1. Ask your friends or companions to show you some playing cards for a few seconds. You should try to describe them immediately after they have been removed from sight. This helps in sharpening retention power of the mind and this is an elementary step for meditation.
2. Read a few pages of a book. Now try to focus on what you have read. Reject the thoughts which conflict with the effort to delve on the contents of your readings. Focus the mind on one object. Now tell your mind to classify the thoughts and make them up in small aggregations based on similarity of content. Now compare these assorted thoughts. With this practise you will be able to assimilate much more of your readings and much faster too. There is no gain in flipping through the pages of a book. Some students read very fast but are not able to retain much. This is a waste of effort and time. If we pay attention carefully to the subject at hand, it leaves a deep impression on the mind. Deep impression sharpens memory. Have you ever thought why you remember only some of the things and not all from your childhood? Things that have left deep impressions are indelible and last in our memory through a life time, and sometimes even beyond.
3. Sit in a comfortable posture for meditation. Keep a time piece at a distance of one foot from your eyes. Concentrate your mind on the ticking sound of the clock. Keep pulling back your mind to the ticking sound of the clock, as soon as it wanders away. Assess yourself as to how long you manage to keep your concentration intact. With practise, wandering mind gets controlled.
4. Sit in a comfortable posture for meditation. Close your eyes. Put earplugs in your ears. Now concentrate on listening to the sounds. You will hear different sounds, like flute, violin, drums, storm, temple bells, humming of bees and birds etc. Concentrate on the macro sounds at first. Concentrate on one type of sound at one time. If the mind begins to wander, try to take it from macro sounds to micro sounds, and from micro to macro. Usually one hears the sounds in the right ear, but sometimes one can hear them in left ear as well. One should try to focus on the sounds in any one ear. This stabilizes the mind. This is an easy method for controlling one's own mind.
5. Light a candle and place it in front of you. Concentrate the mind on the flame. When the eyes feel tired, close them and try to focus on the mental image of the flame. Try this initially for half a minute, and slowly increase it to 5 to 10 minutes. When you reach a state of deep meditation you will have the vision of gods. You may actually see images of learned men as per your perceptions. These impressions are manifestations of cultural upbringing that one has been exposed to.
6. Lie flat on an even surface under the open sky on a moonlit night, and concentrate on the moon. As and when the mind wanders, pull it back on to the image of the moon. This is an extremely effective method for those who are deeply emotional.
7 One can select any one of the stars instead of the moon, and practise the same way as prescribed in preceding paragraph.
8 Sit on the quiet bank of a river where waves meet each other with a sound of Om. Concentrate on this sound. Practise as long as you want. The experience is extremely exciting and inspiring at the same time.
9. Lie flat on an even surface under an open sky, and concentrate on its vast expanse. This practise works wonders for expanding the mind and opening it up. You will feel elevated. The blue expanse of the sky will remind you of the endless spirit.
10. Sit in any comfortable posture for meditation. Concentrate your mind on any one of the many subjective qualities like kindness, compassion etc. Decide upon the duration of the practise as per your capabilities. Only practise can help improve concentration.
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