Wisdom Teachings - Sat Yoga, Costa Rica

Student Question: I’m meditating more now, and I’ve been using two different strategies: either trying to stop all thoughts that come up and staying in a state of intense concentration, or staying in the observer position, although I easily fall out of it. Which is a better strategy? “It’s different for each one because everyone has different karma,” begins Shunyamurti, the founder of the Sat Yoga Institute in Costa Rica. “But, the ‘vasanas,’ the tendencies to externalize and to keep the mind busy, running away from one’s core of silent awareness, is a tendency that can be defeated by consistent return to the center. And it just has to be a habit that becomes more important, more powerful, and then the other habit will be extinguished.” Recorded on the evening of Thursday, November 11, 2010.