Paul the Apostle, teacher and writer put it this way: “When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see through a glass, darkly;”  It’s found in 1 Corinthians 13, and it’s considered to be Paul’s  most powerful piece of writing. It talks of unconditional love and is a powerful call to self-examination.

“For now we see through a glass, darkly.”   Eight words! What an incredible message!

We  come into the world--the physical--as babes born with clear superminds--superminds that are like sponges: they absorb everything around them, particularly the emotional stuff. Children observe their role models--mom, dad, brothers, sisters, friends, school teachers, and they remember things said and things done.

As  philosopher Alan Watts wrote in The Book Against Knowing Who You Are, “Other people teach us who we are. Their attitudes to us are the mirror in which we learn to see ourselves, but the mirror is distorted.”

“Why don’t you grow up,” say the voices, and obediently we become little men and little women.  We learn how to jump on the roller coaster of adult life, a roller coaster of emotional ups and downs that gets faster and faster. Our companions are ambition, possession, social escalation, short-lived relationships, fears of sickness, stress, anxiety and a whole bunch of others. Often we proclaim: “I’m seeking happiness,” but happiness on the roller coaster is often a short lived affair.

When someone wants to get off the roller coaster, his wisdom and sanity are questioned by other riders, who cannot imagine any other life. Driven in their lives, they have forgotten who they really are. They have become their own worst problems.

How do we remember? How do we remember our true selves? How do we start to clean up Paul’s “glass, darkly”?

Long before Paul trod the dusty road up Mt. Parnassus to speak at the Temple of Delphi, overlooking the beautiful Gulf of Corinth, someone had written a message for all humanity -- “Know Thyself.”

Meditation is a doorway to answering that statement: “Know Thyself,” which Naomi Humphrey in her book Meditation - the Inner Way, calls “the universal call to awakening...a process of gradual refinement, of distillation and transformation” 

Meditation brings about a condition called higher awareness and self-realization. Meditation is a process that develops through an altered state of conscious. If this sounds threatening, and a creation of New Age, it shouldn’t. It’s been around since Abraham’s time. “And Isaac went out to meditate in the field at eventide:” (Genesis 24:63). Most of the Psalms were written for meditation.

The initial key to meditation is relaxation. It’s a fact that when you are relaxed you can focus or concentrate without all the barrage of thoughts, called mind-chatter, that bombards our consciousness on a daily basis. Meditation practiced on a daily basis creates some distinct benefits in life. Your world of outside pressures may not change, but the way you see them will change. You may also see people around you differently.  But more importantly,  you start to see yourself in a new light, with a growing self-confidence, a blossoming self-esteem.

Meditation generates a multiplicity of benefits at ground level. For instance, at a physical level you’ll notice your breathing becoming easier and more rhythmic, the pulse rate starts to slow down, blood pressure can (but not always) show a decrease,  and lactic acid buildup, one of the fatigue acids that results from stress, diminishes. At the mental level, regular meditation reduces mind chatter, one is able to focus or concentrate more easily, and studying and memorizing become easier as mental stress diminishes. Sleeping habits also improve.

In addition, an interesting phenomena develops: time appears to slow down. You feel as if there are more hours in the day. Memories take on a different perspective, as do views of the future. Ralph Waldo Emerson, the 19th century essayist and poet said: “You find men talking everywhere from their memories, instead of from their understanding.”  Meditation brings understanding.

When body-mind stress levels are reduced, the immune system is strengthened  by the lowering of stress-hormone levels. In Health for Life,  a special edition of Newsweek (Spring-Summer 1999), a section on Meditation said: “A 1995 National Institutes of Health panel found ‘strong evidence’ that meditation and other relaxation techniques are effective in treating a variety of chronic-pain conditions such as lower-back pain, arthritis and headaches.”

There are various methods of meditation, Intellectual, Emotional, Physical, Action and Meditation, Structured Meditation, and Unstructured Meditation, and the student needs to practice whatever method is most suitable.

Many teachers claim meditation is not easy. It’s the discipline that is difficult to sustain. The need to take ten, twenty, even thirty minutes a day  out of one’s “busy” schedule to do something, that to many, appears unproductive and futile. Create the practice of meditation as a positive habit, a dynamic on-going process, and know the benefits will start to accrue.

There is another aspect of meditation, that becomes extremely profound, and not easily described. Meditation gives one a sense of expanded universal consciousness, a sense of timelessness, a sense that you and the Infinite Intelligence are one. As you clear the conditioned mind of all the clutter it picked up, you’ll start to realize something dynamic: “It’s all right to love myself. I am lovable.”  And with it you’ll recognize that thread of God-consciousness that flows through us all.

When this happens you’ll want to rush out and tell everybody. Don’t!  When somebody, who notices your complexion and perhaps your aura looking great, stops you and says: “What’s happened to you? Somebody special in your life?” You simply say: “Meditation.” If they ask for details tell them. The reason?  Jesus the teacher said it in the Sermon on the Mount: Matthew 7:6 “Give not that which is holy unto the dogs, neither cast ye your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you.” (Matthew 7:6) Many people have been hounded, persecuted and martyred for breaking this expert advice, including the teacher who gave it on the Mount.

One other important aspect in meditation. As you become aware of your memories, habits, practices, thoughts, do not judge them as good or bad, negative or positive. Simply work to understand them.  Be aware of them without judging, opinion, or comment. In an age when television and other media promote opinions, this may be difficult. If it is, study your desire to be opinionated--without judging, without feeling guilty. Judge not, was also a piece of  cosmic wisdom  given in the Sermon on the Mount.

The main goal of meditation is self knowledge, and as you realize a growing awareness of self-knowledge, you’ll find yourself changing. The “glass, darkly” that the teacher Paul mentioned so long ago to the Corinthians will start to clear, and you will see yourself and your life  as they really are.  You’ll enjoy being your true self. You’ll enjoy being part of the Universe. You’ll be on the home stretch.

In a burst of joyous enthusiasm you may start to meditate several times a day in the hope of early achievement. Perhaps they didn’t tell you about the  second phrase written in the Temple of Apollo at Delphi. Three words: “Nothing in excess.”

FOOTNOTE: I used Paul's "Glass Darkly" reference in my book and indeed the title "Cracking the Glass Darkly."  R.E.