Meditation is very difficult to describe and can only truly be explained once experienced. It is the practice of mental concentration leading ultimately through a sequence of stages to the final goal of spiritual freedom, nirvana. The purpose of Buddhist meditation is to free ourselves from the delusion and thereby put an end to both ignorance and craving. The Buddhists describe the culminating trance-like state as transient; final Nirvana requires the insight of wisdom. The exercises that are meant to develop wisdom involve meditation on the true nature of reality or the conditioned and unconditioned elements that make up all phenomena. The goal of meditation is to develop a concept in the mind.
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<br>Learning to meditate properly, …show more content…

Vipassana teaches that everything is attached and interconnected in the world.
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<br>Samatha meditation is the development of mental tranquillity with concentration, and is accompanied by three benefits; it gives happiness in the present life, a favourable rebirth, and the freedom from mental defilement, which is essential for attainment of insight. The mind becomes completely free from disturbance and agitation, and ready to show the nature of things as they really are, the aspect of them which is hidden from ordinary knowledge by the restlessness of craving.
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<br>Vipassana means insight. Vipassana is the realisation of the three signs of being, Anicca, Dukkha, and Anatta, by direct insight. Until these are seen to be true in one's own experience - one can then be said to have gained Vipassana, or greater insight, into oneself and the world, and to have increased in wisdom and have rid the mind of egoism and craving.
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<br>In a whole, I think meditation is central to Buddhism in the sense that it generates a lot of feelings that helps the Buddhist detach themselves and accept concepts such as ‘no self', and to focus on other people rather than themselves. Thus the idea of a ‘self' ceases. They realise the process of change is constant and eternal. As you read these words, you body is ageing.
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<br>Through meditation, we slowly become aware of what we really are below the ego image. We wake up to what life really is. It is not just a parade of