CHRIS CONNELLY

•  

  Revisiting Sitting in the Power - part two

  17-Mar-2023

  In the previous blog, we explored the main types of meditation practices (visualisation, focus and transcendental) that provide physical, psychological and spiritual benefits in their own way. Still, in this part, we will look more at the practice of Sitting in the Power.

  Sitting in the Power has gone through several iterations from the version I was taught and still teach from the 1990s. It is my personal opinion that some of these iterations have minimal relation to the version I was taught and that I have personally benefited so much. Therefore, if you don't recognise the steps as those you may have been introduced in the following few paragraphs, I recommend you give them a try.

  When we look at the steps typically involved in the practice of Sitting in the Power, we find that it doesn't fit comfortably in any one specific meditation type. Though arguably could be seen to encompass characteristics from each. So, what's happening here? Let's go through each step and see.

  At the start of the practice, the individual is asked to get comfortable, close their eyes. Take their awareness to their breathing, and allow the breath to ebb and flow. Each lasted around the count of three.

  This step aligns nicely with the focussed meditation practice designed to help develop the ability of the individual to control and inhibit erroneous. Often, a tutor guiding the individual through the practice can be heard to say, "…if you find your mind wandering, that's fine, just go back to the breath and continue where you left off..". Acknowledging the importance of developing the ability to sustain our focus or awareness upon the chosen stimuli, e.g. the breath.

  The next step requires the individual to synchronise the breath to the imagination and feeling of expanding their energy. This is usually completed in several phases. First, to get a sense of their energy expanding and feeling in the room, they are seated. Secondly, to get a sense of their Power expanding beyond the room and into nature. Then lastly, to expand out into the universe.

  This step adopts the use of the individuals' imagination to provide a focus and distracts everyday thoughts. Encouragings the exponent to have a sensory experience similar to the meditative practices that use guided visualisations to achieve the desired outcomes.

  It is often said by tutors that this process aids the individual in being able to develop and build their own Power. An essential skill for any developing medium and an explanation that I do have some sympathy with. But I feel the instructions in the phases should not be taken too literally. Rather than relating to the individuals' Power, it is a means to exercise the cognitive components of the individual psyche.

  The last step I find the most fascinating. Here the individual is asked to invite the Power of the Spirit World firstly and then God's Power to blend with the Power they established in the previous step. Interestingly, the instruction is always to blend with these two places' Power and not to establish 'communication'. This emphasises that this step isn't about mediumship per se, but rather the benefits it brings to one's mediumship, through again exercising some components of the individuals' cognition. This step encourages the experience from blending with these powers to come to the individuals' awareness. But never to become fixated on a specific experience but rather acknowledge the experience and let it flow by.

  This is precisely the practice adopted by transcendental meditators. The meditator takes the role of the observer, allowing thoughts to bubble up from the unconscious to conscious awareness. Never interacting or becoming fixated, but simply developing the state of awareness and allowing that awareness's effect (emotional, psychological, physiological) to occur.

  So by splitting Sitting in the Power into its component stages, we discover that the practice is a hybrid of several different meditation practices working together to benefit mediumistic unfoldment. In the final part, I will suggest why it is necessary to have these other parts and their role in the mediumistic unfoldment. Further, if the story of how Sitting in the Power came about, e.g. through communication from a spirit control, is true. This will demonstrate the genius and intelligence of the Spirit World.

  Tags: mediumship, sitting in the power, meitation, glyn edwards

Comments

• (no comments)