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Posts: 27 · Posted: Sat Sep 01, 2007 12:28 am

Hi guys...your opinion...yoga says one has to be physically fit to achieve good results in meditation...is it really important or is it a myth???

Posts: 1802 · Posted: Sat Sep 01, 2007 3:17 am

It really depends on the form of meditation being used or it's intended primary purpose that largely determines the level of fitness required in order to successfully meditate. Even quadriplegics or people with cancer can meditate, so would you necessarily regard them as being physically unfit by the society's standards, and therefore to be barred from being able to meditate because they do not come up to someone else's standards of what being physically fit is?

It is not recommended that people with certain psychological or psychiatric disorders or who are taking particular medications should meditate in the usual sitting upright posture, yet to a degree other forms of meditation in moderation could potentially be of great benefit to them in combination with treatment from a qualified medical practitioner. Are these people not physically fit enough as well to gain the many possible benefits of being able to meditate?

From a personal perspective as someone who is asthmatic, I believe that any difficulties in breathing can be an effective barrier to me reaching a level or depth in order to be able to meditate as effectively as I would hope to, but as certain types of meditation and relaxation techniques are prescribed specifically in order to improve our reduced ability to breathe effectively, I do not by any means believe that we should be prevented from using this completely drug free therapy as a support for conventional medical treatments.

Just how fit then should anyone be to meditate both safely and effectively, as the level of physical fitness of any person is only relative to another? What is regarded as either an average or normal level of physical fitness anyway?

Excessive periods of meditation can actually be a danger to your health and physical fitness, just as any good thing taken to the extreme can easily be overdone and possibly become an obsession. Of course meditating for a maximum of 30 minutes per day is not going to do anybody any lasting harm, and it will probably do them quite a lot of good. We are taking mainly about meditating for several hours each and every day and using certain intensive meditation techniques to force these changes happening within us, rather than simply allowing them to develop gradually in the proper fullness of time.

Quote:

What are the dangers of meditation?

Before participating in New Age meditation, it is wise to consider the dangers of meditation. This practice seeks to put a person in an altered state of consciousness, which leads to spiritual or self enlightenment. This is accomplished through stilling the mind. So, is this practice dangerous?

Many people believe that there are no dangers to practicing meditation. However, upon study, you will see that this is untrue. ......

http://www.allaboutspirituality.org/dangers-of-meditation-faq.htm
http://www.lorinroche.com/page8/page8.html

EOT

Posts: 3143 · Posted: Sat Sep 01, 2007 12:55 pm

Physical fitness would certainly preclude a lot of the populace. It would be restricted to the few. Meditation is a tool of our own consciousness (it means - to think upon) and therefore is available to all. The more we balance our body, mind, spirit and empower ourselves is good physical culture, the better any exercise may work.

Exercise for the body - physical fitness. Exercise for the mind - meditation. Exercise for the spirit - enlightenment.

Posts: 6 · Posted: Mon Sep 03, 2007 3:12 pm

Whether you practice meditation as yoga teaches or meditation in a biblical sense I believe after you do it for some time you will probably be more motivated to exercise daily.

I find walking meditations great. What I do is play cd's by my favorite motivational or spiritual speakers like Wayne Dyer, Louise Haye, Carolyn Myss on a walkman or cd(whatevery you call it) and do a half hour walk everyday.

This isn't deep trance meditation by any means but I look forward to it every morning and benifit in more ways than I can count. My biggest challange now days is to keep the walking meditations to half hour or at least no more than 45 minutes.

Posts: 856 · Posted: Tue Sep 04, 2007 2:58 pm

One of the main reasons that kung fu came into being was because the monks at Shaolim practised sitting meditation and because of that they very unfit (very simplified version, here is not the place for the extended version).
Eye of Tiger, around 80% of my meditation class have some form breathing difficulty and they tell me that just learning to control their breathing through use of the diaphram is beneficial, about 40% of the full on martial arts classes have asthma and providing we all monitor them then they seem to cope very well.
I will admit it took some getting used to as an instructor when students just wandered off and got their inhalers, don't know what my instructors would have said - they were so strict about leaving the mat I've known children pee themselves because they were not allowed off.
But times change, thank goodness.