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Another form of meditation is more closely akin to prayer and worship, wherein the practitioner turns spiritual thoughts over in the mind and engages the brain in higher thinking processes. The goal in this case is the receipt of spiritual insights and new understanding.
From the point of view of psychology, meditation can induce — or is itself — an altered state of consciousness.
Meditation generally involves discounting wandering thoughts and fantasies, and calming and focusing the mind. Meditation does not necessarily require effort and can be experienced as "just happening". Physical postures include sitting cross-legged, standing, lying down, and walking (sometimes along designated floor patterns). Quiet is often desirable, and some people use repetitive activities such as deep breathing, humming or chanting to help induce a meditative state.
Meditation can be done with the eyes closed (as long as one does not fall asleep), or with the eyes open: focusing the eyes on a certain point of an object or image, and keeping the eyes constantly looking at that point.
The purposes for which people meditate vary almost as widely as practices. It may serve simply as a means of relaxation from a busy daily routine, or even as a means of gaining insight into the nature of reality or of communing with one's God. Many have found improved concentration, awareness, self-discipline and equanimity through meditation. The disciplined self-cultivation aspect of meditation plays a central role in Taoism, Sikhism, Hinduism and Buddhism. Generally, there is religious meditation, where one meditates to commune with or on the Divine, and focus meditation, where one meditates to improve health or mental faculties. Very often there is significant overlap between these two positions in many meditative traditions.
In the Samadhi or Shamatha, or concentrative, techniques of meditation, the mind is kept closely focused on a particular word, image, sound, person, or idea. This form of meditation is often found in Hindu and Buddhist traditions (especially the Pure Land school), as well as in Christianity ( Gregorian chant, for example), Jewish KabbalahKabbalah "Reception", Standard Hebrew Qabbala Tiberian Hebrew Qabblh also written variously as Cabala Cabalah Cabbala Cabbalah Kabala Kabalah Kabbala Qabala Qabalah is a religious philosophical system claiming an insight into divine nature. Kabbalah" is a, and in some modern metaphysicalMetaphysics is a branch of philosophy, and related to the natural sciences, like physics, psychology and the biology of the brain; and also to mysticism, religion, and other spiritual subjects. It is notoriously difficult to define, but for purposes of br schools.
The concept of vipassana works in believing that the meditator's mind will eventually take note of every physical and mental experience "real-time" or as it happens, the goal being that it will gradually reveal to the practitioner how one's mind unknowingly attaches itself to things that are impermanent in nature. Thus, when such things cease to exist, one experiences the suffering from its loss. This in turn can gradually free one's mind from the attachment to the impermanent that is the root of suffering. In other words, in vipassana (insight, or seeing things as they are) meditation, the mind is trained to notice each perception or thought that passes without "stopping" on any one. This is a characteristic form of meditation in Buddhism.
However, in at least some forms of vipassana, one does not attend to whatever perceptions arise, but purposely moves one's attention over their body part by part, checking for perceptions, being aware and equanimous with them, and moving on. This form of meditation has some resemblance with "choiceless awareness" — the kind of meditation that J. Krishnamurti addressed.