Guidelines for Journalling
Journalling - writing about your meditation experience – can help you to recollect your meditation sits and discuss them with your teacher.
- Before writing down the sitting, write down the date and time that the sitting took place. This is helpful when referring back to the journal entry.
- There are two basic ways to begin writing it down: to make a list or to write a narrative. If you decide to make a list of the events you recall from the sitting, we suggest that you use longer descriptions than single words. You don’t need to write down the sitting in chronological order. You can start with what you remember most easily and, once you have that on paper, you can write down the other things that start to come to mind from the meditation. For those who like to have journals in chronological order, you can always rewrite the journal entry afterward, putting it in order, or mark entries in some way to give a picture of when they occurred in your sitting.
- Your descriptions do not have to be exact. They just need to be truthful. If a description doesn’t feel accurate, that is fine as long as you are being honest. We can’t hold ourselves to a strict standard of precision and accuracy in this endeavour.
- Try to keep your journal entries focused on what went on during your meditation sitting. In the course of writing things down, you might have some thoughts about an experience. You may write down these afterthoughts but, if you do, then mark them in a way that shows they did not occur during the sitting (such as putting them in parentheses).
- You will remember only a fraction of what goes on in many of your sittings. That is perfectly normal. Just write down what you can recollect. That is enough. Some journal entries may be many paragraphs long, while others may just have a couple of sentences.
Reflective Meditation: Cultivating Kindness and Curiosity in the Buddha's CompanyAre you new to meditation, looking to develop a practice that you actually will enjoy and do? Or are you an experienced meditator, perhaps seeking a new, less structured, gentle approach? Do you wish to learn or deepen your understanding of early Buddhist teachings? Or are you simply wanting to reduce your stress levels? Are you at an impasse with meditation? Do you believe you cannot meditate?
You’ve come to the right book |
Come join this exploration of a kinder, gentler type of meditation that is remarkably easy to do. You will either find what you are looking for in the pages that follow, or you’ll get one step closer to it!
Reflective Meditation: Cultivating Kindness and Curiosity in the Buddha’s Company welcomes you into a lively, open minded, often humorous, and astoundingly insightful conversation between the founders and lead teachers of Reflective Meditation, Nelly Kaufer and Linda Modaro, with anecdotal input from members of larger Reflective Meditation Sangha, the combined online spiritual community of their respective Sanghas – Pine Street Sangha in Portland, Oregon, and Sati Sangha, which is based in Southern California but operates online.
You may find yourself laughing out loud or possibly feeling a great sense of relief as Linda and Nelly (or Nelly and Linda -- it’s not always clear who is speaking, and it doesn’t seem to matter!) lightheartedly articulate a broad, roomy, and inclusive path for turning inward, reflecting, and using the language of experience to cultivate a deeply rewarding and satisfying meditation practice.
Discover A New Approach
Reflective Meditation: Cultivating Kindness and Curiosity in the Buddha’s Company welcomes you into a lively, open minded, often humorous, and astoundingly insightful conversation between the founders and lead teachers of Reflective Meditation, Nelly Kaufer and Linda Modaro, with anecdotal input from members of larger Reflective Meditation Sangha, the combined online spiritual community of their respective Sanghas – Pine Street Sangha in Portland, Oregon, and Sati Sangha, which is based in Southern California but operates online.
You may find yourself laughing out loud or possibly feeling a great sense of relief as Linda and Nelly (or Nelly and Linda -- it’s not always clear who is speaking, and it doesn’t seem to matter!) lightheartedly articulate a broad, roomy, and inclusive path for turning inward, reflecting, and using the language of experience to cultivate a deeply rewarding and satisfying meditation practice.
Discover A New Approach