Anyone with consciousness in this world can do meditation. You can do it in your commute to work, in your bedroom, on top of a mountain, anywhere. However, to separate your thoughts and emotions from yourself is not an easy task to do.
When you try meditating, you will soon notice that your mind is always in a constant stream of thoughts, and some people are not even aware of it since they are used to identifying themselves with their thoughts. Thinking about the future, dwelling on the past, worrying, fantasizing, daydreaming. Moreover in this digital era, we live in a world with too much information, and as a result, our mental energy is constantly drained to cope with it.
With meditating, you are training yourself to filter your thoughts and emotions, and to only focus on the present, and on what is important and necessary. Your mind is like a muscle, and meditation will help your mind to be stronger. The more control you have over your mind, you become more conscious in processing information and making decisions. Consequently, this will impact other areas of your life; your self-control, your discipline, your mental and physical health, your performance, your relationships, everything.
How To Meditate
There are different techniques to meditate, and nothing is right or wrong. Whatever that trains your mind to separate yourself from your thoughts and emotions are considered as meditation. Most religions have their own traditional ways to meditate. Nonetheless, there are plenty of secular ways to meditate as well.
In general, the easiest way to meditate is to focus on your own breath.
First of all, be in a comfortable position, be it sitting on the floor or laying on your bed. You can either open or close your eyes.
Set a timer to force yourself to push through. If you are new to meditation, it’s better to start small, 1 minute would be enough.
Now clear your mind and focus on your breath.
Take a deep breath, expand your chest.
Exhale all the way.
Repeat; inhale and exhale.
The hardest part would be the thoughts and distractions that popped up in your mind. You might start thinking about the work you should be doing, or the conversation you had with your friend a few days ago.
It is totally okay if you can only do a few breaths without being distracted by your thoughts. What’s important is how you respond to it, instead of judging it and letting it carry you away, acknowledge your thoughts and then resume to your breath. Meditation is also an excellent way to practice self-compassion and acceptance for yourself.
With consistent practice, it will yield profound results, giving you mental clarity, calmness, and overall greater control over your thoughts and actions. However, meditation will not fix all of your life problems. Meditation is only a tool to help give you perspective and clarity, but you still have to take action to tackle your problems.
You can practice meditation anywhere and anytime. However, when just starting out, listening to guided meditation might help you. Instructions might help bring your awareness back to your breath and not on your thoughts. Check out these guided meditation videos in various lengths:
1-minute meditation to de-stress
5-minutes meditation
10-minutes meditation to reduce anxiety
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