Minding the Joy: Meditation for beginners

Minding the Joy Within:

Meditation for Beginners

  Meditation is one of “The Four Pillars of Exercise” (“Hard and Fast, Slow and Soft”), the “soft” pillar. It is an essential part of the Art of Living Health exercise regime. Many people find beginning a meditation practice to be hard or intimidating, but meditation can truly change your life. Certainly, it can literally change your mind. Start by understanding that meditation is not an esoteric concept, but a technique, a skill which can be practiced, and which will improve your concentration and relaxation as it is used more often.   

  I give you here a simple, easy and effective approach to meditation, and encourage you to give it a try. Commit to just ten minutes per day, for eight weeks, and see for yourself the benefits of meditation. I will offer you a number of ways to meditate, so try them all, and see which is the most natural and pleasing for you.

  Meditation provides a rich and varied set of benefits for one’s health, including a sense of grounding, improved heart rate and blood pressure, improved concentration, decision making and energy, and a sense of calm aliveness and basic joy in being. Meditation allows us to slow things down, rest in the present moment, and get a good look at what is going on in our unconscious bodymind, below the radar of our everyday lives. 

  Meditation allows us the opportunity to be here, in the moment, mindfully aware of what is present, moment to moment, and in touch with the earth. That may include thoughts, feelings, physical sensations, memories or images. Meditation makes more room for all of your experience, without getting caught up in that experience. Simply observing, without attachment or judgment. The result is thinking more clearly, acting from a place of clarity and purpose, and bringing one’s whole self into any activity we are engaged in. This state is essential when we are trying to manage stress, or strong feelings, such as rage, fear, terror, depression or feeling overwhelmed. Every parent has had those moments with their child when they had to remember to “keep breathing” or “breathe deeply, three times”. Those breaths actually do slow down the nervous system, boosting parasympathetic nervous activity, the part of our nervous system which is active at night, slowing our system down. Slow, relaxed breathing slows us down, physiologically.

  We live, unfortunately, in an increasingly fast, busy overwhelming culture, in which information comes rushing into us from all sides, with ever less time to take it all in or process it. This rushing is, culturally, one way to avoid feelings such as loneliness, hurt and sadness, which are frowned on in our society, but which, unacknowledged, cause even greater hurt and suffering. All of this rushing about leaves us depleted and tired, mentally, physically and emotionally. Meditation allows us to recharge our batteries at no cost, to become quiet again and come back to ourselves, where we can notice what we are actually experiencing. A chance to smell the roses again. I highly encourage you to try meditating in one form or another. You will find yourself more productive, calmer and more at peace with yourself.

“I always wanted to meditate, but I don’t have the time”

 This ten minute meditation is designed just for you! There are many wonderful books, tapes and approaches to meditation out there, including visualization, silent meditation and chant. The following approach is very easy and workable. It only takes ten minutes per day, although you may well find that, after using it over the next few weeks, you choose to increase the amount of time involved, ideally working up to two, 20-minute sessions per day. But that is later. For now, see this as Day One. By starting today, at this time next week you’ll have meditated seven times, over one hour of meditation. If you knew that one single hour this coming week could be devoted to changing your life, would you do it? Of course you would. So start today.

  It all starts with watching your breath. Sounds simple, right? Well, it is, and it isn’t. A misconception many people hold about meditation is that it causes all thinking to stop. If you do meditate, or you have tried to meditate, you know that the experience is more like the opposite. If only it did stop you from thinking!

  You breathe in, and think about what to cook for dinner. Breathe out, and you’re remembering a guy from high school you couldn’t stand. Breathe in, and worry about whether the starter on your car needs attention; it’s not cranking up properly. Breathe out and…you get the idea.

  If anything, it seems like your mind is going bonkers with thinking more than ever! And guess what? It is, and does that every moment of every day. Thankfully, we learn to cut out most of that noise by limiting our awareness. Unfortunately, it is also pulling us all over the place, like a big dog on a leash, taking us for a walk. And it is also keeping us from much of the wisdom and riches of our unconscious, all the insights and new life options that are hidden from view.

 So begin by knowing you can do this, and it is not a sign of failure to notice a lot of thinking going on once you start to meditate. Just like that big dog on a leash, taking you for a walk, you can learn to keep pulling gently on the leash of your wandering mind and thoughts, to bring the “dog-mind” back to you, to the center. “Stay”. 

  A good deal of meditation is just this: watching the breath, having stray thoughts, sounds feelings or sensations, noticing them, and then coming back to the breath again. Over and over. That’s called a practice. You may even find yourself losing focus at those times where you are noticing that the “bid dog” is actually staying still for a while!

  On a practical note: this practice is easier if you have a timer, to keep track of time for you, so that you don’t need to do as much work (you’re likely to start out wondering how long it’s been, and when you’ll finish, anyway). An inexpensive kitchen timer will do. If you have a smartphone, there are timer apps, such as Insight Timer, made just for meditating on the go, as it were.

  It is best to have a fairly set time for your meditation each day or night, and a set location. Soon after waking up, or near bedtime, in a room and location that is not too noisy, where you feel comfortable. It also helps to have a comfortable chair, seiza (meditation) bench or cushion. You do not need to be in the Lotus position, or even on the floor, for meditation to work for you, although this is fine as long as you are comfortable. Sit up, not rigidly, but not slouching, either, and not sitting back in a chair, or on a couch. If you use a chair or couch that are not very upright, place a few pillows behind you, so that your body is upright, but comfortable.

One Breath At A Time

·      Set your timer for ten minutes.

·      Take your meditation position on your chair or cushion, comfortable and alert.

·      Gently let your eyes close.

·      Take along inhale that sweeps up all your current thoughts, worries, hopes and wishes. Hold it for just a moment, and let it go out slowly with a sigh. 

·      Once again, take a deep breath in, and release any leftover tension.

·      Start your timer, and simply pay attention to your breath for the next ten minutes. If any thought, sensation, feeling or sound comes up, just notice it, and let it go, like a cloud floating away, and come back to your breath. 

Notes:

·      If you notice you are controlling your breath, just let go of the control and relax.

·      Notice where you are most aware of your breathing (chest, diaphragm, nose, throat). There is no “right” place.

·      Bring attention to that point- your “anchor point”.

·      With your attention on the anchor point, observe each breath naturally rising and falling.

·      There’s nothing to “figure out” here. Allow each thought to come and go. Allow, allow, allow. Ironically, this letting go brings you back into more focus, not less.

·      You’re thinking a lot? That’s fine! Just notice this, saying to yourself “thinking”, and come back to your breath at your anchor point.

·      Try to follow just one single in and out cycle of the breath. Then another. When you con not do it, just start again.

·      Getting tired, bored, frustrated? Just notice that feeling, and again come back to your anchor point and breath.

·      Continue this way, at your anchor point, following the breath. Continue until the timer sounds. 

·      Repeat this sequence for ten minutes each day.

“I keep thinking, and it feels pretty awkward”

 Beginning to meditate is usually a bit awkward, frustrating and, sometimes, boring or irritating. That’s normal. But the last ten minutes may be the first time in a long time that you’ve actually been still, silent, awake and present- all at the same time! That’s a new way to experience things, and feels strange at first.

  Like any new practice or skill, meditation takes time, before you lose the sense of being sloppy, slow or klutzy. Stay with it, because it improves, as in any practice- a new sport, playing guitar or learning to knit. Don’t lose hope or give up. Make the time for the ten minute meditation each day this week, and see how you feel at the end of the week, and after each session. May the mindfulness be with you!

  If you want other tips on meditating, or other practices, using chant, imagery and the like, some good authors are Jack Kornfield, Pema Chodron, Ken Cohen and Sharon Salzberg. There is a lot of great information and practice forms out there. Experiment, and find what works best for you. The form is not important; practicing is. That’s why it is called “a practice”!