What Is Meditation?

Meditation is defined as an attention-based technique for inner transformation, providing a common reference for cross-cultural study. The essay discusses how meditative attention varies in focus and mode across cultures, attitudes toward its technical nature, and the relationship between short-term state changes and long-term trait changes in inner transformation. It distinguishes meditation from non-technical, state-oriented, or mechanical practices like automated mantra repetition, and explores fuzzy boundaries with prayer, mysticism, ritual, shamanism, medicine, martial arts, relaxation techniques, and psychotherapy.

Study at a glance

Abstract

This essay defines meditation as an “attention-based technique for inner transformation”. This generic definition establishes a common point of reference for the cross-cultural study of meditation, and it serves as a basis for discussing cross-cultural issues relating to the foci and modes of meditative attention, the attitudes toward the technical nature of meditation, and the relation between short-term changes of “state” and long-term changes of “trait” in the inner transformation that meditation brings about. Meditation is distinguished from related phenomena that sometimes go by the same name, but are non-technical, state- rather than trait-oriented, or mechanical in a way that fails to modify the mode of attention of the meditator, as in the automated and ritualistic repetition of mantras. The essay also discusses the fuzzy borderlines between meditation and a number of other practices, including prayer, mysticism, ritual, shamanism, medicine, martial arts and modern-day relaxation techniques and psychotherapy.