When a Christian friend of mine tries to use mindfulness meditation, after a while he says he feels the presence of Jesus and God.
I told him that this arises because of his history with religion.
What should I tell him about this and what should he be noting when this arises?
what he told him so far is probably correct that the feeling of the presence of Jesus and God does arise in him because of his history to the Christian religion.
There is
there's the perception of a deep spiritual feeling
and when he knows nothing else than jesus or god then of course this must be jesus and god but um when the mind opens up and says okay there might be something else out there then jesus and god then when the mind opens then there can be uh
the possibility to feel different to feel or to name different the feeling would possibly be the same a deep spiritual feeling but a person with a non-christian background or with an open mind would
Maybe not say, oh, this is Jesus and this is God, but just say, this is a feeling.
So we only can perceive or we can only name what we know or we cannot, but we do usually.
give names of what we what we know what you can tell him is that when there is that feeling of Jesus and of God then he should say feeling feeling
feeling and when there is liking you should say liking liking liking and you could tell him that it is not so important at that particular moment
to feel Jesus or God but to know what is going on in the present moment because that is the mindfulness meditation and to feel Jesus and God is
another meditation which is good also for Christian but if you want to practice mindfulness meditation then you should say feeling feeling and whatever else is arising in that present moment
and not get or not be attached with the thoughts of Jesus and God and not be attached to the liking of Jesus and God or to say it less blasphemic be attached to that deep spiritual feeling
It depends also on the person.
It depends on whether they are truly open-minded or whether they're just... I mean, it can even be in some cases where they're just doing it to make friends with you so that you come and be Christian with them or so on.
So it depends on the individual.
But another tact you can take, depending on the person...
Is that they've made this truth assertion, this factual assertion that what they are feeling is the presence of Jesus and God.
The first thing you have to explain to them is what does it mean to note, what does it mean to be mindful, what does it mean to be aware of or to meditate on something.
You have to be clear that because many people misunderstand that by noting we're not trying to get rid of the object.
And the noting itself doesn't necessarily remove the experience.
It can in fact make the experience stronger inadvertently, but it can have that inadvertent effect because the mind lets go and allows for it to arise even stronger.
The mind is clear.
So why this is important is because it can happen that when you have them say feeling, feeling, they don't want to do that because they feel they're afraid that it's going to disappear.
So they'll be mindful of other things, but they won't be mindful of the things that they are clinging to for fear that they will disappear, for fear that they will lose them.
So you have to explain the noting isn't for that purpose.
The noting is for the purpose of understanding what exactly that feeling is.
So if that feeling is God and Jesus,
your investigation of it will just show you further and further that that is Jesus, that is God.
But to simply feel something and say this is Jesus and this is God is only a belief.
It's not yet an attainment of the truth.
So the practice of meditation is to investigate, to see clearly what is that feeling.
Explain this to them.
And explain to them that
Through the practice, we're going to try to find out, we're going to understand exactly what is that feeling.
You have this assertion that this is God, this is Jesus.
Let's look and find out.
Let's look and see what we find the closer we look at the feeling.
So then you say to yourself, feeling, feeling.
And when you think of it as God, say to yourself, thinking, thinking.
And what will happen, they will come to realize that actually it's just a feeling.
The thought is just a thought.
It arises and ceases.
And the idea of it being God, it being Jesus, is actually a meaningless...
meaningless thought process, a meaningless recognition or association.
Those are just words.
This is God, this is Jesus.
And eventually to find out, to realize that something like God, something like Jesus cannot possibly exist because it's an entity.
And reality is only experience.
And experience arises and ceases.