Meditation is mind training. Many religions and philosophical systems of the Far East apply meditation in order to calm down the mind, develop concentration and insight. This method helps to experience what philosophical theory suggests. But different religions usually have different aims, and therefore their meditations also differ. Even in Buddhism there are many various meditations. They are united by the same goal: they help practitioners to liberate themselves from suffering and understand the nature of mind. Meditations bring mind to peace and concentration by leading it to a more stable state. Calm mind can see things inside and outside more clearly. They better see their own states and for this reason are able not to be controlled by them, not to depend on them. They better understand the world and other beings knowing how they feel, what they need and how to benefit them.
It is said that meditation brings the teaching from the level of head to the level of heart: what was understood intellectually now turns into experience because of the practice and is reflected in the immediate reactions of a person.
Gradually Buddhist view starts working inside: a practitioner perceives the things better and manifest himself or herself the way it is described in the teachings. The most effective meditation in Karma Kagyu tradition is a constant identification of oneself with the Buddha nature, experiencing outer world as Pure Land. When the experience of the totality of the subject, what is seen and the act of seeing becomes unbroken – both in meditation and between them – the goal, the state of Great Seal (Mahamudra in Sanskrit), is considered to be reached.