Below are a list of meditations – as well as interactive group exercises – that I’ve guided at The Consciousness Explorers Club (CEC) in Toronto. Some have audio (I add more audio all the time) and can be followed along as guided meditations. Others are description-only, but can be plundered for your own freestyle practice, teaching, and learning purposes.
TEACHER: Jeff Warren THEME: Giving and Getting MEDITATION: Don’t Know Mind GROUP PRACTICE: Activate 1: What Does Activate Even Mean? Beneath that secret contemplative circuit is, apparently, an equally secret dynamic hiding right in plain sight: giving is getting and getting is giving. Expressing your caring in action is, they say, a healing practice, and … Continue reading “Giving and Getting”
TEACHER: Jeff Warren THEME: Challenge MEDITATION: Into the Underworld! GROUP PRACTICE: These are all the ways I suck, and this is what it feels like to talk about my suckage with you. This week we take our medicine. We learn how, in TS Elliot’s words, “to be restored, our sickness must grow worse.” It’s arguably … Continue reading “Into the Underworld!”
TEACHER: Jeff Warren THEME: Breakthrough MEDITATION: Moving Ever-closer to The Now GROUP PRACTICE: Time bandits So as I said, breakthrough is gonna look different depending on the person. For some, it might be a glimpse into the constructed nature of sensory reality, for others an energizing kundalini shock, for others still a sudden insight into … Continue reading “Breakthrough”
TEACHER: Jeff Warren THEME: Effort MEDITATION: Dog on a Bone Concentration GROUP PRACTICE: Lucid Dreaming mini-workshop Everything starts with concentration. The ability to focus, to stay on task. In meditation you learn the things you once thought were boring – like breathing – are actually fas-ci-na-ting when you concentrate on them. That’s because when the discursive mind settles, there’s … Continue reading “Effort”
TEACHER: Jeff Warren THEME: Reality / Unreality MEDITATION: Melting into the Dream of You GROUP PRACTICE: Mini Lucid Dreaming workshop In my other life I wrote a book about dreaming and waking, and, like many before me, I became enchanted with the alternate reality known as lucid dreaming. Excellent for celebrity sex and super power rehearsal, obviously, but oh so much more. … Continue reading “Reality / Unreality”
TEACHER: Jeff and James THEME: The Beat that my Heart Remixed MEDITATION: Your body is a tuning fork for cosmic symphonies. GROUP PRACTICE: We’ve done this before, and it is always good. After focusing your sensitive little heart, we’ll pull out the blankets and bolsters and spill onto the floor as James and Jeff guide you through … Continue reading “The Beat that My Heart Remixed”
TEACHER: Jeff Warren THEME: Punching Right Through the Gates of Your Face MEDITATION: Silent Illumination GROUP PRACTICE: Dharma Combat Oh yes this will be good. Already I am so happy about this that I may not even show up. So for the meditation we’ll do a dead-simple Chan (Chinese Zen) practice called Silent Illumination where we’ll get all steeped in foreverness. Then what? We fight. Yeah, that’s … Continue reading “Punching Right Through the Gates of Your Face”
TEACHER: Jeff Warren THEME: Gettin’ Rigour MEDITATION: Vipassana-style noting GROUP PRACTICE: Partner Noting We start the month with a bit of disciplined practice. Basic insight noting. Object: the breath – a fine object with an auspicious lineage, for under the Bodhi tree the Buddha apparently rode his breath all the way to enlightenment, whatever that means. Of course this was only after a pitched psychic battle with the armies of Mara – ie. sloth, … Continue reading “Gettin’ Rigour”
TEACHER: Jeff Warren and Avi THEME: Devotion 4: Ye Gods! MEDITATION: Deity Yoga GROUP PRACTICE: Inter-Personal Adventure Psyched to welcome my new friend Avi Craimer, a smart and rigorous Toronto-based meditation teacher with an interest in the devotional side of practice. This is rare in the West, where there is much more emphasis on dry “attentional skill” training. Check … Continue reading “Devotion 4: Ye Gods!”
TEACHER: Jeff Warren THEME: Devotion 3: Giving Up MEDITATION: Stop Trying GROUP PRACTICE: Let’s All Surrender So much to explore on the interconnected themes of devotion, love and surrender. For the group practice, we’ll go inside using a form of contemplative inquiry designed to activate our intuition-rich anti-search engines. As the cliche goes, this one is about accessing your … Continue reading “Devotion 3: Giving Up”