Decision making and concentration

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First of all thanks for all the help. It serves to be part of a network of individuals. I need to share what must be common among the autistic population, that is deep concentration and decision making, particularly on deep subjects. I wanted to try meditation to gain some deep insight on my thoughts and I don't know how to go about this without a guide that will charge me. It becomes very frustrating that I don't have enough brain power to clearly visualize, meditate and etc.

I want to hear about other's technique and your experience with this type of decision making and concentration. Help guide me.

Greeny, I studied Zen Buddhism years ago. The idea in meditation is to free one's self from one's thoughts--to be in purely a mentally receptive mode, to have no sense of "I" separating us from our environment; Zen mind is no mind. I think if you try this you will find that such is impossible, at least for a beginner. So then what is encouraged is, as Suzuki said, to watch one's thoughts drift by the same way we would watch clouds drift by in the sky. And just as we don't get upset by the clouds, we also should not get upset when we can't rid ourselves of our thoughts, or even at the content of those thoughts.

Another technique I learned was to label my thoughts, particularly with respect to how much they have to do with either me or others. As skittish and anti-social as I am, I learned that almost all of my thoughts are either about me or about others; few of my thoughts are about completely abstract matters, such as math, logic, or other academic-type concerns.

On a practical level, while I haven't meditated in years, it did help me immensely as I learned not to be bothered by my thoughts so much, and to slow them down a bit.

The book I would recommend would be this one. It is the first one I read, and still my favorite:

http://www.amazon.com/Zen-Mind-Beginner ... r%27s+mind

Hope this helps.

When people mention contemplating an idea, they talk about "meditating" on it. Is this the same idea?

I would like to recommend Peace is Every Step by Thich Nhat Hanh. Anything by D.T. Suzuki is excellent, too.

To reiterate what thelibrarian said, meditation is about emptying your mind of thoughts for a moment. With practice you can go longer without thoughts/worries filling your head, but in the beginning, it could be quite difficult, depending on how much you struggle with pervasive thoughts on a daily basis and your disposition.

Back to the question of how to make a decision and improving concentration, I think you will logically agree that the best approach for both begins with a clear mind. ie, Greater mental clarity will improve your concentration and make it easier to come to decisions about things. So! back to meditation.

When you meditate, you don't want to sit there and think about whatever problem or question it is you are trying to solve. The goal is to give yourself some time to think about absolutely nothing. So what works for me usually:

I like to step outside, but you can do this in your room. Just be somewhere safe and uninterrupted for a few minutes.
You can do this sitting, standing, or even lying down, but I recommend standing.

Relax completely. Take a few deeeep breaths, a sigh, a yawn, or whatever, and just let a smile come, don't force it (this just helps me relax). You can think "ahh this is nice" but don't fixate on that thought. As thelibrarian said, any thoughts that come to you in meditation should be let go.

Don't struggle or feel resistance if you can't stop the thoughts, just accept them and move on. You want silence and stillness, but thoughts happen, and that's okay, too. What you don't want is for your mind to be racing with them.

One way I keep my thoughts to a minumum during meditation is just focusing on my breathing. You can count your breath, or just listen to it, or just feel it going in and coming out. Breathing is highly underrated. It's not quite the same as "thinking of nothing", but it channels your mind into one thought. Also known in zen terms as: "One-pointed mind." This is applicable to daily life and something I think a lot of people on the spectrum can excel at. When you are doing one thing, do it and nothing else. Brushing your teeth, don't think about the crazy weather or Justin Bieber, just focus on brushing your teeth.

And just stay there for a few minutes. Preferably as long as you can but even one or two minutes in the beginning is good.

Similar to what thelibrarian mentioned about labeling thoughts, I prefer the technique of awareness. I don't try to label them, but I try to know where they are coming from. Is this thought coming from fear, or worry, or anger, or sadness, or joy. And the most important thing to remember is that you are not your thoughts. You are you. You are always in control of yourself, but you need practice and sometimes you need a reminder. Meditation is great for that.

There are other types of meditation which do include visualization, but until you can have some experience with getting in the state of mind where you can brush off irrelevant thoughts, trying to do that might not be very effective. Nothing in meditation is forced. Visualizing should be gentle. For example, if you want to visualize success on a final exam, don't sit there and pretend to go through the entire exam in your head. That would be irritating. Instead, just feel your mind opening to possibilities of more productive study times and absorbing more information, imagine how you would feel after acing the test.