When My Meditation Began to Deepen

For a long time, I thought meditation was mainly about sitting still and trying to quiet my thoughts.

Sometimes I could do that for a while. Other times my mind wandered constantly—to work, relationships, things people had said, things I wished I had done differently.

I could sit quietly on the outside while remaining very busy on the inside.

Over time, I began to understand that the difficulty was not simply a matter of technique.

In Falun Dafa, meditation is part of a broader cultivation practice. Zhuan Falun teaches that genuine tranquility is closely connected with the state of one’s mind and character.

So I began paying more attention to what happened outside meditation.

When conflicts arose, could I look at myself first?

When I felt hurt, competitive, resentful, or eager to prove I was right, could I recognize those reactions rather than simply follow them?

I started reviewing my thoughts and behavior more carefully each day. At first, nothing dramatic happened. But after some time, I noticed that my meditation had changed.

My mind settled more quickly. The usual stream of thoughts became quieter. Then one day, while sitting in meditation, I entered a state unlike anything I had experienced before: My body felt extraordinarily light and comfortable.

Gradually, I could no longer clearly feel my legs. Then the awareness of the rest of my body seemed to recede as well. Yet I was not asleep or unconscious. My mind remained clear. I knew I was meditating.

The experience immediately reminded me of a passage in Zhuan Falun, which describes an optimal meditative state in which one may feel wonderfully comfortable, almost as if sitting inside an eggshell, while awareness of the limbs and body gradually disappears and only a small awareness of practicing remains.

I had read those words before. Now I understood them differently.

On other occasions, meditation became so tranquil that outside sounds no longer disturbed me in the same way. Once, loud music and people nearby could have pulled my attention immediately. But in deeper meditation, I could remain aware that the sounds were there without my mind following them.

There were also times when I felt an unusual sense of spaciousness, lightness, or powerful calm.

These experiences were difficult to describe afterward. What became clearer to me was that deeper meditation did not seem to come from trying harder to force the mind to be quiet. It came as my mind carried less. Less resentment. Less attachment to being right. Less emotional struggle. Less need to hold onto every thought that appeared. That was perhaps the most valuable lesson.

I had once thought tranquility meant suppressing thoughts. Gradually, I began to see it differently. The mind became quieter when there was simply less inside that demanded my attention.

For me, meditation was no longer only an exercise performed while sitting cross-legged. It reflected how I was living, thinking, and responding throughout the rest of the day. And as that inner burden became lighter, meditation seemed to open into a state that I could never have reached simply by trying to sit still.

（Adapted from several Falun Dafa practitioners’ experience-sharing articles published on Minghui.org. The experiences described are personal accounts and are not presented as scientific or medical claims.）