Upvote:0
There are trillions of places meditating on concepts can bring you. The void sounds like one of these places if I'm not mistaken. It might lead to some peace and concentration but most likely it would be nothing permanent and no real wisdom would be realized. Mindfulness, putting one's awareness on one's experience or one's reality, in the present moment, can only help one see through the many delusions in front of true reality. These delusions are such that most people don't even realize they are there. Mindfulness can bring one to only one place: "Reality". Mindfulness or the meditation to see clearly, is a meditation that leads one to transcend suffering permanently. Meditations to see concepts can only aid with one's attempt to attain enlightenment.
Upvote:1
One type of mindfulness is expanded.(Being aware of sensations, thoughts, walking etc)
The other type of mindfulness is narrowed.( Being aware of the sensation of the breath at one point).
Both are mindfulness.The second one narrow mindfulness can lead to concentration then absorbtion which may or may not lead to a voidlike experience.But Awareness will always be present within the void or any other experience that may arise during meditation.You may not be aware of who is being aware,what your being aware of but you have to be aware of awareness itself. The moment you go blank even when you are absorbed that is wrong concentration.
Upvote:5
There are an almost countless array of meditations within Buddhism. The Visuddhimagga alone outlines 40 different practices for calming the mind. It covers even more practices for developing mindfulness. Zen teaches "just sitting" and koan meditation among others. I can't even begin to count the amount of practices used in Tantra/vajrayana. Needless to say, it's exceedingly easy to get confused. It's easier still to not see how one practice might lead into another, when one might practice might be appropriate over another, or when to avoid a given practice altogether.
My best advice is to find a teacher and practice with him or her. I'd further add that it's important that you find just one teacher and stick with whatever practice they give you. Eating at the Buddhist Buffet is only going to divide your attention and limit your progress.
Upvote:5
"One side tells me to be aware of all my actions ( Breath, Stepping, Thinking )"
The above is satipatthana / vipassana / sama-sati ("right mindfulness" in the Noble Eightfold Path) practice.
Then I see another type where basically you remove all Mindfullness like entering a void, Blankness and without thought but yet still sort of There.
Two things about the above remark:
Satipatthana and samatha present distinct practices, and the Buddha taught both. Though one does not do both simultaneously -- they are known to get in the way of each other -- they may be practiced in conjunction. So, "remove all mindfullness [...]" meaning "not doing satipatthana to do samatha" could start to make more sense, as the descriptions of mental states above suggests an attempt of describing jhanas, which is an array of special "states of mind" often referred to as "absorption states", developed through samatha practice.
What is the type a Buddhist should practice? Or the benefit of the two?
First, there are many kinds of meditations preserved by many buddhist traditions as pointed out in this answer.
Having said that, and speaking of only samatha and satipatthana, popular saying is that one either practices both, or just satiphattana -- it has been brought to attention that there is some ground on the sutras for this position.
The benefit of samatha are manyfold, but the prominent characteristics are of calming the mind and sharpening concentration. It's a practice of samadhi, and as such, it has direct correspondence to "right concentration" in the Noble Eightfold Path: samma-samadhi.
Sathipatthana is often considered to be the "actual work" that drives one to the understanding, to directing the mind to reality, to "directly see" (vipassanΔ). It also has a correspondence with "right mindfulness" (sammΔ-sati) in the Noble Eightfold Path.