Meditation isn’t sitting down and taking deep breaths for a few minutes and then having your mind cleared of all its clutter like magic. Instead, meditation is the practice of mindfulness so people can recognize when our minds are jumping around and how to channel focus to just one thought.
Why Meditate?
Meditation helps improve our relationship with ourselves. With meditation, you can connect better, lower your stress, improve your focus, and reduce the chatter going on in your brain. As an extra bonus, meditation can be done anywhere. You don’t have to get a membership or join a class to experience the feeling of mindfulness. You can meditate in your office, your home, in the park, anywhere really!
How to Meditate?
- Find a place to sit: You want to feel calm and have quiet around you.
- Set a timer: When you are starting out, you may only want to set the timer for five to ten minutes. The more you meditate, you can start setting the timer for longer.
- Notice Your Body: It doesn’t matter where or how you are sitting. Just make sure you feel stable and can stay in the position for a while. Then begin to notice how you are sitting and how your body feels.
- Feel Your Breathing: Focus on the motion of you breathing in and out.
- Be Mindful: Notice when your mind starts to wander off. Your attention will leave focusing on your breathing and start thinking about the week ahead or a meeting you have to prepare for. When this happens and you notice your mind wandering, simply return your focus back to breathing in and out.
- Don’t Judge Yourself: Don’t be too upset when your mind wanders. It is natural and will happen. You don’t want to focus on the fact that you lost your mindfulness, you just want to make sure you come back to it.
- Repeat: Keep feeling your breathing and come back to it when your mind starts to wander until the timer goes off.
When you are ready, come out of your state of meditation and notice your surroundings. Take notice of how your body feels and what you are thinking and how you are feeling.
