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Directing and settling attention
The ability to take attention deliberately out of problem-solving mode and leave it where it is. With repetition this comes to depend less and less on circumstances.
Programmes Meditation
A space where nothing needs solving.
A weekly group practice with Dr Matej Černigoj. Every session joins understanding to direct experience: an explanation, meditation in silence, and a conversation about what happened during it. For people who want to understand meditation, not merely follow instructions.
We will send you the date, the programme and the practical details. No obligation.
- 90 minutes
- Ljubljana
- October–May
Why
The brain does not keep your office hours.
If your days are full of decisions, responsibility and constant anticipation, you have developed a considerable capacity to work under pressure. The difficulty arises when that same mode stays switched on once it is no longer needed: the mind goes on assessing, planning and improving long after the working day has ended.
Rest, then, does not necessarily mean inner quiet. Even relaxation can become something to be done properly and with a result — and so merely another form of effort.
Alongside this, one can understand a great deal about oneself and still find it hard to notice directly what is actually going on inside. And meditation that a person tries to keep up alone often remains without context, without feedback and without continuity.
The way of thinking that keeps you in control through demanding situations is not the way that lets you truly switch off and be fully present with the people close to you.
What you develop
What the practice builds
Not a new technique, and not one more task to be performed correctly. These are capacities that grow gradually, through regular practice and conversation about it.
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Clearer sense of your own reactions
You notice as it happens when you are judging, controlling or straining — including when none of that is needed any more. Noticing is the condition for being able to set that mode down.
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Understanding your own experience
The explanation gives you orientation: what you are doing, why, and where it leads. Less guesswork and self-checking means more trust and less control over the experience.
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A regular, sustainable practice
The modern world is not kind to »just being«. A fixed time and a group of people who share that value help keep the practice from falling apart after the first few weeks.
How a session runs
Every session has the same shape.
A session lasts 90 minutes. How the minutes divide between the parts is not fixed in advance — it depends on the questions the group brings.
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Explanation and questions
Context, orientation and room for questions. You understand why you do what you do, and what you need not do.
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Meditation in silence
The meditation happens in silence, without the experience being steered as it goes. No one directs your experience — not even you.
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Conversation about the experience
Reflection, and making sense of what was noticed. The conversation helps distinguish what actually happened in the practice, and where someone got tangled.
Understanding is not an add-on. It is part of the meditation.
The theory commits you to no worldview. It is a map of the experience: you look at it before meditating, then put it away and give yourself to the experience.
- Being and doing
- Matej distinguishes the mode of doing — in which we try to change or preserve what is — from the mode of being, in which we strive for nothing.
- The paradox of meditation
- If we set being up as a goal, we turn it into another achievement. Hence the need to understand how perseverance and non-doing can meet at all.
Who it is for
For adults who think a great deal and carry a great deal of responsibility.
The programme is probably for you if you
- think a great deal and carry a great deal of responsibility;
- want to understand meditation, not merely follow instructions;
- are looking for a serious, continuous practice;
- value a considered explanation and the chance to talk it through;
- want to develop a different relationship to what goes on inside you.
Probably less suitable if you
- are looking for a one-off relaxation event;
- want an instant technique that removes difficulties quickly;
- are mainly interested in a religious or esoteric approach;
- do not wish to take part in a continuous practice.
The practice is intended for personal enquiry and self-knowledge. It is not medical or psychotherapeutic care.
How to join
Orientation first. Then continuous practice.
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Introductory weekend workshop
The compulsory first step. It provides the shared ground, an understanding of the approach and a safer entry into the group: being, doing, the paradox of meditation, and the manner of the practice.
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Joining the weekly sessions
Once a week, 90 minutes, from October to May. Once you have done the workshop, you can join mid-season as well.
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Continuous practice
The practice may continue across several seasons. You secure your place with a monthly card bought a month ahead.
The workshop is compulsory because the approach is not a set of instructions that can simply be carried out. Without shared ground the weekly sessions have nothing to work from — and the conversation about experience loses its precision.
The next date is being arranged. We will send it to you as soon as it is confirmed.
Who leads it
Not only a meditation teacher.
What Matej brings is the combination of broad psychological knowledge, conceptual work of his own, and many years of first-person practice.
- Doctor of psychology
- More than twenty years of meditative practice
- Author of Jaz in mi and a researcher of human experience
More about Matej
He read psychology and, after graduating, worked as an assistant at the chair of social psychology; his doctorate was devoted to the relation between the individual and the social environment. That research grew into the book Jaz in mi — Raziskovanje temeljev socialne psihologije.
Later he developed the practice of self-knowledge and a vision of a science of being. He starts not only from theory about the human being, but from first- and second-person enquiry into experience — his own and that of his clients.
He has researched and practised meditative non-doing for more than two decades; the approach is therefore no generic script, but the result of long testing. At slikavelika.si he publishes essays on the human condition and on meditation.
Practical information
When, where and how much.
Location
Perihoreza, izobraževanje & svetovanje
Koprska ulica 98, 1000 Ljubljana
Day and time
Once a week; we confirm the day and hour of the current season when you enquire.
Length of a session
90 minutes
When it runs
From early October to the end of May
How to join
The introductory weekend workshop first, then the weekly sessions. Joining mid-season is possible.
Introductory workshops
At least three each season: in late September, in early January and in the second half of March.
| Introductory weekend workshop | The price will be published together with the next date. |
| Weekly sessions — monthly card | 99 € |
| Half-season card (October–January or February–May) | 376,20 € |
| Full-season card (October–May) | 712,80 € |
The half-season card is four monthly cards less 5 %; the full-season card is eight less 10 %. The monthly card is bought a month ahead.
The monthly price includes VAT and is a flat rate for four sessions a month; it does not change with the number of sessions a given month happens to bring.
Cancellation by the facilitator: a cancelled session does not count as having taken place. A replacement date is normally arranged; if none can be arranged before the card expires, the card's validity is extended automatically. Where no replacement is possible, a proportionate credit or refund is given.
Frequently asked questions
What people most often ask before the first workshop.
Do I need previous experience with meditation?
No. The introductory weekend workshop explains the framework, shows what to do and what not to do, and gives a first structured experience. It also suits people who already meditate and would like to understand what happens during the practice.
What if I cannot stop my thoughts during meditation?
Thoughts arising during meditation are not the problem. The urge to control the experience is. That distinction is one of the central ones at the introductory workshop — and one of the common reasons solitary meditation stalls.
Why is the introductory workshop compulsory?
Because the approach is not a set of instructions that can simply be carried out. The workshop provides the shared ground and an understanding of the approach, and with it a safer entry into the group and a more precise conversation about experience.
Can I join the programme mid-season?
Yes, once you have attended the introductory weekend workshop. The season runs from early October to the end of May, and there are at least three workshops each season: in late September, in early January and in the second half of March.
Is the approach religious or spiritual?
No. The theory you receive commits you to no worldview. It is a map of the experience: you look at it before meditating, then put it away. The starting point is psychological and phenomenological — enquiry into experience, not adherence to a doctrine.
Is this psychotherapy?
No. The practice is intended for personal enquiry and self-knowledge. It is not medical or psychotherapeutic care and does not replace it.
What happens after I send an enquiry?
Perihoreza receives the enquiry by email and replies to the address you give. We will tell you the date and price of the next introductory weekend workshop, the day and hour of the weekly sessions, and the practical details. Sending an enquiry commits you to nothing.
Send an enquiry
Interested in the next introductory workshop?
We will send you the date, the price and the practical details. Sending an enquiry commits you to nothing.
Address
Perihoreza, izobraževanje & svetovanje
Koprska ulica 98
1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia