that is vital to being able to stay still and allow the state, whether it be distress, pain, numbness, calmness etc to just be as it is, long enough to see what is really trying to show itself.
So without understanding how our thinking operates and what is required to be able to stay with what is going on for me, I can so easily convince myself it's too hard, painful or force myself to keep still.
What's happening in that moment is I may be caught up in my thoughts, being reactive to the state I'm in, but at the same time still being able to keep sitting still. There is no right or wrong here, it's just the process of discovering what is happening in the nature of thought.
Believe me it is by no means easy to keep still when the urge is so strong to move away from what it feels to be in that state.
But as Matthew keeps explaining, the body will not and cannot harm itself just being in this stillness. Although the thoughts arising will seem extremely convincing that it will, in an attempt to avoid what is being felt. I have not seen anyone harmed, in fact the opposite is true.
It is a monumental flaw in the human being that we give THOUGHT and all its structures and institutions we have built from it ie. religion, science, technology and any belief system so much of importance, only to avoid the only real sense of ourselves in being the living organism directly experiencing the moment and responding, is all that is required to function naturally.
We have such a habitual tendency to describe everything we see, hear, touch etc that we lose the direct contact with it, just as it is.
It is so vast, to relate what is experienced while sitting still in this way and being guided and challenged by Matthew to get the thinking out of the foreground, which usually consumes our attention, but keep bringing it back to the sensations in the body as it is.
There is so much more to be said for what this process has brought to light in my life and the many lives I have seen transformed, by Matthews integrity and unwavering support for people who wanted to find the truth within themselves.
post submitted by M.S
