A meditation technique that is very effective in bringing back the awareness in you by dropping all the desires and allowing life to lead you. This is also a Stop technique. But the difference here is, you will not be stopping suddenly, stopping in the middle of the action or the impulse. Here you will practise a slow, controlled stopping of impulses or desires. Stopping an impulse is a beautiful way to catch yourself off-guard. As of now, all your responses are conditioned. An ‘impulsive’ action usually arises out of layers of unconscious conditioning. The conditioning has gone so deep that you are aware only of the effects, not the cause. So it appears to be an automatic response. When you stop an impulse suddenly, in a single moment, layers and layers of conditioning can fall away, exposing you to yourself. You never like to be caught off-guard, because you are afraid to fall into this space! A single moment of spontaneous awareness can be more effective than all your planned responses. All your planning, your preparedness, is just one more impulse for your survival. You always think you will survive only if you are cunning and constantly on guard. Now suspend that cunningness. Be innocent and trusting. For a change, stop leading life but allow life to lead you! When there is nothing you can plan for, nothing you can be sure of, nothing outside that you can hold on to, naturally your awareness falls into your center.
This meditation is also excellent to rid yourself of addictions. We have all heard about chain smokers, alcoholics, womanizers, who one day simply quit their addictions and never returned to them. They didn’t try to quit – they simply quit, that’s all! With this meditation, not only the action, but the urge itself will drop. You don’t have to struggle with your addiction because the desire itself will be no more.
When a desire arises, consider the desire well. Be deliberate. Face the desire in its full force but do not act on it. At the same time, do not suppress it. Be aware that you are feeling this impulse and desire. Then, suddenly just drop it. Suppose you see a beautiful woman and desire arises in you. Examine your desire. Be attentive to what is happening to you at that moment. Be aware of how your body is feeling feverish, trembling. Be aware that your pulse is racing, that you cannot think clearly. Notice how the desire seems to have taken control over you. Do not judge yourself or the desire; don’t tell yourself, this is a bad desire. Don’t have any opinion, simply witness it. Then suddenly, drop the desire. It is possible! You can simply drop it.
Do not suppress the desire. Suppression is the root cause of most of our psychological problems. When you fight with an impulse, it becomes stronger. When you have considered something fully, it becomes easy to quit. The moment you say, I quit, you become separate, you become the watcher. You are watching your body and mind are filled with desire, but they are not you. At that moment, you become aware that none of these is you. Once again, you are thrown back upon your being.
