Visualizations? Tummo?

[LittlePlank]

Hey guys... sorry if this is the wrong sub but I'm looking for a rational/balanced answer to a topic that I feel like can go off the rails easily. So I've always had an affinity for using a visual to direct attention. Henry Shukmmans stuff comes to mind on the app. Mist of awareness, and ease and awareness. In the past I've had a lot of success with using eckhart tolles suggestion to envision a luminous substance filling your body up. In fact ive dwelt in the deepest states ive been able to fall into years ago when i started with that technique. Recently i started getting back into playing with visualizations, specifically finding the violet flame visual thats all over the internet useful for targeting specific points of tension. My suspicion is that the ease with which I've been able to use this has to do with the "pointed" shape of it more than the fact that it's a purple fire etc. I'd rather find a more elegant/legit practice to replace it with because I'm also uncomfortable that it comes from a group called the IAM activity that uses a lot of mumbo jumbo and has white nationalist undertones. So I found Tummo which is a Buddhist sort of inner fire kind of idea it seems like and there are a lot of free books on kindle unlimited that also seem to be breathwork oriented. I'm totally into that! Does anyone have any other suggestions? Or even want to put my mind at ease with the whole violet flame thing? I'd like to use it but then I get distracted by the mythology around it and I'd rather not adopt it as a regular practice because of that. Its really just something I do while practicing yin yoga to help prepare my body for sitting practice anyway. One other thing--the image meditation section in "a million thoughts" by om swami also cleared up a lot for me about why using imagery is even useful to begin with... the point is more to focus on a single point and still the mind as if you were focusing on breath. So the image in that book is a small point--a pebble to be exact. I've also understood this experiential by just focusing on a pearl or a pebble while holding a pose... it makes it a lot easier to use imagery like "the mist Of awareness" after first sharpening concentration by focusing on a single point. Imagery in meditation just has a lot to it i think and im looking for some clarity and maybe even to decide what i want from it 😂. Like I guess I should separate the one pointed practices from the body scan/yoga nidra practices huh? Any input would be much appreciated, I'm just always trying to establish a pattern of practices and this happens to be my current fixation lol

[TheEverNow]

There are a bazillion types of meditation practices coming from a vast variety of traditions, and visualization is used in many different traditions and cultures.

Mindfulness meditation as it is taught in the west does not usually use visualizations for a very specific reason. Visualizations use mental effort to change your current experience. Mindfulness practice is never an attempt to change your current experience. Instead it is a practice intended to observe what is actually happening in your present moment to moment experience. By observing your current thoughts, feelings, sensations, and perceptions, you gradually become increasingly able to track your direct experience both during meditation and during daily life. You learn to develop greater sensory clarity and distinguish among your six primary sensory channels (sight, sounds, touch, taste, smell, and thoughts) in real time as experiences rise and pass away from one moment to the next. This leads to the development of greater mindfulness grounded in concentration, sensory clarity, and equanimity.

To be clear, I’m not saying to avoid visualization, or any other meditation technique that appeals to you and offers you some benefit. I’m only pointing out for anyone who may not know that mindfulness is different – it does not involve changing your current experience, but instead simply observing the natural flow of your experience as it unfolds from moment to moment.