Simple Meditation & Relaxation. Joel Levey

      

      PRAISE FOR THE LEVEYS

      “You are presently engaged in work that has great prospects for bringing the inner sciences to a very wide section of people who may not under ordinary circumstances come into contact with the inner technologies of mental development and transformation.”

      —His Holiness the Dalai Lama

      “The methods included in this compilation work wonders. As a satisfied user of so many of them, I affirm that they truly deepen the appreciation of life.”

      —Ram Dass, author of Be Here Now, and How Can I Help

      “What a beautiful book! We need so much in our world to focus on how to be instead of how to do, and your book shows the way.”

      —Larry Dossey, M.D., author of Be Careful What You Pray For…. You Just Might Get It, and Healing Words

      “Simple Meditation and Relaxation is a skillful blend of time-proven antidotes to the stress of modern life.”

      —Dan Goleman, Ph.D., author of Emotional Intelligence

      “The Leveys' book is a remarkably useful and important guide in a stressful age. Joel and Michelle free meditation from commonly held misconceptions and set it soaring—fresh and joyful—into the heart and mind of the modern-day spiritual explorer. It's meditation demystified. Pure and simple.”

      —Peg Jordon, R.N., editor-in-chief, American Fitness Magazine

      “This book is an excellent primer for waking up. Practice these techniques and your life will change.”

      —Richard Strozzi Heckler, Ph.D., author of The Anatomy of Change and Akido and the New Warrior

      “In this beautifully done book, the Leveys have skillfully woven together contemporary insights into the value and need for meditation practice in our lives with a large number of extremely evocative suggestions for making use of different ways to practice relaxation, concentration, and meditation. A real gem.”

      —Jon Kabat-Zinn, Ph.D., author of Everyday Blessings, Mindfulness Meditation, and Wherever You Go, There You Are, Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society (CFM) at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center

      “There is no question that relaxation and meditation are desperately needed in today's stressful society. The Leveys' book wisely emphasizes the need for relaxation and concentration exercises as skills needed to practice good meditation.”

      —C. Norm Shealy, M.D., Ph.D., co-author of The Creation of Health, and Anatomy of the Spirit, Founder and Medical Director of Shealy Pain & Health Rehabilitation Institute

      “In this beautiful book, the Leveys condense two decades of study, experience, and teaching in the art of self-mastery. They make it clear that it is not stress itself that kills us but our reaction to it, and they lead the student from simple self-regulation to the heights of self-knowledge and spiritual awareness. Hopefully everyone who reads this book will make room in their life for the practices and growth program that it illustrates.”

      —Dr. Elmer Green, co-author of Beyond Biofeedback, Director of the Voluntary Control Program, Menninger Foundation

      S I M P L E

      MEDITATION &

       RELAXATION

      Joel Levey and Michelle Levey

      CONARI PRESS

       Berkeley, California

      Copyright ©1999 by Michelle Levey and Joel Levey

      All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations in critical articles or reviews. For information, contact: Conari Press, 2550 Ninth Street, Suite 101, Berkeley, CA 94710-2551.

      Conari Press books are distributed by Publishers Group West

      Cover and book design by Claudia Smelser

      LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

      ISBN: 1-57324-151-2

      Printed in the United States of America on recycled paper.

      99 00 01 02 03 xxx 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

      To our many kind teachers and to the awakening wisdom within us all.

      CONTENTS

       Foreword by Joan Borysenko

       Awakening Our Wholeness and Full Potential

       What is Meditation?

       Guidelines for Developing Meditation Skills

       Concentration Meditation

       Mindfulness Meditation

       Reflective Meditation

       Creative Meditation

       Heart-Centered Meditation

       The Practice of Dedication

       Resources

       Index of Meditation Practices

       Acknowledgments

       About the Authors

      FOREWORD

      We live in a culture where stress has supplanted happiness as the most common state of mind. Despite the rapid growth in technology and availability of material goods, polls indicate that the typical midlife American is ten times more likely to be depressed than our grandparents were. The very things that are supposed to save time and give us the opportunity to relax and enjoy life are too often the cause of hassle and worry. The abundance of information, including the profusion of both paper and electronic mail, can be overwhelming. The realization that the Earth's resources are perilously close to depletion and that population growth is now exponential fills many of us with angst. The response to this situation has largely been one of denial and “business as usual.”

      Run faster, work harder, distract ourselves with television and movies, take stimulants and follow exercise regimens that are meant to relax us but often feel like one more task to fit into an overflowing schedule.

      The simple truth is that we won't be able to heal the world until we can come to balance within ourselves. We can't even use our full creative potential or enjoy the blessing of intimate relationships when we are chronically worried and on overload. In the early 1900s, two Harvard physiologists, Robert M. Yerkes and John D. Dodson, discovered