[ensonar]

Does anyone have any specific techniques that have helped them reach greater depths of inner silence?

I have trouble getting past just a few minutes of inner silence at a time. It seems that no matter how much I remind myself and feel determined to hold the silence for long periods, I somehow slip back into internal dialogue over and over again.

There have been a few times where I was able to stay focused for longer periods, but those are really few and far between.

I'm not really sure that any advice from someone else could help much, but I am just curious of other people's experiences with inner silence and techniques used at reaching it.

The one from Castaneda's books that has helped me the most is "listening to the sounds of the world". At times I focus in on just one sound that I randomly pick out and try to stay with it as long as possible, and keep coming back to it as I begin drifting back to thinking. At other times, I try to listen to everything at once in the same manner.

Through this technique I've discovered that it is possible at times to split my attention and listen to the sounds and think at the same time. I know this isn't stopping the internal dialogue, but it does take the focus away from it when I just can't seem to be quiet. It also helps when trying to listen to a person or speaker. If my mind starts wondering, I have been finding that I can let my mind wonder and still pay attention to what they are saying at the same time. For some this might just come naturally. For me, it is a breakthrough

Would anyone else like to share some techniques that have helped them reach inner silence?

[admin]

Hold your breath without reason. Stop the world, and you can do something different,

[Lilac]

Reeching inner silence has always been a real challenge to me. Staring at the waves of a lake helps sometimes, though. The waves take your thoughts away.

[ryan]

couple it with a form of not-doing

[Lilac]

One method I have used is to let all the voices of the world to come into your head and imagine that those voices are happening inside your head. Then those beautifull natural or ugly technical voices kind of push your own thoughts away.

Birds, children, cars, wind, construction site, people...

[Merged]

Stopping the internal dialog is a gradual process that happens a little at a time. I started by observing my internal dialog and analyzing how much of it is rooted in my cultural conditioning. Keeping notes from hour to hour for a few weeks will get you in the habit. This allows one to slowly gain control of one's internal processes. I have been on a Toltec style path for 9 years and I am just now gaining true control. I can at times stiop the internal dialog to the degree that all of the objects in my visual field lose their emotional attachments and become random shapes and objects without real depth. This often happens while driving or when concentrating on a very difficult task. It is starting to become commonplace in the last few weeks. It is an intensely sober feeling. The second someone speaks to me it kicks the internal dialog back in and I enter the flow of society.

[jonian]

one needs patience to increase silence time, often years, anyway the very best technique is controlling one' s breath, sometimes even twenty years are not enough (especially for males )

[ensonar]

In what way do you feel the breath should be controlled? I've tried this on and off, but I don't feel that I have never got it quite right.

[jonian]

in whatever way effective to calm down, personally i' ve found the breathing from the abdomen expained in the Sorcerers' Crossing very good

[QUOTE][I]"The breathing of a person who is upset, " she said leaning closer, "is rapid and shallow and is localized in the ches or head. The breathing of a relaxed person sinks to the abdomen."[I][B]

[ryan]

must admit i have allways been a bit confused as to what constitutes inner silence. where do you draw the line between meditation and inner silence, is it the intent that makes it different? if i lay down and empty myself of everything, i can sustain absence of thought, and brief momments of not consciously registering the inventory i project onto the objects of my field of vision. and then i fall asleep. Ensonar i like the term you use "cognitive dissonance", do you think not-doing and internal silence are the same thing? or, Ensonar how do you think internal silence and not-doing differ.