I suck at meditation, too! I have more luck with moving meditation, than if I’m trying to be still.

The following is cut and pasted from wikipedia. I had a very hard time with meditation. The technique Big Mind was useful for me. It is not a classic meditation, but then again, I don’t live in a classic Eastern culture.

Here is an intro: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Mind
One key idea in Big Mind is that for 2500 years Buddhism has been trying to achieve enlightenment by sitting and meditating on various mental states. Merzel’s teaching is based on ideas from Gestalt psychology and Hal and Sidra Stone, that simply talking to a given mental state or voice may help a person achieve the state immediately, although dedicated practice is generally needed in order to arrive at deep levels of that state.

One analogy is that of a long journey where someone shows you a map of the entire journey. Then you fly in a helicopter and very briefly touch down at key points in the journey, all the way to the end of the journey. One then goes back to the beginning and spends a lifetime walking the route on the ground.

Technique

The Big Mind process consists of “talking” with various voices in the mind. For example the dialog between the facilitator and the student or students might go as follows for the voice of Fear:

Facilitator: Ok, I would like to talk to the voice of Fear.
(Everyone does a small sitting position shift to represent a change of voice or shift in perspective.)
F: Who are you?
Student: I am the voice of Fear.
F: What is your job?
S: To be afraid.
F: Will you ever stop being afraid?
S: No. It’s my JOB to be afraid. That is why I was hired and get paid.
F: What are you afraid of?
S: Everything.
(Various students will volunteer items that one could be afraid of, digging deeper into what is the nature of fear.)
Students: Other people. Being attacked. Failure. Being hurt. Losing control. Uncontrolled fear. Death. Fear itself…
F: Why are you (Fear) useful?
S: I protect us from harm. I act as a warning. I Tell the Protector (voice of the protector) that there is danger.
(Note that all responses are done in the first person AS Fear, not a third person description of fear.)

The group then goes on to talk with the voice of Fear about benefits, disadvantages, roles, and such of the given state of mind. The conversation is always in the first person.

Many voices are investigated, culminating in the voice of Big Mind. Big Mind is usually described as being in and of everything and timeless. Big Mind is synonymous with the Buddha Mind, the Mind of God, the Timeless Mind, the Non-Dualistic Mind and many other representations of one’s higher consciousness.

The voices engaged and the order in which they are engaged varies due to the dynamic nature of the Big Mind process. This process can take anywhere from 2 to 7 hours. Longer sessions allow for better internalization of ideas and realizations that the participants experience.

A typical order in which each voice is engaged follows:

The Dualistic Voices

* Introduction
* The Skeptic
* The Protector
* The Controller
* Fear
* Anger
* The Fixer
* The Damaged Self (takes all the damage when the above fail)
* The Innocent Child (this is what all of the above are protecting)

The Non-Dualistic Voices

* The Non-Mind
* The Big Mind
* The Big Heart
* Complete heart-mind

The Integrated Self (Real Self)

* The True Self (Big Mind, Big Heart, All Dualistic Voices integrated); also called “Integrated Free-functioning Mind”
* Great Doubt
* The Big Mind
* The CEO (Chief Executive Officer: the voice that sets goals, directs and plans)

[edit] At dismissal to leave on a good note

* The voice of Great Joy