Can meditation increase our awareness and intuitive experiences?
—Archit, India
Dear Archit,
Yes, meditation can indeed increase your awareness and intuitive perception. This is because you are calming your mind in meditation and going to the center of your being. The perceptions that are gained in meditation come to us when we have stilled the mind and calmed the emotional waves of feeling in the heart. It is at that point that deeper perceptions and understanding are possible.
To achieve this requires both a good meditation technique for stilling the mind, and an understanding of how to calm the heart’s feelings. In addition, it is necessary to commit to a daily practice of meditation. Your awareness is increased in meditation because you are able to go beyond the senses and perceive a much broader reality both within and all around you.
In the Autobiography of a Yogi, Paramhansa Yogananda describes his first deep experience of cosmic consciousness, given to him by his guru, Sri Yukteswar. Although this is not what most meditators will experience at first, as your practice deepens this is the direction that it will take you in. At the very least, meditation will give you peace. And as you pursue a meditation practice, it will lead you in the direction of expanded awareness, intuitive perception, and a much broader understanding of life itself.
If you are interested in pursuing this, I would suggest that you contact Ananda in India. They offer classes, both in person and online, that can help you with this. Ananda India has a number of teaching centers located throughout the country.
In divine friendship,
Nayaswami Parvati
