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meditation
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A woman sits cross-legged in a meditation pose by a peaceful pond, facing a stone bridge and lush greenery in a tranquil garden setting.
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A woman sits cross-legged in a meditation pose by a peaceful pond, facing a stone bridge and lush greenery in a tranquil garden setting.
meditation Woman meditating outside.

meditation

mental exercise
Written by
Dan Merkur
Psychoanalyst and Research Reader in the Department of the Study of Religion, Universtiy of Toronto. Author of The Psychedelic Sacrament: Manna, Meditation, and Mystical Experience and Mystical...
Dan Merkur
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Britannica Editors
Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree....
Britannica Editors
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•History

meditation, private devotion or mental exercise encompassing various techniques of concentration, contemplation, and abstraction, regarded as conducive to heightened self-awareness, spiritual enlightenment, and physical and mental health. Meditation has been practiced throughout history by adherents of all the world’s religions. In Roman Catholicism, for example, meditation consists of active, voluntary, and systematic thinking about a biblical or theological topic. Mental images are cultivated and efforts are made to empathize with God or with figures from...

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