Week of February 18, 2018…
Spiritual Care – 3 of 8 Powerful Spiritual Heart Practices of Sufi Meditation
There are many forms of meditation that quiet the mind, open the heart and elevate the soul. The Sufis, like many other disciplines, have a practice of meditation that is as effective as several other meditation forms.
Below, is the Third out of Eight Spiritual Heart Practices of Meditation offered as a facet of the Sufis spiritual discipline. Throughout the next few weeks you will receive additional meditations that together, as a practice, will help you connect your heart self with the Divine.
Enjoy these meditations. I share them with you one at a time.
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Heart Meditation
This practice, called Jikr-e-Sirr or Wakoof Kulbi (awareness of the heart), is a type of jikr (remembrance of God). It is one of the two central practices of the Naqshbandi Sufi.
For the Yogis, the spiritual heart (anahata chakra) is in the center of the chest, under the sternum bone. Some—like Ramana Maharshi and some Tantric texts—speak of the spiritual heart as being different from the heart chakra, and call it hridaya, saying it is on the right side of the chest. But according to the Sufis, the spiritual heart is at the same place where the physical heart is (on the left).
Here are the steps for this technique:
- Start by collecting your dispersed energies, bringing them from the outside world back into yourself. Still the mind and the senses so that you can directly experience the inner reality of the heart.
- Focus your attention intensely at the place where physical heart is located, until you forget all about yourself. This state of self-oblivion is considered the straight path to the Infinite.
- The third step varies, according to the source and Sufi school. Here are some variations:
* Try to listen to the heartbeat in the form of the name of the Almighty. With time, one starts listening to the sound of the heartbeat even during daily life.
* Do the zikr (mantra repetition of Allah).
* Keep thinking about God or one’s spiritual master.
In all of the three variations above, keep your attention focused on the heart center and simultaneously cultivate feelings of love for the Beloved.
In some more esoteric traditions, it is said that the master transmits his power to the disciple (tavajjoh or tawajjaha) and that awakens his spiritual heart, which is then filled with love. Only after this happens is the practice really effective.
This practice can be done seated or lying down and the recommended length is at least half an hour.
Here is a more detailed description of the third variation, as found in the book The Experience of Meditation:
The first stage in this meditation is to evoke the feeling of love, which activates the heart chakra. This can be done in a number of ways, the simplest of which is to think of someone whom we love. This can be God, the great Beloved. But often at the beginning, God is an idea rather than a living reality within the heart, and it is easier to think of a person whom we love, a lover, a friend.
Love has many different qualities. For some, the feeling of love is a warmth, or a sweetness, a softness or tenderness, while for others it has a feeling of peace, tranquility or silence. Love can also come as a pain, a heartache, a sense of loss. However, love comes to us we immerse ourselves in this feeling; we place all of ourselves in the love within the heart.
When we have evoked this feeling of love, thoughts will come, intrude into our mind—what we did the day before, what we have to do tomorrow. Memories float by, images appear before the mind’s eye. We have to imagine that we are getting hold of every thought, every image and feeling, and drowning it, merging it into the feeling of love.
Every feeling, especially the feeling of love, is much more dynamic than the thinking process, so if one does this practice well, with the utmost concentration, all thoughts will disappear. Nothing will remain. The mind will be empty.
UPLIFT – http://upliftconnect.com/8-powerful-spiritual-heart-practices-of-sufi-meditation/