Mindfulness Meditation vs Vedic Meditation

“What’s the difference between Vedic Meditation and Mindfulness?” is a question we get asked very often. Thom shares how both meditations work quite differently in their effects on the mind and body, and how both can be complementary to one another. Watch Thom’s video and let us know what you think below!
Subscribe to find greater ease and bliss: www.youtube.co...
Interested in learning how the Vedic Meditation can enhance your feelings of joy and well-being? Visit thomknoles.com/​ to learn more.
/ thethomknoles​
/ thethomknoles
Video Transcript:
People often ask me the difference between "mindfulness," as it's come to be known, and Vedic Meditation.
Mindfulness is a technique that has been innovated in about the last century, the combination of ideas that came from the older technique known as Vipassana. And none of it comes from the historic Buddha. The historic Buddha probably was teaching something much closer to Vedic Meditation.
In mindfulness, one is learning how to be a kind, and gold-hearted shepherd of thoughts. How to treat thoughts lovingly. How to establish oneself in a mindset of the loving shepherd of the flow of thinking. And so it's a technique for thought management, really. And, in that, we have a great respect for it.
Vedic Meditation, on the other hand, is a technique using the pulsation of a particular mantra or sound, chosen for the practitioner on the basis of the resonance of that mantra, with that individuality of the practitioner. When that match is made, and one receives one's mantra for Vedic Meditation, the mind experiencing the pulsing of the mantra repeating, is drawn effortlessly inward, beyond thought entirely.
To go beyond thought is not only the goal, but the mechanism and the outcome of Vedic Meditation. Stepping beyond thought and experiencing the source of thought, which is a silent state of pure Being or pure Consciousness.
Now, there is no conflict between practicing Vedic Meditation, and if one likes, taking up or continuing the practice of mindfulness. My experience is that people who practice Vedic Meditation receive much more benefit from any kind of mental activity in which they engage. So for example, if you practice Vedic Meditation, because the baseline level of happiness, pure intrinsic inner bliss is awakened, and you apply your mind to say calculus or algebra, that the calculus and the algebra are much better engaged in, much greater logic, much less distraction, because the mind's happy.
If you engage in Vedic Meditation twice a day - this is what the practice entails, about 20 minutes, twice a day - and then you decide to apply your mind to the techniques of mindfulness by whatever name they go. You will be able to experience the phenomenology of mindfulness with much greater ease.
Vedic Meditation can not be damaged by any other practice, nor can it bring damage to any other practice. The technique of Vedic Meditation is completely innocent. Once you've had the benefit of doing it, you may apply your mind to anything, and whatever that thing is to which you apply your mind, that thing will work better as a result of being a practitioner of Vedic Meditation.
There are though, many, who having learned Vedic Meditation, find that it satisfies what they were looking for through all of the other kinds of practices of meditation. And that group of people find that since there's only so many hours and minutes in a day, that if they're going to be spending a certain amount of time with their eyes closed, sitting quietly, they want to get the experience of going to the source of thought, experiencing Being, and not simply more thinking.
So this is perhaps one of the reasons why the question comes up; what is the difference between mindfulness and Vedic Meditation? The hidden question is; which one should I be doing? And why? I think that in terms of getting the most for one's time, experiencing the source of thought, experiencing Transcendence, is going to yield a far greater practical effect than simply sitting and shepherding one's thoughts for half an hour.
#thomknoles #vedicworldview #vedicmeditation

[@mypetpal7382]

Jai gurudev

[@unitedintraditions]

I did TM and Vedic Meditation. Although both are similar, I encourage everyone to go to a Vipassana 10 day retreat. It is free in which at the end of 10 days you offer what you can afford. They feed you and provide you shelter for the 10 days. Vipassana changed my life as it has many.

[@luisaa.7906]

Interesting 💡

[@ThomKnoles]

Jai Guru Deva. Let me know if you have any additional questions!