You’ve heard about meditation. It’s everywhere these days. From your hippie aunt to your productivity-hacking mate. Every man and his dog is talking about meditating these days. Now, I’d love to come in with a contrarian take, to blow the lid on how over-hyped meditation is, but I can’t. Well, I could, it’s definitely kinda over hyped. It’s not a magic bullet and it’s not going to solve every problem for you. What I can say it will do though, is give you some more space to fix what’s happening in your life.
That’s the aim of this little project I’m putting together. The first step is to calm down, and meditation is going to be one of the most bang-for-your-buck ways to do it. Meditation simply is one of the most effective ways to chill out. Give me a few minutes of your time, and I hope to make a relatively convincing case for why you should give it a try.
So, what do you picture when you hear the word meditation? If you’re anything like me then you’re picturing a monk sitting on a mountain, maintaining the most tranquil of vibes. Lately, my image is more of me freezing my butt off when I wake up early to try and squeeze some meditation in every morning. Yep, if it wasn’t clear already, I’m drinking the meditation Kool-aid. But, I’ll be honest. I suck at it.
I know how good meditation is. I really do. The periods in my life where I’ve been meditating most frequently have been marked by a relaxation and clarity that boosts my ability to get the most out of my days. It also helps keep me grounded when the world is on fire around me. Now, I say “the periods of my life”, but I’m a convert, just a very lazy one.
Meditation is incredibly easy to put off or procrastinate. Any of you who are dabblers in the practice will know the feeling well. You tell yourself that you’ll do it in the morning, then the morning comes and you decide you’ll do it in the afternoon. Then the afternoon comes and you tell yourself that you’ll do it before bed. Then bedtime comes and you’re wrapped up in your sheets and you’re not coming out. Then we get right back to you telling yourself you’ll do it in the morning.
One of the things that makes meditation so great is part of what makes it so easy to put off. You can do it anywhere, anytime. All you need to do is, for your standard take on meditation, is to sit down and stop thinking so hard for a while. Now, it can get infinitely more complicated than that, if you’re really diving deep into it, but it also doesn’t have to be. Just sit down and take 15 or 20 minutes to do your best to ease up on all the thinking. That sounds pretty doable, right?
Here’s a basic guide. Find yourself a nice chair, or sit on the floor. You want to be grounded, either with your butt feeling the ground or chair, or your feet placed firmly on the floor. Posture is relatively important here, so try and straighten your spine out, unroll those shoulders, and take a moment to relax a little. Don’t strain yourself, try release any muscular tension you’re holding. Got that?
Next comes the challenging part. Just sit. If you’re anything like me, your mind will be racing, thoughts flying around at a millions miles an hours. That’s normal, that’s cool. Take a deep breath and focus on what it feels like to suck that breath in, then let it go slowly. Keep doing that, try and stick with the feeling of the breath. Your mind will wander, that’s a given. When you notice that it does, all you need to do is gently refocus on your breathing.
That’s all there is to it, for now at least. It’s both stupidly simply, but unexpectedly challenging. Give it a try, it won’t be perfect, but I find it really does help me chill out a bit. When I do it in the mornings, I feel a bit readier for the all chaos the day will throw at me.
Now, if you want to look into it, there’s a heap of benefits to doing this, even for 20 minutes a day. I’m really not the guy to regurgitate numbers and stats at you, but if that’s your bag then they’re certainly out there. I recommend looking into the studies on Mindfulness-based stuff and its outcomes. There’s the science for those that care, and there’s the spiritual qualities for those that might matter more too. Meditation is the core practice of many faiths out there, even the Christians or Muslims who are scoffing right now, meditation and prayer are almost identical in practice. So, if that’s your bag, then maybe look into that.
For the more esoteric of you, you can look into the Monroe Institute and their gateway stuff. I haven’t, but if I understand it right, they believe that meditation is the pathway to psychic powers. There’s also people who believe that meditation puts you on the same frequency as UFOs, and if you meditate you’re more likely to encounter UFOs. If anything like that is appealing to you, then look into it.
Now, what I described was the most basic of mindfulness-styled meditations. That happens to be where I’m most experienced and the people around me are into. I have a friend that very into Transcendental mediation and that’s its own thing. There are thousands of years of traditions and more techniques than you can shake a stick at. You can find something that works for you. I really enjoy breathwork and walking meditation, that works for me.
Now, I’m not trying to convert you into anything. I’ve seen the benefits in my life and those I care about. I truly think it might be one of the most bang-for-your-buck ways to calm your body and mind down a little. Calming down and giving yourself the space to reflect and act in a way you feel is correct is the goal here.
So, I can’t force you to sit down and meditate. I have just told you how you can start and what the benefits could be.
So, what are you going to do?