Meditation 4 (Advanced): Expanded States

Expanded States
This meditation technique can be done once the basics are firmly in place. I think you should have worked with the basics for a few years first, and that only because you really want your perspective to have shifted and anchored into a new version of how you experience your reality, where you are calm, not bothered by a lot of thoughts, able to shift your emotional state at will, and you feel ready to expand on outward to a new level and perspective.
 
Until you have learned the basics, advanced meditations will sound theoretical and imaginary. Once you have a personal sense of yourself distinct from thoughts and emotions, the ability to focus for an extended period of time without thinking, and the ability to move your consciousness around your body, you can now receive simple instructions on where to send your conscious focus, and send it outside of your body, where you can feel different states. This won't sound woo-woo to you, because you'll know exactly what I'm talking about. 
 
Expanded states meditations are taught in martial arts and yogic traditions. I learned expanded states meditations when I was a martial artist and advanced on to acupuncture school, and studied qigong. Essentially, you are able to move your conscious awareness outside of yourself and connect to other people, or animals, or trees, or the planets out in space. You simply get into the regular meditation state, then transition into body awareness, and then follow instructions to expand your awareness outward and begin connecting to other things. We are able to do this because there is some kind of shared space we all inhabit, and we are using that to connect to other life forms that exist in the shared space. It sounds very abstract and theoretical, but you can do it yourself, and you will feel subtle shifts in sensation in your own body when you connect to other beings outside yourself, and you may also receive some information, such as a feeling in your own body, or an idea that arises in your mind. 
 
This type of meditation becomes difficult to describe, because it is a non-verbal experience, but just know that when you do it, you will be able to experience different states of mind yourself, because you are expanding your awareness to include other beings. Doing this type of meditation, even for a short time, can be very enriching, because you definitely view your own life differently when you become aware of other beings outside yourself and a sense of the shared larger space we are all dwelling in. You don't have to take drugs to have this kind of experience. It's a lot safer and easier to integrate if you just do it through meditation, and you can just do it once or twice a year to achieve the results that come from expanding your awareness. I do this type of meditation once a month on the full moon with Sadghuru, a yogi from India, and it honestly makes my personal worries seem small and gives me a sense of a larger, intelligent system where everything is working as it should according to an order beyond my personal agenda.
 
Why You Need It
When you hit a certain level in your meditation awareness and inner work, you may find yourself to be so sensitive that happenings in the greater world around you may feel overwhelming and depressing. You may, at times, struggle to accept very difficult experiences you had personally, or very awful things you see happening around the world in politics, or the environment. As a sensitive person, you may suffer from a type of depression where you can't bear the suffering you can see all around you in people, animals, and nature. You may struggle to integrate some of the things you become aware of when you are doing a lot of compassion meditation. This type of meditation will ease that immensely. You will come out of expanded awareness meditations feeling very at peace with a larger world that includes all of the negative aspects. You will feel very peaceful, safe, and able to trust in a larger sense of order and well-being.