The two forms of meditation

Résumé 0

The term meditation is imprecise because it connotes different experiences. For the sake of clarity, we have sought to list and classify the various types of meditation. Meditations can be divided into two categories : self-hypnosis meditations and mindfulness meditations. The former seek to repoduce, in an individual context, the pattern of hypnosis characterized by the passivity of the hypnotized subject. Self-hypnosis meditations therefore require letting go and its corollaries : the silencing of consciousness, the abolition of the will and of the critical mind, the mechanical repetition of a phrase or a sound sequence. Consciousness, on the other hand, as Maine de Biran has shown, is always the result of an effort. It inaugurates reflection and cleaves the person. Mindfulness meditation is thus point by point opposed to self-hypnosis meditations. This opposition is, perhaps, a revealing indication of a polarity in the psyche. Self-hypnosis meditations could constitute returns to animal life, the normal unconscious underlying human life according to Maine de Biran ; mindfulness meditations, on the other hand, exercise more recent abilities and help to restore them when they have been damaged by illness. These two meditations complement each other. Moreover, in the light of neuroscience, they both allow for the hope of modifying the brain in the direction of progress.