Inquire within...

This meditation will help you listen to your soul as it points you in the direction of your true desire...

Close your eyes. Become aware of your body. Bring your attention to your breath. Become aware of your effortless breathing for one or two minutes, until you feel still.

Now, bring your attention to your forehead in the space between your eyebrows. As you hold your attention there, become aware of your body breathing. Relax. Don't force or try to shape your breath.

Allow your awareness to connect your breath to the point between your eyebrows. When you notice the body breathing in, your awareness moves from the point between your eyebrows to the midbrain, a point roughly between your temples that is sometimes called the third eye. When you notice your body breathing out, sense your awareness moving from that point back to the point between your eyebrows. Continue to feel your awareness move from one point to another on the movement of your breath. As you breathe in, awareness moves from the point between the eyebrows to the midbrain. As you breathe out, awareness moves from the midbrain to the point between your eyebrows.

As your mind settles, feel the practice becoming more effortless; feel a growing sense of calm.

When you experience this, become aware of presence slowly unfolding in the midbrain. Continue to watch, feel and listen.

Once you enter into a rhythm of deep peace and effortlessness, begin to sense that your awareness, at the point between your eyebrows, moves in and out on its own, independent of the breath. Eventually, stop thinking about the breath and just be aware of a kind of effortless pulse moving in and out of the third-eye center. Gradually feel a sense of bliss unfolding, your whole being flooded with a boundless sense of contentment and joy. Don't try. Just be aware and, at the same time, completely relaxed. Contentment will continue to unfold the more completely you let yourself go into effortlessness.

Now, become aware that the source of this contentment and joy you are experiencing is actually you. Continue letting go until you feel that you are the source of joy and bliss. In the final stage of this practice, you are completely absorbed into a state of joy and bliss, such that you no longer experience being separate from the universe of which you are a part. Eventually, you experience being bliss itself - unbounded, you are the bliss that the ancient teachings tell us is the nature of all things.

Now, established in this state, tune in to your "wisdom center" - the place of knowingness within you. For many people, it's in the gut. For others, it may be in the heart or third-eye center. The important thing is to just settle and tune in to a feeling of knowingness and certainty within you. Resting in a deep state of contentment, experience the part of you that knows exactly what you need and what you don't need. Feel connected to the inner core of truth that is always ready and fully capable of guiding you to your best life.

Continue to rest in contentment as you pose the following question to your higher Self. Calmly ask: "Which one of the four desires, if it were to be fulfilled in the next 6 to 18 months, would best serve my highest purpose, or dharma?"

Allow your inner voice to provide you with an answer that pinpoints the particular desire that will best serve your highest purpose. Don't let your rational mind take over this process; it must be organic and intuitive. The response from your soul will be decisive and clear.


Reference: Yoga Journal 2011