Hesychasm meditation

Hesychasm meditation comes from the Greek word "ἡσυχία", which means silence or calmness.

Hesychasm is the process of blocking out your senses so you can achieve an experiential knowledge of God. It is based on Jesus's instructions in Matthew 6:6, which urged "whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you".

This type of meditation involves assuming a specific posture that is believed to increase its efficacy. The posture involves placing your head between your knees in order to help you block out your senses. Because of this unusual posture, early Christians who engaged in this practice were mocked by their opponents as "navel gazers".

Once in this position, begin breathing deeply and reciting the words of the Jesus Prayer - "Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me" - in unison with your breath. Your meditation will then involve three stages of development.

The first stage, purification, involves developing focus and attention. You are to pay extreme attention to the consciousness of your inner world and to the words of the Jesus Prayer, not letting your mind wander in any way at all.

The second stage, illumination, involves moving your intention from your mind to your heart as you recite the Jesus Prayer. In this stage, you begin to see the words of the Jesus Prayer not just as a set of syllables strung together, but begin feeling on a deep emotional level that the words are a real invocation of Jesus Christ. At this point, your mind begins to obtain a certain stillness and emptiness.

In the third stage, your mind begins automatically reciting the Jesus Prayer, allowing your heart to open to God. At this stage you can achieve Theosis, or unification with God. People who have reached this stage report experiencing directly the contemplation of God as pure light. For many Eastern Christians, achieving the state of Theosis is seen as the ultimate purpose of human life.