How to meditate

I write an overview of diferent techniques of meditation below hoping that one of them appeals to you and works for you.

One of the great sages defines meditation as the art of concentration on God.  God is defined differently based on each person's level of understanding. An atheistic physicist could define God as the sum total of all the matter, dark matter, universe and the rules governing the universe.  But, this is not a complete Whole as it does not explain what happened before Big Bang.   The second definition God is the life giving principle of all living beings --- this is called the Super Soul. This is what the Yogis meditate on during trance. The third definition of God is a person who lives outside the universe and is responsible for the universe, and whatever happened to it prior to Big Bang. Srimad Bhagavatam summarizes these three forms in verse 1.2.11 and further expands them in canto 2.

Meditation is the art and science of concentrating on God and in the process removing all the less desirable dirt in our heart (lust, anger, pride, jealousy, greed, etc.). The sages conclude that after cleaning up, one will realize that one's consciousness, mind and the body are three distinct entities. For instance, we make this distinction when we say "my body is aching". I never heard anyone saying "I am aching".   The sages also conclude that one can see the super-soul (God) when he has cleaned up his heart enough and is devoted.

The best definition of meditation is  in Bhagvadgita 6.47 as the one who thinks of the speaker of the Bhagvadgita. This would include the speaker's words (which would include the Gita), His actions, His form, His pastimes, His devotees etc.   Now, when one thinks of something, the mind tends to wander everywere except the object of meditation. To solve this problem, it is actually recommended that one chooses a phrase ("a mantra") with a sublime meaning, chant it and hear it. So meditation is actually very simple: pick a mantra, chant it and hear it.   Now, all mantras are not the same. For example, if one chants "coke coke coke", one gets bored very soon. On the other hand, if one chants names such as "aum", "Krsna", "Rama", "Allah", "Siva", "Ganesh", "Christ", people have demonstrated that they can do it for days and weeks with no stopping.   After experimenting a lot, I have settled down on this manthra: Hare Krsna Hare Krsna Krsna Krsna Hare Hare Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare.

Other ways include reading revelations such as Bible, Quran, Bhagvadgita, Srimad Bhagavatam etc. Sometimes, these books are very heavy. For example, Einstein struggled with Bhagvadgita which is "only" 700 sentences. If one is disinclined to such heavy literature, one could start with reading historical accounts of great saints. One such book is "autobiography of a yogi". Or read a book written by a Self-realized person. These books convince you to try to come to mode of goodness, away from passion and ignorance. Technically, there are nine ways to meditate defined in Bhagavatam, which describes the highest meditation techniques.

There are people who practice concentrating on looking at a candle (trataka). Somehow, I never understood it to be sublime.

The typical distractions to meditation are our senses (eyes, ears, mouth, nose and touch). If your mouth is burning due to eating too much Jalapeno peppers and red chillies, it becomes difficult to meditate. So, one needs to eat food that is conducive to the meditation and mind. Milk is a good one. I have found high protein diets inconducive. I have found onion, garlic and sometimes even pizza (due to fermentation) distracting to meditation.

Even if one eats the right food, the body is still causing a lot of unrest to maintain the vital functions like excretion, breathing, pumping blood etc. These distract the practioner. To aid in reducing this unrest, one uses various breath control techniques, broadly called Pranayama (the fourth stage of eight fold ashtanga yoga system). Some people advocate watching the breath. The one I follow often is breath retention: take a deep breath with one nostril, retain and then exhale out with other nostril maintaing comfort and a time ratio of
1:4:2. One unit inhalation, 4 units retention and 2 units exhalation while mentally chanting a mantra. It is important not to stress the heart or lungs.  Slowly you will notice that your breathing slows down, your whole body slows down and your mind's unrest slows down, allowing it to focus. The meditation experience is deeper with breath control. Some people get these benefits from just watching breath.