Monday, July 26, 2010

Active Meditation: Better Living through Handwriting

My favorite form of meditation is handwriting. I do it daily. As I move my pen across the page, my mind is freed to ponder the attributes of each letter. I am practicing graphotherapy, which changes the neuropathways of my brain by adopting new letter shapes.

According to Vimala Rogers, the author of “Your Handwriting Can Change Your Life”, by changing the shapes of your letters, you can train your mind to think differently. She states that by altering specific letter strokes, you can change certain aspects of your personality. To that end, she developed an affirmative alphabet to practice.

For example, the letter “A” that is often taught in schools emphasizes the ego instead of the soul. The attribute of Ms. Rogers “A” is “spiritual stardom, transforming ego into spirit.” The affirmation for “A” is “Today I will notice how my personality affects others and grow from that knowledge.” Writing her “A” repeatedly has helped me to internalize those things.

Ms. Rogers has set up a letter writing program to accomplish these ends. She instructs people to fill two sketch book pages, positioned in the landscape position. First, you write the letter across in one line, and then in the next line you write the attribute. After that, the following next three lines are filled with the letter, then the affirmation, and then finally the letter again. You do this over and over until both pages are filled.

Doing repetitive writing frees my mind to absorb the qualities of the letter I am writing. The meditation focuses my mind on one thing. As I write I can feel the junk leave my brain. When I am done, I feel refreshed. I do this daily meditation because it fills my mind through activity and thought. I am actively doing something instead of sitting passively chanting. The active meditation engages more of me, and is one that I enjoy.

NOTE: Vimala Rogers’ Alphabet can be seen at
http://www.iihs.com/vimala-alphabet.html

WORKS USED:

Rogers, Vimala, “The International Institute of Handwriting Studies”, 2008, http://www.iihs.com/vimala-alphabet.html , (17 July 2010).

------, “Transform Your Life Through Handwriting”, Sounds True, Boulder CO, 2009.

------, “Your Handwriting Can Change Your Life”, Fireside, New York, 2000

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