"Meditation: Religious Enlightenment or Developing Focus"

In Chamseon, martial meditation, I learnt that the "Eastern Method " of meditation is not thinking of nothing. It is thinking of some subject matter. Hapkido Grandmaster Yong Ki Song himself said this to me. In martial arts, we meditate to concentrate on our techniques. It can be used to concentrate on e.g. your studies. So in martial arts case meditation is a method only and not religious. It is a tool/method to discipline our mind thought process and to remove distractions, so as to prepare for deeper thoughts.

In my case, if my mind is too occupied with many things, I prepare myself for quiet devotion by meditation method of counting my breath, then when I (my mind, body, spirit) am still, I do my Christian devotion. Prayer is deep concentration of talking to God. I think of Bible verses application. I think of what is true, noble, right. Philippians 4:8 "Whatever is true, noble, pure, lovely, admirable - anything that is excellent or praiseworthy - think about such things." (Please note that I am not saying you have to be in a meditation position to pray. In Christian context, prayer is simply talking to God, and you don't need to be in any specific position. I do this personally to help me concentrate myself. Of course there are many other ways to calm yourself, like going for a walk in the park, listening to music etc. But meditation method is fast to bring your mind to readiness to concentrate.)

Most important I find that for a Christian when meditating is not to let your mind be blank, as a Christian who believes that there's always a spiritual battle going on, if we let it go blank, we expose ourselves to spiritual attacks rather than be filled with Holy Spirit.

For non Christians, some meditation do go into the spirit realm and hence into a trance. So as an instructor I teach my students to focus on a topic, and not let the "emptiness" of mind take over. So I use the tool of meditation to prepare myself for martial arts training, prayer, thinking of Bible verse application etc.