daemon

I remember hearing quite a while ago that excessive meditation can, in essence, shut your brain down, causing you to go into a vegitative coma. Unfortunately, I have no references, and it's at least not a common urban legend if at all--no reference could be found on snopes.

If memory serves me, this referred to very large amounts of meditation, however--you'd have to be able to devote your life to it to acheive this state.

CuriosityKills

I am currently taking a course on meditation at a local Buddhist temple. The monk who is teaching it is a champion meditator at 83 years old! I guess he spent something like 25 years in the jungle in Thailand meditating, so he's pretty experienced.

Meditation has many benfits. After an hour of meditation (a half hour walking and a half hour sitting), my mind feels totally refreshed. I feel calm and happy. I have found that I am less likely to lose my temper or have angry thoughts. My memory has increased incredibly.

I have practised meditation before I started this class and was never able to truly cultivate a technique or understand exactly what was happening to me. I found this a little frustrating and wasn't vey committed to meditating at that time.

After being under the guidance of a good teacher I have learned how to recognize certain things that better enable me to meditate properly. Because of this I have recieved tremendous benefit.

My teacher has advised us that without proper instruction, we are susceptable to delusion. Many people meditate without guidance and cannot recognize delusions when they come along. He has told us that things such as seeing bright lights, hearing voices and other hallucinations should be ingnored while meditating.

I think that it is very important to be in contact with someone who can answer your questions and provide guidance while meditating. if someone is there to guide you, you will not break your brain.