The Super Simple Guide On How To Meditate!
Hello Everyone,
There are lots of guides on the internet on how to meditate, but from what I've seen they're not very straight forward and always leave me with the feeling that I'm not sure whether I'm doing it correctly or not. This is going to clarify it in a few sentences and you'll be set for life.
It's best to do this in the morning so you can feel the effects throughout the rest of your day:
Simply sit, or lay down although you're likely to fall asleep if you lay down so I recommend sitting with your back against a wall and cross legged on a pillow. Begin by closing your eyes and taking a deep breath and paying attention to your field of consciousness, as in the sounds you're hearing, the feeling of your back against the wall and your feet on your legs. Your heart beating and your breath going in and out. There is a fundamental difference between your attention and consciousness, so keep your attention on your breath always. Soon enough you'll find yourself thinking about something random and when you do catch yourself thinking, just bring your attention back to your breath and stop the thinking and you repeat this process over and over and over again for as long as you like. Whenever you catch yourself in a daydream, just bring your attention back to your breath. Personally, I recommend if you've never meditated before to only start by trying it for 1 minute daily. The key here is to develop it as a daily habit because it can indeed have enormous positive impacts on your well-being, but only if it is practiced consistently, so don't try to go all out and spend 30 minutes meditating on day one because it's unlikely you'll be able to keep this up forever. Just slowly work your way up after a week, double the amount of time you started with until you reach a point you are comfortable with. Science has shown a habit takes about 60 days to develop, so keep that in mind.
In an age where there are 10 million things going on at the same time always, and so many different things are putting demands on us, meditation is more important than ever in order to feel relaxed and get through the day. If you are indeed able to keep this up for a week and then end up not meditating for a day, you will feel how big an impact it will have on your day, even if nothing different happens on this day and that will show you the importance of meditation.
That's all folks,
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I do a modification of this meditation as my bread and butter meditation type. Focusing on my breath as you describe is my default. But I allow myself to change focus every now and again. So it might be a touch (e.g. by butt against the floor, a breeze brushing my skin), something I see (e.g. leaves on a tree fluttering, or if eyes closed the light blotches you see through your closed eyelids), a sound (bird tweeting etc), or a feeling (these are the hardest, cos I find it hard to connect with my feelings, and also when meditating that feeling is normally a pretty boring tranquillity, he he). I'll blandly label it as sound/something seen/something touched/something felt....and then I "savour" it, simply allow my mind to focus on it, totally appreciate it, and I'll let myself stay there for a while and then move on to a different focus. If it was a sound and the sound stopped, then I continue savouring that sound in my minds eye. And so it trains mindfulness and focus. I've read a few books on meditation but I think that one came from Dr. Dan Siegel's Mindsight, a great book that explains in simple terms and with loads of real-life clinical examples and practical exercises to practice, the neuroplasticity and psychotherapy science behind meditation.
That's great, but I was trying to inform people on a more beginner type of meditation. Also, when you say you'll switch your focus from one thing to another within the same meditation session, I wouldn't advise this, because it takes away from the strength to concentrate on one thing for extended periods of time, and building true concentration, which is an extremely rare and valuable asset in today's age. I think switching focuses, even though it doesn't seem to make a big difference, can indeed help support our ADHD nature of today.
Yes I had the same reflection when I read about that meditation. IN fact the original was to stay focussed on one thing for about 10 seconds he says, but that seems very short to me, for all the reasons you say above, so I stay a good time focusing on one thing before letting my attention fasten onto someting different.
10 seconds is definitely wayy too short, lol. But yeah, there's nothing wrong with your approach honestly
Simple and accessible description. Related - in the words of one of my teachers Adyashanti - "If you want to learn how not to meditate well, try to meditate well."
A great teacher indeed. He seems to always be able to bring in the needed perspective to these matters.
Yup. I'm seeing him next month for a silent retreat. Very excited.
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