Lol, Sid. Having practiced meditation, I can assure you that it is everything just a matter of being able to concentrate properly at all. Visual focus can perhaps be a helpful aid but it is all about focus, not just about visual focus. I admit it is also incredibly hard for me to concentrate on just one thing for longer than a few seconds, without any interrupting thoughts,but mastering this skill is the purpose of meditation as it then makes you extremely perceptive, calm and somewhat smooth. Focusing on a sound, a smell or a touch will work equally as well, or at least it does for me. Everything is possible, sometimes it just needs to be done in a different way than the mainstream world does it. When we can live in the every day society, go shopping or just meet friends, drive a vehicle (with a navigator) and I don't know what else, and even play some mainstream games, we can also meditate. In one regard, it might in fact even be slightly easier for some of us, as I found out that those who rely so heavily on sight oftenhave an even more chaotic and disturbed mind full of messed up thoughts all over the place than I seem to.
Lukas

So what techniques do people use, then? In the environment I grew up (conservative christian), meditation was neither practiced nore encouraged, as it was seen as dangerous and something that could open you up to demonic influences.  I've often been interested in learning the skill, but every single guide and tutorial I've found online, including all of the audio ones, encouraged you either to focus on something visual in your environment, or to keep a visual picture in your mind (candles and flames seem popular). I don't even know how to start adapting these to my use, as I have no background in meditation to begin with. Does anyone have any pointers or resources that they found helpful?  I'd rather something without religious overtones, as I have no interest in changing my religious practices, or getting in touch with my spirit guide or the mother goddess or whatever; I just want something to reduce stress, calm and organize the mind, improve health, etc. Any thoughts on techniques and practices that work for you would be appreciated!

I won't rather talk about religion at all, at least not here. Anyway, Dark, to me personally, concentrating on nothing, or blackness, darkness, whichever way we put it, seems to be the very top skill level in concentration. I find that a lot harder than, for example, using the ground as your focus point, or a sound of the sea, or a smell, or anything you like, although the ground technique sounds particularly good and I am in fact going to try it out. :-) I find that when I try to just empty my mind, the longer I try, the more thoughts, and increasingly more chaotic and unrelated to anything else, seem to fill it. From what I heard and read, it's supposed to be caused by how our brain is trained to behave and to process impulses from the outside world. We are used to having so much perceived information input and to process so much unrelated stuff at once every day, every hour and minute, that the sudden calmness and emptiness we are now trying to force upon ourselves is somewhat disturbing for our rational, logical, conscious part. That's another reason why I find meditation so useful - to learn to make better use, and to be in better touch, with your other, subconscious, intuitive and emotional hemisphere.
Lukas

LOL, funny about the running water.
Even the sighted people still have to put up with the other outside simulations somehow if they close their eyes. that's part of the skills and concentration that meditation develops. When I was learning a certain japanese skill that I shouldn't probably talk about here, my master was putting great emphasize on learning to accept the surrounding environment as it was, even if it might not be pleasant to us. In the end, we truly learned to manage to just put up with it and put it aside so that it didn't disturb us any more.
I have never tried using headphones as i believe it would just cause more distraction than anything, but that's just myself. And it is best to avoid any direct electronical influences as much as possible. if i want to meditate at home, which is rare but still, I found out it works best if I just turn all electronic devices off, including the computer, HIFI player, anything, make sure that I am alone in the apartment, and close the door to my room. Rather than headphones, I would recommend some pre-recorded soundtrack playing quietly in the background from loud speakers. If you don't place yourself too close to the device, that should actually help rather than cause distraction. Just choose what fits you best, deciding for the proper track to listen to should be an important step in the process if you want to go this route, or just forget about little aids like this and start learning to imagine something in your own mind. That's your only sanctuary, nobody can steal this from you, and it works the very best of all possibilities. :-)
Lukas