The Fivefold Game of Lasting Happiness

1) Sit. Find a place to sit and set aside time with the specific intention of meditating. Set a timer if you need to, and don’t worry about going for long sessions – even 5 minutes to start with is fine. Eventually, try for 15 minutes, once or twice a day.

2) Notice your breathing. Watch yourself breathe as if you were looking at ocean waves at the beach. Don’t try to change your breathing, or do any special kind of breathing. However, the act of observing our breath often makes us breathe more deeply, and that’s fine.

3) Notice your distraction. For most people, noticing your breathing is very boring, and you will quickly become distracted by a bodily sensation, a sound, or your own thoughts and feelings. Just notice this distraction. Don’t judge it. Just observe it, like watching TV.

4) Return to noticing your breath. When your distraction naturally comes to an end (don’t ever force it to end), go back to noticing your breathing. Try to keep your attention on your breath.

This form of meditation is often called “mindfulness,” or the “Basic Form.” It’s great for beginners, because it teaches you to be non-reactive. It strengthens your ability to simply watch life unfold without judgment.

However, it’s not much fun to sit there and stare at your own mental and emotional struggle and do nothing about it. Eventually, you’ll want to learn how to actually heal your unhappy feelings and confusion about life.

Unfortunately, the Basic Form just doesn’t go there. That’s why our Meditation Coach, Mukhtar “Muki” Ramsey, decided to find a better way to meditate.

Samanya Dharma means “universal path to happiness.” Samanya Dharma teaches the “Advanced Form” of meditation, which actually includes five types of meditation to practice and master. Each one moves us sequentially through the process of healing our mental and emotional struggles. They are as follows:

1) Contemplation. Beginners start with “contemplation,” which is the art of using reason and science to develop some core truths about life, such as the purpose and meaning of life itself. This form of meditation helps to establish a feeling of clarity where there might have once been confusion in your mind.

2) Mindfulness. Students then learn “mindfulness,” which is the art of choosing to live our daily lives according to these core truths, which helps us to develop positive attitudes. This practice establishes a feeling of peace within our feelings, where once there was sadness.

3) Concentration. Next, we learn the art of “concentration.” This is the art of focusing our minds on our core truths. Even when life is very difficult, or when we want to take our meditation to the next level of spiritual awakening. This practice helps us to experience deep states of harmony with ourselves and the world around us, which helps to make our anxiety a thing of the past.

4) Energetics. Once we have mastered the art of concentration, we then work on developing our “energetics” practice, which is the art of moving towards the truth itself. Energetics focuses on opening chakras and moving energy in the body, such that we speed up the process of spiritual awakening. Energetics is a joyful practice that helps us address and ultimately eliminate our existential fears.

5) Communion. For the most advanced students, we begin to work on “communion practice,” which is the art of living in a constant “flow state.” This practice helps us experience a heightened sense of intuition and a deep sense of connection with all living beings. Communion practice allows us to replace our loneliness with bliss.