That all is as thinking makes it so, and you control your thinking. So remove your judgments whenever you wish and then there is calm.” – Marcus Aurelius

 

There are a number of meditation practitioners who literally meditate naked, without clothes. They report that the openness and the sensations from the air moving over the skin are both pleasant and helpful to being open to experience in meditation. We have been taught that being naked is something we should be ashamed about, and that we should hide our imperfections. By meditating naked, we can accept what we truly are.

 

For most people meditating without clothes is not acceptable or appropriate and would certainly be problematic in group meditation settings. But, unclothed meditation is not essential to the true meaning of meditating naked. What we’re referring to is meditation that involves an unclothed mind, one where the mental process with which we cloak our experiences have been stripped away and they are appreciated simply as they are unvarnished by thinking.

 

We tend to live in our thoughts far away from what is actually happening around us. I find when teaching meditation that it is a complete shock to the beginning student to discover that they are unable to control their minds and thoughts simply arise regardless of their efforts to stop them. They have always believed that they were in control, that they were the rulers of their internal mental state and to discover that they are not is a revelation. Meditation is wonderful when we can strip off our thoughts, when we can be mentally naked and completely open to our immediate experience.

 

At first the student tries to stop the thoughts, thinking that this is what it means to be mentally naked in meditation. But, this is a misunderstanding. To be aware in the present moment is to be aware of all of our experiences and that thoughts are simply a part of that experience. What we need to do is strip away our attachments to our thoughts, to our beliefs that our thoughts represent reality and what we truly are and simply let them be part of our experience. We simply watch the thoughts, naked of attachments, and not hold onto them but allow them to simply and spontaneously arise and fall away.

 

We need to meditate naked of goals and aspirations. Meditators make the mistake of trying to accomplish something. A goal or an aspiration engages the mind in seeking and attempting to control experience in order to attain the goal. This is also a mistake as there is no goal to meditation. There’s just relaxing, letting go, and letting experience rise up and fall away, stripped of effort, of accomplishment, and of control. We need to strip away all notions that there is a goal that must be pursued.

 

We need to meditate naked of judgments. Meditators often classify their meditations as either good or bad depending upon how close to their expectations they came during the meditation. This is a mistake. Meditation is about letting go and just letting things be as they are. So, however they are is fine, not good, not bad, just what is at the moment. The human mind is constantly weighing and judging everything. This is useful in everyday life but in meditation it is a refusal to recognize that what occurs is simply what occurs neither right nor wrong. Strip off judgements and see things just as they are.

 

We need to meditate naked of interpretations. Meditators tend to interpret whatever is happening during the meditation. Hearing a sound the mind automatically interprets it as footsteps. Feeling a tactual sensation the mind interprets it as an itch. Seeing the light dim, the mind interprets it as a cloud moving to cover the sun, etc. This is a mistake. Strip away these interpretations. Just interpret the sound simply as an experienced sound, the tactual sensation as a just a sensation, the light dimming as just light falling away. Just be, watching, feeling, hearing stripping away any attempt to interpret the experience

 

Finally we need to meditate naked of expectations that we can actually maintain a meditation naked of thoughts, goals, aspirations, judgments, and interpretations. We need to strip away any belief that complete naked meditation can actually be accomplished. We’re human beings with minds that we can’t control. We need to strip away any notion that we can. It’s OK when we interpret, when a thought arises, when we judge, when we try to accomplish something. It will happen and will happen frequently. These things happen, even to the most experienced and adept meditators. Strip away any notion of a perfect meditation. Every meditation is perfect in its own way but not in the way that our minds think it should be. The thoughts, goals, aspirations, judgments, and interpretations are just as much part of our experience as the sounds of birds chirping, as the sight of a sunset. Strip away any regret that you are not the naked meditator that you want to be. Just be what you are, experience what it, and be exposed to your true nature.

 

So, strip the mind and meditate naked.

 

“We could say that meditation doesn’t have a reason or doesn’t have a purpose. In this respect it’s unlike almost all other things we do except perhaps making music and dancing. When we make music we don’t do it in order to reach a certain point, such as the end of the composition. If that were the purpose of music then obviously the fastest players would be the best. Also, when we are dancing we are not aiming to arrive at a particular place on the floor as in a journey. When we dance, the journey itself is the point, as when we play music the playing itself is the point. And exactly the same thing is true in meditation. Meditation is the discovery that the point of life is always arrived at in the immediate moment.” – Alan Watts

 

 

CMCS – Center for Mindfulness and Contemplative Studies