Meditation

When Joannie Parker developed breast cancer, her doctors eradicated the disease with surgery, chemotherapy and radiation. But the rigors of battling cancer left the 66-year-old Westwood woman feeling as many patients do: stressed out. To deal with her anxiety, Parker enrolled in an eight-week meditation class at UCLA's Rhonda Fleming Mann Resource Center for Women with Cancer.

Twilight is falling. More than 3,000 barefoot, mostly Western and 30-something followers of Osho Rajneesh have padded into a lofty tent christened "Buddha Hall" to again hear the master's words. The guru's white armchair, complete with a cushion to ease his chronic back pain, is reverently borne in and placed on a marble platform. A screen lowers to the amplified twang of a sitar. The projector lights up and purrs.

Molecular biologist and author Jon Kabat-Zinn was a pioneer in applying the Buddhist concept of mindfulness to Western medicine and secular society. But he doesn't consider himself a Buddhist. "Mindfulness, the heart of Buddhist meditation, is at the core of being able to live life as if it really matters. It has nothing to do with Buddhism. It has to do with freedom," Kabat-Zinn said in a telephone interview from Lexington, Mass. "Mindfulness is so powerful that the fact that it comes out of Buddhism is irrelevant.

As the lights dimmed over a hotel ballroom in downtown Los Angeles, 2,000 people closed their eyes and commenced their morning kirtan, or devotional chanting. "Oh, God beautiful, at thy feet, oh I do bow," they sang as monks played tiny cymbals and other instruments. "To the yogi, thou art bliss." The visitors were attempting to establish a spiritual tone for the weeklong world convocation of the Self-Realization Fellowship, a religious and spiritual organization whose devotees practice yoga and meditation while honoring underlying principles of truth in the world's great religions.

Rivers Cuomo has no problem admitting that he sometimes still feels like a teenager. "Maybe I haven't matured in some ways that other 40-year-olds have," the Weezer frontman said in a recent interview. "Or maybe I'm more willing to honor those immature voices inside myself that other 40-year-olds aren't. " He certainly isn't very age-appropriate when performing, which is a good thing for a rock star, even one who's now married with a kid and a degree from Harvard. Back in August, Weezer played the headlining spot in the concert series attached to the U.S. Open of Surfing in Huntington Beach.

We know filmmaker David Lynch for the dark surrealism of "Eraserhead," "Blue Velvet," "Inland Empire" and "Twin Peaks," as well as for his deep, abiding love of coffee. Lynch is also passionate about transcendental meditation, which he first took up "on a beautiful, sunny Saturday morning" in 1973. That passion spawned a book, "Catching the Big Fish," and the David Lynch Foundation for Consciousness-Based Education and World Peace. Lynch spoke about what TM means for him and why others should try it too. Catch the longer podcast at latimes.com/davidlynch.

The anonymous white walls of my cell were bare except for a crucifix. My tiny cot creaked loudly against the church-imposed silence as I rolled, trying to sleep. Even flushing the toilet seemed a noisy intrusion. At 6 a.m., the steeple bells would call me and 30 bleary-eyed men down dimly lit halls and into the chapel for the day's first prayers. It was 12 hours into my stay at St. Anselm Abbey, a 108-year-old Benedictine monastery, and already I had had enough silence and prayer.

A Meditation to Help You With Weight Loss By Belleruth Naparstek; Time Warner AudioBooks One cassette One hour; $12 Time Warner AudioBooks has added three titles to a beneficial and masterfully produced meditation series by psychotherapist Belleruth Naparstek. Naparstek, who has a soothing, deep voice, leads the guided meditation on the first half of "A Meditation to Help You With Weight Loss" and the affirmations on the other half.

Everyone agrees that stressful situations make your blood pressure take off. It's the fight-or-flight, prepare-to-do-something-dramatic response your ancient ancestors had when being charged by a woolly mammoth. Your body releases stress hormones that make your heart beat faster and your blood vessels constrict, and blood pressure rockets. When the stressful situation is resolved, blood pressure comes back down. Some scientists suspect that getting stressed out too often can lead to chronic high blood pressure.