One particular topic that’s played a large part in my self-development journey in the past year – and yet, one that I’ve shared little to nothing about on here – is meditation. Yes, I have been regularly practising meditation for a year now, and the effects have been amazing. So today, I want to share with you how I did it, why it’s helped me, and how you can do it, too.
I was familiar with meditation for a while, and I first tried to get into the habit in Year 13. At the time, it hasn’t yielded the results I was looking for; I do think my lack of consistency and the unhealthy habits I was cultivating on the side – staying up at night, wasting all my time on social media – were to blame. It wasn’t until my second year of university and the start of therapy that I’ve tried again, and completely turned my life around as a result.
But before I jump into explaining how to do it, what is meditation? Meditation is the practice of mindfulness and focus, with the purpose of training one’s self-awareness and creating a state of inner calm. But, this is not enough of a broad definition to entail everything that meditation consists of. Meditation can rest one’s mind, it can train perception, attention and awareness, and it can reduce stress, anxiety and depression. You can use meditation to relax before going to bed, improve your concentration for academic purposes, or get to know yourself better.
You get it, meditation is quite cool and it can help you with many things.
Meditation has its origins in the Ancient Times, as part of practices of various religions and traditions. More recently, meditation has become a common practice in people’s individual lives, and it is probably the no. 1 positive habit sold by all self-help books.
Following my struggles with mental health, I felt particularly exhausted and all over the place, and meditation was what helped me ground and heal, among other things. It became a nice, worth-looking-forward-to daily habit that encouraged me to take a break from the stress of everyday life, pay more attention to my health and state of mind, and reconsider my values and priorities. Meditation has also improved my concentration and attention, and it has helped me ground myself in reality a little more.
If meditation sounds like a habit you might want to incorporate in your daily life, today I want to tell you everything I’ve learned about practising meditation. If meditation doesn’t seem like the thing for you, that’s okay, too! Regardless, you might want to try it once, just to see how it fits you.
First of all, why do you want to start meditating?
This is a good question to start from once you set yourself any kind of goal: what is your purpose, your motive? How will your life change once you make your goal a reality? Maybe you’ve been feeling a bit under the weather recently, and think you need a mental reset. Maybe you want to enhance your attention and connect to your surroundings better. Maybe you’re just curious! Any goal is a good goal. But as I always like to preach, goals are good because they help us know where we’re going.
As you start your journey with meditation, you might want to tailor the practice that you’re going for to whatever you seek to achieve through meditation. Take, for example, self-confidence. If you want to give your self-esteem a boost by meditating at the start of your day, you might want to choose a few positive affirmations for your mantra (things like ‘I am worthy of success’, ‘I can do everything I put my mind to’, etc.) Based on what makes you feel calm, you might want to listen to nature sounds or meditate in complete silence.
The truth is, there is not one single way to meditate, and discovering what works for you is meant to be a journey. That’s one thing I can’t exactly give you! But next, I will provide you with some guidance on how to start building your habit.
Consult resources on meditation.
I learned a lot about meditation from the internet when I started. There are a plethora of articles, blog posts, video tutorials and guidance recordings out there to help you get started! But that is just if you wish to scratch the surface: you can get yourself books on meditation and do as much research as you’d like.
One way to learn about meditation through actual practice is engaging in guided meditation. You can meditate while listening to a guided recording, which will tell you what to do and remind you to stay focused when your mind is wandering off. When I first started meditating, I had so much trouble getting into a mindful state and I would often end up thinking about something else or, even worse, stress about it. Guided meditation has helped me a lot with that, and I still listen to guided sessions quite often, especially if I feel tired or distracted. Again, you might prefer these to meditating on your own and that’s completely fine!
You can get meditation apps for your smart devices, that come packed with guidance recordings of different lengths and for various purposes, push notification to remind you to meditate how often you like, and nature sounds and relaxing music. Most of these apps will offer you all of these services if you purchase a subscription, but a fair amount of their media library is available for free! Some of my favourites are:
Calm – this is the first meditation app I’ve ever used, and I am a big fan up to this day. I especially love their nature videos with relaxing sounds!
Headspace – it is great for beginners, as it offers you a free 10-sessions course on how to meditate. I found it very useful when I first started out! And their library is broad and offers a diversity of guided meditations, although almost all of them are offered only within their paid subscription.
Stop, Breathe & Think – I especially love this one because it offers you suggestions for guided meditations and relaxing activities you can try based on your current mood!
Another amazing free resource worth checking out is The Honest Guys YouTube channel, which posts guided meditations as short as three minutes (and up to an hour and a half!) and for different purposes, ranging from positive mood to better sleep. It’s just so pleasant to listen to, so make sure you look it up!
Building a habit of meditating
I believe that the biggest challenge of regularly engaging in meditation is building the habit and going back to it every day. Not only will meditation not give any results if you do it every other month, but you will also not improve your mindfulness if you don’t train it regularly. You also don’t have to commit to doing it every day if you doubt that you will actually succeed: however often you decide to meditate, make sure you stick to that goal. Set yourself a reminder on your phone or put up a post-it where you’re most likely to see it. Then, after every session, make a note of it in a calendar. So when the month ends, you have a whole bunch of X’s to show that you’ve stuck to your goal!
Another way of consistently practising your habit is to create the adequate conditions for it. Choose a time of the day that best suits your needs, preferably when you are least likely to have any commitments or have to do any work. Find yourself a nice, comfortable place, adjust the lighting to your liking, open a window or play some music – the possibilities are endless for you to make this practice your own! As for the time you might want to spend meditating, prioritise quality over quantity: try not to rush your practice or force yourself to meditate when you don’t feel like it. This is not a competition, this is time you spend with yourself and nothing more.
Setting the right goals
Just like with any other habit, setting the bar high will only derogate the experience for you: either you will not enjoy meditation as much because you’ll think you’re not doing enough of it or you’re not doing it right, or you will lose your interest in meditation completely. In fact, I do think that’s what made me stop meditating three years ago. Fast forward to my second year of university, when I decided to make meditation part of my daily life again. And my first goal was to meditate one minute every day for a week.
‘One minute??’ you might think. Well, that’s a minute more than I meditated two weeks before that.
The truth is, there is no rush, so you might as well do it right. Start with a minute every day, increase to two, then to three, then to five. Pick up the pace if you’re doing fine, don’t be afraid to stick to a smaller goal for a while if you can’t keep up. Also, don’t get too upset if you start to think away during your practice. Just gently push your focus back to meditation, and leave the thoughts that distracted you behind. Be consistent: it’s a practice, not a race.
And there you have it, my personal introduction to meditation! Although I think it was self-explanatory from the very start, I am not an expert and with this post, I just wanted to share my experience with meditation and how I’ve made it a habit in my daily life.
Do you meditate yourself? If so, how do you like to do it and what impact has it had on your life? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments section below!
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