Practice Circle: Lake Meditation

Continuing in our exploration of visualizations in contemplative practice, this Sunday at 8 pm CDST, Practice Circle will focus on the Lake Meditation. To join our video conference group, simply follow this link: https://zoom.us/j/968569855. Ted Meissner, MBSR teacher with Jon Kabat-Zinn’s Center for Mindfulness at UMass, will be leading this session’s half hour guidance and half hour sharing.

For more information about the Lake Meditation, you might wish to read the excerpt below from Kabat-Zinn’s Wherever You Go, There You Are.

The mountain image is only one of many that you may find supports your practice and makes it more vivid and elemental. Images of trees, rivers, clouds, sky can be useful allies as well. The image itself is not fundamental, but it can deepen and expand yourr view of practice.

Some people find the image of a lake particularly helpful. Because a lake is an expanse of water, the image lends itself to the lying down posture, although it can be practiced sitting up as well. We know that the water principle is every bit as elemental as rock, and that its nature is stronger than rock in the sense that water wears down rock. Water also has the enchanting quality of receptivity. It parts to allow anything in, then resumes itself. If you hit a mountain or a rock with a hammer, in spite of its hardness, or actually because of it, the rock chips, fragments, and breaks apart. But if you hit the ocean or a pond with a hammer, all you get is a rusty hammer. A key virtue off water power reveals itself in this.