ONE NIGHT INTRODUCTION TO MEDITATION FOR BEGINNERS

Tuesday, January 12, 7:30 - 9:00 p.m.
Location: Music Together in the Mews, 594 Valley Rd. Upper Montclair
Fee $25

Here is an opportunity to explore the experience of meditation and discover how an Introduction to Meditation course can transform your moment-to-moment experience, reduce stress and its damaging effects, increase your energy, and enhance your well-being.

This class offers a general overview of the six-week Introduction to Meditation course for people who are thinking about taking the course. It is a way to experience meditation and to learn about basic concepts, but is in no way a substitute for the six-week series.

Many studies have been done on the effects of meditation on the body/mind. A few of the benefits include quicker recovery from stress, lower levels of cortisol (stress hormone) in the blood, increase in alpha rhythms (slow, high amplitude brain waves that correlate with relaxation,) deeper, slower breathing, muscle relaxation, enhanced creativity and self-actualization, reductions in both acute and chronic anxiety, feeling more centered, grounded and balanced.

Meditation is associated with silence. In the beginning that silence may be external as we attempt to establish ourselves in a practice that ultimately leads to inner silence and stillness. We do this with no expectations as we sit and observe our thoughts and feelings without engaging them, without identifying them. If this sounds almost impossible to you, understand that we have tools, techniques that have been practiced for thousands of years that enable us to access incredible stillness, pure being, unconditioned mind within our own awareness.

Meditation is a step from the known into the unknown. It's being okay with not knowing. It's paradoxical because when we try to explain the state of meditation that unfolds from within, we really can't. It's experiential. Just being leads to a fundamental experience of oneness and the realization of unity that lies at the heart of the practice.

Fee: $25, for those registered in advance, $35 for walk-ins

REGISTER

Advanced registration is required. Make your check payable to Yoga and Meditation Center of Montclair and send it with your registration form to 292 Bloomfield Ave., Montclair, NJ 07042 or register by paying online. Any questions? Call 973-746-6707.