PEACE THROUGH MEDITATION: VARIATIONS RANGE FROM CHANTS TO QUIET, CENTERED PRAYER

Back in the 1970s, Rob Dillon found a way to deal with the voices in his head.

"How often do you find yourself jumping from one thought to another, getting distracted by a mental to-do list of your own thoughts?" asked Dillon, a theater professor at Southeast Missouri State University. "Meditation is a way to get free from the chattering monkeys in your brain."

For the past eight years, Dillon has been battling the monkeys successfully with a breath-counting form of meditation derived from Buddhist traditions.

But making meditation into something only Buddhists can do is a mistake, he said. Practices such as breath control, repeating a phrase or focusing on an object have become common. People who have experienced Lamaze childbirth classes or sought help from the Southeast Missouri State University counseling center know this, Dillon said.

"This fast-food version of meditation is out there," he said. "People find what they need through all sorts of paths."

Yana Davis began practicing meditation 26 years ago through a Buddhist tradition called Soka Gakkai, or "value creation society." The society was created in Japan in 1930.

Davis, who works at KCRU radio, discovered it while he was in college and needed a higher degree of focus in his life.

"I've become a more responsible person and also developed an internal wisdom that I can use in my daily life," he said. "In essence, I've become a better person."

Davis' meditation is done out loud. He chants. The most common chant is "nam-myoho-renge-kyo," which is the title of a Buddhist book of wisdom.

Davis will chant at an altar in his home when he gets up in the morning and again in the evening. He spends between 30 minutes to an hour chanting.

A scroll in a small wooden box sits on the altar, and Davis uses this as a point of focus.

A couple times a month, Davis gathers with about 10 other people who come from various parts of Southeast Missouri to chant as a group.

Davis doesn't have to be at home in front of the altar to chant. Sometimes, as he walks down the street, he'll repeat "nam-myoho-renge-kyo."

"But I do this with discretion," Davis said.

Meditation is more than just an East Asian anomaly in American culture, said the Rev. Dr. Andrew Pratt, an adviser for the Baptist Student Center at Southeast. Christians do it, too.

"Basically, Christian meditation is centered on the person of Jesus," Pratt said.

Some Christians refer to their brand of meditation as centering prayer.

"When you're in prayer, you focus on one thing," Pratt said. "It might be a picture of Jesus, or a cross. It can be like using the name of Jesus like a mantra."

A Quaker professor at Azusa Pacific University in Azusa, Calif., has formed a movement called RENOVARE, which advances principles behind centering prayer.

In his book, "Prayer: Finding the Heart's True Home," Richard J. Foster writes that choosing a place for this kind of prayer is important, but the meditative act of prayer doesn't have to stop.

"As we carry on the business of the day, inwardly we keep pressing in toward the Divine Center," Foster writes.

Meditation is a very individual act not limited to one method, said the Rev. Arthur Trapp, superior of St. Mary's Seminary in Perryville, Mo.

Trapp will meditate during his 5 a.m. walk, or while he swims. He also has a special place for prayer that faces east toward the sun.

"I'm cautious to say that there are methods to this, but there are," Trapp said. "You need a regular place and a regular time, so that you can try to build it into a habit so you practice it more often."

Trapp recalls an elderly woman who lived across the street from his family as he was growing up. After reading her Bible, she would sit out in the sun on her porch.

"That's a great way to meditate," he said.