Mindfulness Meditation vs Concentration Meditation

[@MartinKPettersson]

Having lived as a Buddhist monk for many years I agreee. There are basically only two different ways of meditating. They can be used in many different techniques and they tend to have different feel and texture. Mindfulness/insight practice is generally softer wider focus whereas concentration meditation is usually more single pointed, harder and narrow to the exclusion of everything else. Good video and will be sure to help many people!

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Thank you for sharing your thoughts, really appreciated! One thing that I am trying to understand and I hope you can help me - when people talk about breathing mindfulness, does it mean that's possible to merge concentration and mindfulness meditations? Or the assumption that people start with breathing and then gradually move to mindfulness?

[@MartinKPettersson]

@@PracticalHealthNow That’s a good question, I’ll have to make a video on the topic one day :) It’s difficult to write a short answer since I could easily talk half an hour on just this subject. But I’ll give it a try. First I’d make some adjustments to what you said. It’s very rare to ever do either mindfullnes or concentration meditation. Rather see it as a scale with two end points. You do more or less of one kind but rarley do you ever do just one. If you listen to any of the longer guided meditations on my channel you’ll see that I always start with a breathing excercise and then move onto a form of mindfullness practice. They work in tandem and rather than doing etiher or it’s more that you lean towards one or the other. Also I’d say that mindfulness practice doesn’t mean you do nothing. Infact Goenkas vipassana retreats which I’m assuming you are refering to do a body scan where you move your mind from head to toes over and over. I did around 25 of those since I always liked the centers even though I didn’t fully agree with mr. Goenka or their way of teaching. Lovely experience and by far the most easily accessible for non monastics who want to do more intense practice. Instead of saying doing nothing I’d say the goal is to be ”Equanimous” and not react or push and pull towards anything like I usually describe it. Being just mindfull would be experiencing a ”non duality” experience. But even those have a focus and a person experiencing. When you’ve had few hundred or thousand of those they change and you see that there is still a self in those experiences so you are not completely doing nothing and just experiencing. Doing just concentration meditation would be experiencing a full, or hard Jhana when you are absorbed into your object completely and are literally not experiencing any kind of reality or passage of time. This only happend to me a handfull of times after 5 months of continous +10h days of meditation so it’s not something that happens often and you have to intentionally work towards that. In other words majority of people will never do just concentration medtation. So when you say ”mindfullness breathing” to me that is simply using the breath as an anchor. You are aware of your breath and holding on to it when emotions, thoughts come and try to pull you away. Think of it like lying in the ocean with waves and holding onto a pier to not get swept away. It’s not a term that was used often in the circles I practiced in. I spent alot of time in Plum Village with Thich Nhat Han and they usually said ”mindful breathing” or ”be mindful of your breath” which basically means what I just said. Dificult to do a short answer but hopefully that made things clearer for you :)

[@PracticalHealthNow]

@@MartinKPettersson Thank you, Martin, for the detailed answer! I read it a couple times, very helpful! And it's great to be a subscriber to your channel.

[@bx6p166]

concentration meditation makes me feel emotionally numb, mindfulness makes me feel bliss

[@MartinKPettersson]

@@bx6p166 concentration meditation shouldn't make you feel numb. Bliss is more often something associated with concentration since it lessens the pressure of the self by becoming absorbed in your object of meditation. Maybe look for different guides to concentration practices?

[@ShaeLoves]

I never thought about this before but that makes so much sense. I will use what you taught me to inform my practice. Thank you!

[@PracticalHealthNow]

You are so welcome!

[@annatitova7582]

One of the best videos I’ve watched!

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Thank you, glad you found it helpful!

[@adrianrs9520]

this was really good timing for me, I just started meditating last week and wanted to learn more about it

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Glad it was helpful! Let me know how your meditation goes, your discoveries

[@anbphotography]

Thank you for explaining basics in tightly packed manner keeping the essentials of the topic!

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Thank you, glad it was helpful, Anna!

[@prometheus1592]

best video on meditation

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Thank you! I truly believe this is the most insightful and valuable video on the entire channel. Despite that, it hasn't gained as much popularity with viewers. Sometimes that's just how it goes :)

[@yoginaidu7950]

Thank you very much for pointing difference between form and formless. And giving examples. This video is good for students, people trying to achieve higher goals @ work or spiritually.

[@PracticalHealthNow]

You're very welcome!

[@MrAndrsi]

Cool tips for the people who just started meditating!

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@bobbybrown4652]

Best Explaination of Meditation, congratulations a gold star for you 🌟 thanks!

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Wow, thank you!

[@bobbybrown4652]

@@PracticalHealthNow sorry, didnt mean for it to come across as disingenuous, what i mean to say is it was really well explained, so thank you, makes sense the way you put it 👍

[@ryuyump]

Very clear and concise. Thank you!

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Glad it was helpful!

[@nataliialebid1336]

Thank you! I will now be more careful about the choice of meditation

[@PracticalHealthNow]

You're so welcome!

[@amanullahpatel4747]

It was really very excellent

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Amanullah, thank you-thank you!

[@ericbeck6390]

This was great.

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Thank you, great that you found this video helpful, Eric!

[@naps.natureandpeacefulsoun1930]

Great video. Love it so much ❤❤❤

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Thank you so much!!

[@chimavictor6186]

You explained everything thing thanks

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Glad it helped, Chima!

[@indusol1362]

Good video, to the point

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Glad you like it 👍

[@bx6p166]

In my opinion mindfulness is way better because instead of supressing thoughts it acknowledges it

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Absolutely! Mindfulness is one of the most powerful forms of meditation. It can be challenging to practice and master, but it's often considered the ultimate goal for any meditator...

[@AltairIbnLaAhad-z8k]

Can you cite some sources for the individual benefits for concentration vs insight? I may be experiencing this very thing and I need to research further.

[@PracticalHealthNow]

PubMed is the source! One suggestion is to use the scientific names of these meditations - focused attention meditation (concentration) and open monitoring meditation (mindfulness). I hope it helps!

[@PracticalHealthNow]

And here is a good paper - search for "Open monitoring meditation reduces the involvement of brain regions related to memory function" in Nature journal.

[@Renuyadav-yw9nt]

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[@PracticalHealthNow]

Thank you for a kind note 😊

[@sidneyolson8795]

𝐩𝓻Ỗ𝓂Ø𝓈Ｍ 🎶

[@PracticalHealthNow]

Ole-ole!

[@sadhanatatale4462]

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[@PracticalHealthNow]

Your note is a bit too complicated for me :)