Practical Meditation
Meditation has had a reputation of being associated with mysticism, or eastern religions. For that reason, many people have avoided it in their own lives, thinking that it either was purely a form of spirituality, or might even conflict with their own religion. In fact, because of that link to spirituality - I have read at least three authors stating that in academic circles, until the past ten years it was frowned upon to do any research involving meditation.
A few weeks ago, Amanda wrote an informative blog posting on Yoga. Yoga involving both the stretching exercises, and largely focused on calming the mind through positions and breathing exercises. These are meditation. The whole calming of your mind, and learning to let go of issues, anger, grudges, anxiety, and other worldly concerns - are all a part of meditating.
For me, meditating is all of the above. When you are in the thick of life, raising the children, scurrying to get them from music class, to school play, to swimming, to soccer practice - and add in the thousand stresses of your career, creating the new marketing plan, coordinating all the teams on the new software launch, writing the communication piece, answering a never ending stream of questions from sales and engineers - not to mention your own team... it all mounts up. We all live through life's ups and downs. The peaks of success, and life's sad moments. Through the ups and downs are all the stressors.
Most of us live through these stressors, wishing and sometimes looking for stress relievers. What I suggest is meditating to help smooth out the bumps. By meditating regularly you can strengthen your own self-control and calmness capabilities, as Kelly McGonical describes in her book on WillPower (p24).
Meditation is not the answer to all your stresses. It will help, and might even make you only
10% happier (as one author wrote). However, even that is worth a small daily time investment. Sonja Lyubomirsky a research
er in the field of positive psychology wrote that "The key to happiness and health is NOT how intensely happy we feel, but how OFTEN we feel positive or happy." (p.196 Myths of Happiness). So a daily dose of 10% happier.... might be just the right solution to help our overall well-being.
Honestly, the first time I came across meditation - was a book I mistakenly picked up from the library. My first reaction when I realized what it was - was to think that it was just a religious thing, and promptly closed the book, then took it back to the library. After reading some of the academic aspects of the calming and positive aspects of meditation - did I return to seek that book I pushed away... and try this for myself.
For me, I find it has worked, and helps me feel a sense of calm, clarity and control - while also allowing me to better separate the tough parts of life, and keep them from dominating. That let's you focus on what needs to get done, without getting stuck.
I am going to take a little journey now. I am setting a goal to achieve 100 straight days of meditating at least once per day. It might be as little as 10 minutes, or 20-30 minutes. If I break... no trouble ... I will strengthen my willpower and resolve - and start over until I achieve 100 days. I will let you know how it goes, and hope some of you join me on this journey :-)
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Comment by Brian Ritchie on June 8, 2014 at 9:42am
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Great post Charles. I have read a lot of "spiritual" books from authors like Deepak Chopra and Osho who all speak highly of meditation. I've also taken a course in practical philosophy where we did a small meditation exercise twice per class. BUT, I have never really focused on studying how to do REAL meditation if you know what I mean. I believe this is the topic of the next Osho book I will read (I keep waiting for him to spend quality time on the topic). Anyway, it is my goal to get more into this practice and it was refreshing to read this piece focusing on the benefits and how you're applying it. Have a great day and enjoy your meditation get-away ;-)
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Comment by Lorne Alan Riley on June 11, 2014 at 12:00am
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Interesting post ! To be honest I wouldn't know how to meditate...perhaps not something I should admit :)..deep breathing I get but how do you clear your mind etc?
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Comment by Kristina Dragnea on June 11, 2014 at 10:06am
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Awesome post Charles!
Indeed, the merge of Eastern philosophy and Western psychology has created the spawn of a powerful movement called mindfulness as a psychotherapeutic treatment. Its primary goal is the integration of mindfulness into everyday life as a support in dealing with the individual’s unique stressful life experiences. Through a sustained process of daily home assignments, “clients learn and refine a range of self-regulatory skills aimed at awareness of internal experience (i.e., thoughts, emotions, sensations) and their effects on symptoms, feelings of health and well-being, stress reactivity, and overall sense of self and the self-in-relationship. The practice of these mindfulness meditation techniques, Kabat-Zinn (2009) suggests, incorporates mental and behavioral components – “for example, exposure, cognitive change, self-management, relaxation, and acceptance—that have been shown to be effective and necessary in the treatment of anxiety disorders” (p.151) so one can imagine the profound effects this type of practice has the potential to elicit in the regularly stressed-out population. In saying so, I will join you on the 100 consecutive days of meditation challenge Charles, I am currently on day 3!
Brian you mentioned Osho and Deepak, and Lorne you wonder of the seemingly impossible technique of clearing the mind in meditation so I would like to mention a quote by my favorite guru, Thíck Nhát Han.
“Feelings come and go like clouds in a windy sky. Conscious breathing is my anchor.”
If you are interested in a super digestible, applicable, and down to earth read on meditation, pick this one up:
Thích N.H. (1997). Stepping into Freedom: Rules of Monastic Practice for Novices
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Comment by Amanda @Kamazooie on June 11, 2014 at 11:53am
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Thanks Charles for sharing and picking up on the yoga piece. It is commonly noted that yoga (at least in America) is used more as an exercise than it is as a way of meditating. This is a western impact I guess.
Like with Brian's comment, I too have not spent enough time studying how to practice meditation so I understand Lorne's issue. Thanks to Kristina for providing the link to the link to meditation for novices.
Good discussion :-)
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Hey Lorne, as I mentioned, I don't know a lot about meditation but I do know you should try to get yourself to a quiet, relaxed environment - maybe you can try it while you're watching game 5 of the NY vs LA Stanley Cup final :D Go Kings Go!!!
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