Showing posts with label Mind. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Mind. Show all posts

Thursday, October 01, 2015

Logical thinking Exercises..

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When I was in my early twenties we would spend hours discussing these types of situations attempting to work it out.  The first one I ever heard was #2.  Thinking like this keeps your mind active which keeps your body active.  The following are some of the ones we used for this purpose.
Teasers
  1. A father and his son were driving one night and got into a terrible accident. The father was killed and the son badly injured. The son was rushed to the hospital emergency room where the doctor hurried in only to cry, "Oh no! That's my son!!" Why?
  2. John and Mary are lying dead on the floor of the unit they live in. Surrounding them is broken glass and water. A breeze is blowing in the window. Explain that one.
  3. A lady is lying in bed and she is dead. Beside the bed is a pool of liquid and two pieces of wood. How did she die?
  4. When she stopped at the 5th floor, she knew her husband was dead. How did she know?
  5. A man was found hanged in a room that was completely bare except for a puddle of water beneath him. How did this happen?
  6. A man and his wife were driving in a car, when the wife's behavior caused him to stop the car and rush to the nearest house. When he returned to the car, he found his poor wife at death's door and there was a stranger in the car with her. When the police arrived, they did not arrest or even question the stranger. How come?
  7. Caleb Smathers was walking home from the market with three nice ripe cantaloupes, when he was faced with a problem. On the footbridge which he had to cross there was a sign announcing that the bridge's capacity was two hundred pounds. Caleb himself weighed a hundred ninety-six pounds and the cantaloupes weighed two pounds each. What to do. He could, of course, make two trips, but a moment's reflection enabled him to figure out a way of getting himself and his three cantaloupes across safely in one trip. How did he do it?
  8. Helen was expert at her job and always courteous. However, one day as she was going about her daily business she stepped through a door and forgot to count. Shortly thereafter she was dead. How come?
  9. At the end of World War II the few scattered members of a once-rich and important Central European family who had survived concentration camps managed to come together. The family fortune, although much diminished, was still of considerable size. In due course these few known survivors died and the courts began a search for a possible heir to the estate. Two candidates showed up, both claiming to be the same person - the only son of the last head of the family. Their stories were similar (each claimed to have been in slave-labor camps); their information on the family history was much the same; there was a superficial resemblance between them so that old acquaintances could not decide which was the true heir. The magistrate in charge of the case decided to interview them separately. To the first candidate the magistrate proposed a simple identity test. However, when the man readily agreed, the magistrate immediately said, "Arrest this man: he is an impostor. The other is the true heir." How come?
  10. Mr. Brown was spending the night in a hotel in a strange city. He had never been there before and didn't know a soul in the place (neither the hotel nor the city). He had great difficulty getting to sleep. Try as he would, sleep simply wouldn't come. He had a busy day ahead and wanted to be in good shape. He put in one telephone call - local, not long distance - and shortly thereafter he fell into peaceful slumber. How come?
  11. Mr. and Mrs. Northern were returning from a Saturday afternoon game of golf, when Mr. Northern stooped to pick up something from the ground. On seeing this Mrs. Northern quickly struck at the object in her husband's hand with her putter. She was dead in an instant. How come?
  12. When Johnny was four years old, he was sent on a railroad journey. A kindly, middle-aged man put him on the train, having made all arrangements, and entrusted him to the care of the authorities. There was no accident, Johnny was in perfect health, the authorities did all they could, yet Johnny was unable to reach his destination. How come?
  13. Two Americans met in broad daylight. In the sight of a number of people, one of them shot and killed the other. The killing was deliberate, the killer was not an officer of the law, nor was the victim a criminal. However, no legal action was taken. How come?
  14. Horace knew there was some risk in his undertaking, but he underestimated the need for experience. He had read a lot, seen the operation several times, but he had never actually been in charge. He made his big mistake when he pushed the piece of wood the wrong way. For almost immediately thereafter he was struck by a larger piece of wood, and not long afterwards he was dead. How come?
  15. A murder was committed. The court acted largely on the evidence of the one eyewitness, and the murder was apprehended and brought to trial. The jury brought in a verdict of "Guilty," but recommended extreme clemency. The judge dismissed the case and the murder went free. How come?
  16. The captain could see the other ship very clearly on the horizon, and so could the members of the crew who were on deck. But when the captain asked his radar officer to check its position, the officer said, "Sir, there isn't another ship within 4 hundred miles of us." He was quite correct in his statement, but he was ill-advised to laugh at the captain's protest, for the captain had him put in the brig instantly for insubordination. How come?
  17. Jane bought a dozen electric light bulbs as a present for her friend, Edith. To make sure there were duds among them, she tested them all and found all of them perfect. She wrapped them up and presented them to her friend. But Edith, after examining her gift, took them back to the store, where they had been bought and indignantly demanded a new dozen or a refund of the money. The storekeeper laughed in her face. How come?
  18. For many years old Sam Hawks had been night watchman at the Phoenixville National Bank. He was well liked for the faithful performance of his duty and for his cheerful manner. One evening Mr. Stuart, president of the bank, came to the bank at eight o'clock, greeted old Sam, and explained that he was going in to get some papers from his office, for he'd been called to the city and planned to take the ten o'clock plane.

    As Sam listened to his employer's words, his honest face puckered anxiously. "Don't take that plane, please, Mr. Stuart," he said earnestly.

    "Why, Sam," exclaimed the banker, touched by the old fellow's sincerity, and obvious distress. "Why not? What do you mean?"

    "Oh, Mr. Stuart," said Sam, "I had a dream about that plane last night. I saw it crash to earth and all the people aboard were killed. There was a terrible explosion and - Oh, it was awful!" The poor man was almost in tears.

    The bank president patted his arm and, to quiet him, said, "Thank you, Sam. I'll see about it," and proceeded into the bank to get his papers.

    Despite the old man's warning Mr. Stuart DID take the plane, and you'll be relieved to know, there was no accident. Returning to Phoenixville, the bank president's first action was to fire the night watchman, Sam. How come?

  19. A man, going about his daily occupation, brushed against a rock and tore his sleeve. A few minutes later he was dead. How come?
  20. When Mr. and Mrs. Greene returned to their upper East Side apartment in New York after a night at the opera, they were horrified to find the scene that met their eyes in their handsome living room There were Sam and Luella, completely naked! Luella was on the floor, dead: Sam was asleep on the sofa. How come?
  21. A man walks into a bar and asks for a glass of water. The bartender then pulls out a gun and points it at the man. The man then says, "Thank you," and leaves. How come?
  22. A man is lying face down in the middle of a desert and he is dead. He had on his back a pack that is full of all the provisions needed for survival in the desert. How did he die?
  23. A man is lying dead in an alley surrounded by 52 bicycles. How did he die?
  24. There is a man who lives on the 25th floor of the apartment building. Each day he goes to work and takes the elevator down to the lobby. When he comes home, some days he takes the elevator all the way up to the 25th floor. But on other days he only goes up to the 20th floor and walks up the stairs the rest of the way. Why?
  25. A man is asleep downstairs. He hears a crash and runs upstairs and turns on a light. He looks out the window, and immediately kills himself. How come?
  26. A man gets in his car, turns on the radio and kills himself. Why?
  27. Two men in a cabin in the woods are dead from the same cause. Both were in good health, had no quarrel with each other, were in possession of no firearms and no person, animal or disease was involved in their death. How d they die?
  28. A man is lying dead and naked in a desert near a burnt match. Why? (variation on your #22)
  29. A man goes to a restaurant, orders albatross, takes one bite, leaves the restaurant and shoots himself. Why?
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Answers
  1. The doctor was the son's mother.
  2. John and Mary are goldfish. A cat came in through the window and tipped their bowl over and on to the floor.
  3. A poison popsicle.
  4. The elevator stopped because of a power failure. Upstairs in her apartment her husband was attached to an iron lung or some similar device. Enough said.
  5. He hanged himself by standing on a block of ice.
  6. The stranger was a new born baby.
  7. He juggled the cantaloupes.
  8. She was a parachutist, and didn't pull the rip cord in time.
  9. The proposed identity test was a simple blood-test type. The magistrate knew that the true heir would never have agreed to such a test, since the family in question were well known to be carriers of a hemophilia strain, and that for a hemophiliac (or bleeder) even a small scratch is a terrifying, and potentially fatal, prospect.
  10. He couldn't go to sleep because the man next door snored. Brown rang the night clerk, who telephoned the snorer's room and woke him up. When the noise stopped, Mr. Brown had no trouble in dozing off.
  11. The object was a live wire. Mrs. Northern in her effort to protect her husband (who, by the way, was beyond all earthly aid, having been electrocuted the moment his hand toughed the lethal object), forgot that her putter was made of steel. So she, too, was electrocuted.
  12. Johnny was a little goat, and he had eaten his tag.
  13. This took place during the Civil War, or as some prefer to call it, the War Between the States. The principals of our story were a Union soldier and a Confederate soldier.
  14. Horace did not know how to swim when he took a small sailboat out alone for the first time. A brisk breeze blew up. Wishing to change his direction, he tried to tack, but he pushed the tiller the wrong way. The boat jibbed, the boom swung round and knocked him overboard, and he was drowned.
  15. The murder and the eyewitness were Siamese twins, and one could not be punished without involving his innocent brother. Incidentally should the questions proceed to the point of asking if the murder and the eyewitness were identical twins, this answer is immaterial since Siamese twins many or may not be identical twins.
  16. The captain thought he knew all about mirages at sea, but did not know that they will sometimes reflect one's own ship. This was the case, but the captain refused to believe his radar officer and disciplined him for what he considered his impertinence. There was just such a case in our own Navy just a few yeas ago.
  17. They were flash bulbs which, as you know, can be used only once. Jane, who was no photographer, used them up when she tested them.
  18. Night watchmen have no business dreaming at night. They're supposed to keep awake on duty.
  19. He was a deep sea diver. Obviously, when the fabric of his suit was torn, the water rushed in and drowned him.
  20. Sam was a dog who had overturned the fish bowl in which Luella, the goldfish, lived. Luella, poor thing, had gasped her last on the floor, while Sam, unaware - or heedless - of the enormity of his misdeed, was quietly sleeping. If Sam had been a cat, it is unlikely that Luella's body would ever have been found.
  21. The man had the hiccups.
  22. He was a sky diver and thought it was a parachute.
  23. The 52 bicycles are "Bicycle Playing Cards". There was a full deck plus one ace. The man was caught cheating at poker and his opponent shot him.
  24. The man is a midget. He can reach the lobby button so he goes all the way down in the morning. But he can only reach as high as the 20th floor button; so unless someone happens to be in the elevator with him to push the 25th floor button, he must walk the last five floors.
  25. The man lives in a lighthouse. The light he turned on was the spotlight, which he forgot to turn on before he went to sleep. The crash was a boat on the shore. He felt so badly about it, he killed himself.
  26. He's a radio disc jockey who has just killed his wife. His alibi was the tape he left playing at the radio station, but when he turned the radio on, he heard nothing - in despair, he killed himself.
  27. It was the cabin of an airplane that just crashed.
  28. He was trying to make it across the desert in a hot air balloon, first by lightening his load, then frantically trying to relight his flame, then instead of dying of dehydration, chose to jump out of the balloon and die on impact.
  29. This one's goofy, but it makes sense. The man was stranded on a desert island with himself, his wife and a stranger. One day, the stranger came to him telling him his wife had been killed by wild animals on the other side of the island. That evening, the stranger made dinner for the man out of an albatross that he had found. After the man was rescued, on suspicion, he went to a restaurant and ordered albatross, tasted it, realized that he had eaten his wife on the island and committed suicide.
Source
Images @ Eminpee Fotography

Sunday, January 05, 2014

Solipsism - Spiritual Infancy.

 (Listeni/ˈsɒlɨpsɪzəm/

from Latin solus, meaning "alone", and ipse, meaning "self") is the philosophical idea that only one's own mind is sure to exist.  Spiritual Infancy..  Instead we have to grasp true objective reality.  It exists and it could well be uncomfortable.  



I was blessed with the love of Latin from an early age being in a class where the teacher was always referring to the Latin Root Meanings of words to enlarge our vocabulary.  So when you do this as a normal thing then all words start to really have a new life.   So the study for Truth has been just that, a new and exciting study on some of the words that we are told  the meaning of all the while the true meaning is shrouded and secreted and the general population are unaware.

It is time to depart from the Solipsistic ways of our old thought processes and get real and strive for this for the good of the planet.  It is now at this time of resonance and DNA Codices being re frequented so it is imperative to also raise awareness.

Departing from wrong ideologies and aligning with Truth will raise the resonance of the entire planet.  The longer this takes the bigger mess there will be to clean up. 

Think of a room full of children let do what ever they wish with no concern, there is paint and crayons and paper and chaos.  At some point some one child says NO!  No more and intervenes because things are out of hand.  Someone sees truth / sense in the matter that it was not good or right to for one child to make another child drink paint.  A play date was a good idea but the rules of engagement were not followed.  

This analogy is what is happening here on EARTH.  We are presently that room of children and enough of us other kids are standing up now.  We are saying NO this is no longer ok.  We understand what you are doing and we are saying NO!  When the correct number stand up then there will be a tipple in energy and they will no longer have power over us.   (M. Peters)
Solopsism academic definition . .
As an epistemological position, solipsism holds that knowledge of anything outside one's own mind is unsure. The external world and other minds cannot be known, and might not exist outside the mind. As a metaphysical position, solipsism goes further to the conclusion that the world and other minds do not exist. As such it is the only epistemological position that, by its own postulate, is both irrefutable and yet indefensible in the same manner.  Definition from Wikipedia

The TRUTHS CAN BE KNOWN. 
RIGHTS ARE BASED IN NATURAL LAW AND THEY CAN BE KNOWN.   
Image from Youtube
We have to be real about what is going on.  This is objective reality.  Rights should be based in truth and natural law.

Aligning our perception with reality raises our frequency.   When we don't align with truth we are operating at a low frequency .. we are touching truth less frequently.   The more often we align with the truth the higher we resonate as a being.
 
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Wednesday, November 07, 2012

The Kybalion and the Arcane Teachings.

The French version of the cover of the book Ky...
The French version of the cover of the book Kybalion by anonymous authors. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The Kybalion states that the All is Mind; the Universe is mental. The Universe, and all it contains, is a mental creation of The ALL. He who grasps the truth of the Mental Nature of the Universe is well advanced on The Path to Mastery.

The Kybalion is  Hermetic Philosophy and is a 1908 book claiming to be the essence of the teachings of Hermes Trismegistus, ( 3 x great or thrice great)  published anonymously by a group or person under the pseudonym of "the Three Initiates".

The Kybalion was first published by the Yogi Publication Society and is now in the public domain, and can be found on the internet. The book purports to be based upon ancient Hermeticism, though many of its ideas are relatively modern concepts arising from the "New Thought" movement. The book itself early in reading makes the claim that it makes its appearance in one's life when the time is appropriate and includes variations of material found in the book of Proverbs.

Mental Transmutation

Mental Transmutation (also described as Mental Alchemy, the Art of Mental Chemistry, and the Art of Polarization) refers to the art of changing and transforming one's own mental states and conditions, as well as influencing those of others. It is also called a form of "Mystic Psychology".

 IMG 5776 Flagstaff Cockatoos

The Seven Principles

The book devotes a chapter to each of its seven "Principles", or axioms:

1. Principle of Mentalism

The Principle of Mentalism embodies the idea that "All is Mind."

2. Principle of Correspondence

The Principle of Correspondence embodies the idea that there is always a correspondence between the laws of phenomena of the various "planes" of being and life. As above, so below; as below, so above. This principle states that there is a harmony, agreement and correspondence between these planes, delineated as
  • The Great Physical Plane
  • The Great Mental Plane
  • The Great Spiritual Plane

3. Principle of Vibration

The Principle of Vibration embodies the idea that motion is manifest in everything in the Universe, that nothing rests, and everything moves, vibrates, and circles. This principle explains that the differences between different manifestations of Matter, Energy, Mind, and even Spirit, are the result of only different "vibrations". The higher a person is on the scale, the higher the rate of vibration will be. Here, The All is purported to be at an infinite level of vibration, almost to the point of being at rest. There are said to be millions upon millions of varying degrees between the highest level, The All, and the objects of the lowest vibration.
Mental Transmutation is described as the practical application of this principle. To change one's mental state is to change vibration. One may do this by an effort of Will, by means of deliberately "fixing the attention" upon a more desirable state.

4. Principle of Polarity

The Principle of Polarity embodies the idea that everything is dual, everything has two poles, and everything has its opposite. All manifested things have two sides, two aspects, or two poles. Everything "is" and "isn't" at the same time, all truths are but half truths and every truth is half false, there are two sides to everything, opposites are identical in nature, yet different in degree, extremes meet, and all paradoxes may be reconciled.

5. Principle of Rhythm

The Principle of Rhythm embodies the idea that in everything there is manifested a measured motion, a to and fro, a flow and inflow, a swing backward and forward, a pendulum-like movement. This principle explains that there is rhythm between every pair of opposites, or poles, and is closely related to the Principle of Polarity. It can be seen that this Principle enables transition from one pole to the other, and not necessarily poles of extreme opposites.

6. Principle of Cause and Effect

The Principle of Cause and Effect explains that there is a cause for every effect, and an effect for every cause. It also states that there is no such thing as chance, that chance is merely a term indicating extant causes not recognized or perceived. The Principle is clarified in the chapter Causation.

7.  Principle of Gender

The Principle of Gender embodies the idea that gender is manifested in everything. The authors state that this does not relate explicitly to the commonly understood notion of sex, but rather "... to beget; to procreate, to generate, to create, or to produce..." in general. Gender is manifested as the Masculine and Feminine principles, and manifests itself on all planes.
Mental Gender is described as a Hermetic concept which relates to the masculine and feminine principles. It does not refer to the physical gender of someone, nor does it suggest that someone of a certain physical gender necessarily has the same mental gender. Ideally, one wants to have a balanced mental gender.
The concept put forth in The Kybalion states that gender exists on all planes of existence (Physical, Mental, and Spiritual), and represents different aspects on different planes. It is also stated that everything and everyone contains these two elements or principles.
The Masculine principle is always in the direction of giving out or expressing, and contents itself with the "Will" in its varied phases.
The Feminine principle is always in the direction of receiving impressions, and has a much more varied field of operation than the Masculine. The Masculine conducts the work of generating new thoughts, concepts, and ideas, including the work of the imagination.
It is said that there must be a balance in these two forces. Without the Masculine, the Feminine is apt to act without restraint, order, or reason, resulting in chaos. The Masculine alone, on the other hand, is apt to constantly reflect and fail to actually do anything, resulting in stagnation. With both the Masculine and Feminine working in conjunction, there is thoughtful action that breeds success, which points out that both the Feminine and the Masculine fulfil each other.

Authorship

The "Three Initiates" who authored The Kybalion chose to remain anonymous. As a result, a great deal of speculation has been made about who actually wrote the book.
The most common proposal is that The Kybalion was authored by William Walker Atkinson, either alone or with others, such as Paul Foster Case and Elias Gewurz.  Atkinson was known to use many pseudonyms, and to self-publish his works.

Also suggestive is the fact that, among his earliest published pseudonymous and anonymous works may have been a series entitled The Arcane Teachings, which bears many superficial similarities to The KybalionThe Kybalion explores seven "Hermetic Principles" while The Arcane Teachings examines seven "Arcane Laws", The Kybalion claims to be an elucidation of an ancient, unpublished Hermetic text of the same name, while The Arcane Teachings claims to reveal the wisdom of an ancient, unpublished scroll of occult aphorisms, and both books describe three "Great Planes" of reality which are further subdivided into seven lesser planes.

Both books also describe three of the lesser planes as "astral black keys" analogous to the black keys on a piano, and inhabited by elemental spirits. And, both books describe the process of "Mental Alchemy" in great detail, and in nearly complete agreement with each other. There are other similarities, and The Arcane Teachings might have been Atkinson's "first draft" of material which later became The Kybalion. Atkinson also attempted to describe the workings of the universe in terms of a set of laws in 1918's The Secret Doctrine of the Rosicrucians and his last manuscript The Seven Cosmic Laws, written in 1931 and published posthumously in 2011.

Influences

The works of the English philosopher Herbert Spencer are referred to approvingly in The Kybalion as showing an understanding of Hermetic Principles; and Spencer himself is eulogised as a reincarnation of the 5th Century BCE Greek philosopher Heraclitus or Hermes; who is in turn described as being a reincarnation of a still more ancient, Egyptian philosopher: No other writers are similarly referenced or endorsed within the text.
 ************
What I have to add to this is important because it shows that I already have an understanding well versed in this since 1984.

In  Brisbane in 1985 Kerry Riley and his wife Diane Riley ran a course that cost $500.00 back then  called " Mind Powers".  The course was entirely built upon the Hermetic principals of the microcosm of the macrocosm and as above so below principals as well as all of the others written about above with the seven principals.  Kerry and Diane are still doing courses and now they teach Tantric Yoga.

Originally trained as a shiatsu therapist Kerry Riley has had teacher training in yoga and meditation in ‘Dojo’ in Japan. He was recognized world wide for the successful ‘Kerry Riley’s Mind Power course’ which over 40,000 people attended between 1985 and 1995.

Diane trained as a yoga and meditation teacher with the East West Foundation, then with Kerry studied Sacred Sexuality and Tantra with authors Dr Stephen Chang, Moore University, The Muirs, Larry Collins, David and Ellen Ramsdale, and associated esoteric systems.

“Diane and I have always fervently believed that passion, joy, love and sexuality can be heightened and sustained throughout a lifetime. And that sexual love is a sacrament. 
Images @ Melonpopzdropz Flickr
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Monday, October 29, 2012

Meditation is a bridge between Soul and Personality

The recognition of duality in human nature produces, eventually, the intention to bridge the gap between the personality and soul, for the soul ever seeks conscious union with its personality expression.

IMG 5143 Stellar
A painting I was doing while meditating.
While aspiration may provide the motive, the real work of bridge building is carried out on the mental level, based on the ability to control the mind through the discipline of regular meditation. Meditation establishes relationship between soul and personality. It is a cooperative relationship, leading ultimately to soul-personality fusion.

The work is based on the simple premise that energy follows and conforms itself to thought. Correct use of the power of the mind will achieve any purpose, good or not so good. Occult meditation involves a focused mind, the capacity to visualize, an ability to build thought forms and to use the creative imagination, plus an accurate grasp of the soul's intent.

This type of meditation enhances the quality of life. It creates a lighted way of relationship and communication between the subjective realm of the soul and its objective expression. the personality. As the personality adapts and surrenders to the dominance of the soul as the real Self, it is in turn redeemed by soul light and energy and all aspects of life on the physical plane are irradiated and uplifted.
Excerpt from the Lucis Trust on Meditation.

The first step towards this unfoldment is concentration, or the ability to hold the mind steadily and unwaveringly upon that which the aspirant chooses. This first step is one of the most difficult stages in the meditation process and involves constant unremitting ability to keep bringing the mind back to that "object" upon which the aspirant has chosen to concentrate. The stages in concentration are themselves well marked and can be stated as follows:
  1. The choice of some "object" upon which to concentrate.
  2. The withdrawing of the mind-consciousness from the periphery of the body, so that the avenues of outer perception and contact (the five senses) are stilled, and the consciousness is no longer outgoing.
  3. The centering of the consciousness and its steadying within the head at a point midway between the eyebrows.
  4. The application of the mind, or the paying of close attention to the object chosen for concentration.
  5. The visualization of that object, imaginative perception of it and logical reasoning about it.
  6. The extension of the mental concepts which have been formed from the specific and particular to the general and the universal or cosmic.
  7. An attempt to arrive at that which lies back of the form considered, or to reach the idea which is responsible for the form.
This process gradually steps up the consciousness and enables the aspirant to arrive at the life side of manifestation instead of the form side. It begins however with the form or "object." Objects upon which to concentrate are of four kinds:
  1. External objects, such as images of the deity, pictures or forms in nature.
  2. Internal objects, such as the centers in the etheric body.
  3. Qualities, such as the various virtues, with the intent to awaken desire for these virtues and thus to build them into the content of the personal life.
  4. Mental concepts or those ideas which embody the ideals lying back of all animated forms. These may take the form of symbols or of words.
It is the realization of the necessity for "objects" in concentration that originated the demand for images, sacred sculptures and pictures. All these objects entail the use of the lower concrete mind and this is the necessary preliminary stage. Their use brings the mind into a controlled condition so that the aspirant can make it do whatever he or she chooses.

The four types of objects mentioned above carry the aspirant gradually inwards, enabling the transfer of consciousness to be made from the physical plane into the etheric realm, from thence into the world of desire or of the emotions, and so into the world of mental ideas and concepts.
This process, which is carried on within the brain, brings the entire lower nature into a state of one- pointed coherent attention, leading to a concentration of all the mental faculties. The mind then is no longer scattering, unsteady and outgoing, but is fully "fixed in attention."... This clear, one-pointed, still perception of an object, without any other object or thought entering into one's consciousness is most difficult of achievement, and when it can be done for the space of twelve seconds, true concentration is being achieved....

Meditation is but the extension of concentration and grows out of the facility one achieves in "fixing the mind" at will on any particular object. It falls under the same rules and conditions as concentration and the only distinction between the two is in the time element.

The Need for Care in Meditation: 

THOUGHT FOLLOWS ENERGY
The fundamental law governing all meditation work is the ancient one formulated by the seers in India centuries ago, that "energy follows thought". From the realm of ideas (or of soul knowledge) energy pours through; ...it seeps little by little into the dense minds of men and women, and to it can be traced all the forward movements of the present time, all organization of general welfare and of group betterment; all religious concepts and all outer knowledge of the Causes which produce objectivity....

Every form, whether it be the form of a sewing machine, of a social order or of a solar system, can be posited as the materialization of the thought of some thinker, or of some group of thinkers. It is a form of creative work...and all the work has been concentrated with energy of some type or another. The student of meditation must, therefore, remember that he is always working with energies, and that these varying energies will have a definite effect upon the form nature.

It will be apparent, therefore, that those who are learning to meditate must endeavor to do two things:
First: They must learn to "bring through" into the mind and then interpret correctly what...has been seen and contacted, and later transmit it correctly and accurately to the attentive and impressionable brain.
Second: They must learn the nature of the energies...contacted and train themselves to utilize them correctly. A practical illustration of this can be given here. We are swept by anger or irritation. Instinctively we begin to shout. Why? Emotional energy has us in its grip. By learning to control the energy of the spoken word we begin to master that particular type of emotional energy.

In these two ideas of right interpretation and right transmission, and of right use of energy, the whole story of the meditation work is summed up. It becomes apparent also what is the problem confronting the student, and why all wise teachers of the technique of meditation urge upon their pupils the need of care and slow procedure.
( From Intellect to Intuition, pp. 240-42)

My take on this :  I meditate by standing still and just looking at one thing and clear my mind.  That is what I call a real short meditation.  A long meditation for me is painting. 
While doing dot paintings I find that I concentrate on the dot.  I think of nothing but putting another dot in paint.  After a little while this becomes like I have left the room and my arm is painting but my mind is in the heavens
I see visions and hear messages in myriads while in this place.  My partner says I have a far away look in my eye and I seem to leave for a couple of hours.  I find this fascinating to hear these reports of me. 
The sea floor has risen hundreds of meters under the ocean (sea floor) these are the after thoughts I don't entertain while painting.  I prefer to allow the messages to come with out me entertaining.  Letting them just flow naturally like a river does.  Sometimes it twists and turns and spirals like water rushing to an ocean.   Rushing like lovers in the night who have been separated for a time.   I love that analogy. 
The other meditation I like to do is with the dawning sun.  I look directly into the sun and clear my mind of everything and concentrate on only the light and I do this for around a minute.  I have been doing this for sometime and I don't recommend that others do this for this long first up if attempting this. 

Build up from ten seconds to nine minutes.  I only stay a minute doing this as being barefoot on the earth where I live elicits the visit of many biting midgee's and they itch like crazy.  So we stay one minute doing this knowing the energy input coming into my body via the Pineal Gland and the Sunshine and the action of it going through my eyes and settling in my brain.   I swear I see the suns ejections when I look at it like this.  There is most definitely another colour surrounding the sun.  This is where the Star Water is / the ice crystals around the sun.  Sometimes a rainbow  around the sun is these ice crystals illuminated and it is possible to see this in the form of a rainbow.  It is technically called a Sun Dog.
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