.png)
Learn some tools to build a habit in 2019 without getting frustrated.
Here's the deal, so many people will tell you to meditate; doctors, shrinks, co-workers, parents, siblings, friends... but no one will tell you how. I would even bet that if you were to turn around the question, "Have you tried meditation?" their likely answer is, "no". I used to be that person. When I was going through hair loss, everyone told me to meditate but gave me no resources to learn. I was so stressed about stopping my hair from falling out that meditation became one frustrating task I associated with cop-out excuses from busy doctors. But eventually, for other reasons then my hair, I found what I needed to learn how to quiet my world and hypnotize my conscious. For a year and a half I stopped meditating after a mental health episode that was somewhat traumatic. It froze any spiritual tools I was using before it happened. Happy to report I have resumed my meditation practice, and found it so much easier to start back up again since I've learned these tools along the way. Anyway, thought it would be worth sharing because so many, I know for fact, have heard the same recommendation over and over again, and I'm sure are frustrated. Look no further though, friends, I guarantee one of these tricks is bound to help you figure out how to meditate.
Before I begin...
I want to start with erasing any cliches you've heard about meditation, especially the most common one...
A.) You do not have to quiet your mind to meditate...
Although deeper meditation will be achieved if you do, the goal of meditation is to connect with your heart center, your soul, your higher power, and sometimes that means hearing-out your mind.
B.) You do not have to sit in lotus position to meditate...
I don't know where people got this idea from, but don't feel you have to start off like a pro when you're just learning. Start with one goal: to connect with yourself, and go from there. It's so easy to judge ourselves when starting a new habit, and it's easy to get caught up in the perfectionism of something. Not only that, but lotus position is a sacred pose in religious practices, and you don't need to be religious about meditation. While sacred meditation poses can help with opening chakras, and achieve certain healing, if your only goal is to quiet your mind, sit however you want. Personally, I meditate best with one knee up, my elbow on that knee holding my chin, and my other leg tucked under my bent one. I don't judge myself, I only reap the benefit. The only meditation police is you! So stop with the rules!
Also...
Let's outline a few types of meditation... (not covering all, just the basics)
- Focused Meditation
This is where you focus your mind or field of vision on something to hypnotize yourself.
- Visualizing
This comes into play when manifesting, but can also be a fun distraction when you are not in the best of moods. Although it comes in handy while manifesting, you don't have to visualize something you are trying to attract, you can also visualize things like tea, or an orange peal.
- Mindfulness
Mindfulness is a form of smaller meditations that are really amazing during stressful times. Although it is to bring you to present, the purpose of mindfulness is not only about living in the moment. The purpose of mindfulness is to expose layers of something and feel gratitude for it, leaving you in a state of awe. I learned about mindfulness through Thich Nhat Hanh, who wrote an amazing book, that I found addicting, called, The Miracle of Mindfulness. I highly recommend it.
Okay, here it goes, 5 tips to trick yourself into meditation...
1.) Do a Brain Dump Before:
(Good for all types)
Get a journal, set your timer for 5 minutes and write down everything that pops up. You'll probably find it easier to meditate when you no longer have to remember anything, and a brain dump in itself can be a relieving process.
2.) Go In With an Offensive Tackle: aka a Mantra,
(Really good for focused...)
I'm not talking about a 6' tall man in uniform... I'm talking a mantra that will suppress all other thoughts. For example, say I am trying to get out of debt this year... I would go into my meditation with a mantra about financial freedom.... like "Money is easy to multiply." Or maybe you are just trying to quiet your mind, so maybe your mantra is, "It is easy to quiet my mind." It's important that when any other thoughts that are not your mantra come up, to not judge them, but instead acknowledge the feeling behind the thought, repeat your mantra and continue. Remember, you're connecting with yourself.
3.) Trick yourself into R.E.M.
(Good for visualizing)
Wait... don't you have to be asleep to be in REM? Nope! Rapid eye movement can happen while you're awake, and is how professional hypnosis is performed!
Before I talk about how, I want to let you in on why REM is beneficial to your brain. When you're in REM, your brain is firing out (or into) the cerebral cortex; the part of your brain responsible for learning, organizing information, and storing memories, (it's no wonder I believe dreams are helping you figure stuff out in waking life, but that's a different blog post for another time).
This is kinda the reason you need an offensive tackle... If you are activating the part of the brain meant for learning and sorting information, you have to have something to focus on, or else it is just going to do what it does, sorting through memories and conceptualizing them.Since this part of the brain is also in charge of imagination and visualizing (hence dreams) you have to be willing to tell it what to see.
Here's how you can get your body into REM:
- While keeping your head straight forward, look up for 1 minute.
- Then close your eyes while continuing to look up for another minute.
- Keeping your eyes closed, take your hand and feel you eye... is it moving? crazy, right?
Now you can choose to open your eyes and stare at something, or you can keep them closed an visualize.
4.) Hypnotize yourself with a candle, or an incense:
(good for focused)
The flick of a flame of the smoke off an incense can be an effective way to hypnotize yourself. Personally, I prefer incense. If you are worried about the smell, put it on a windowsill and crack a window. Not only do I find smoke more mesmerizing, I also enjoy the timing of an incense. A lot of meditation teachers will tell you to set a timer on your phone, I'd advise against that, because then you're always checking how much time you have left. Instead, if you watch an incense burn down, you are much more likely to have a successful meditation because you are literally looking at the amount of "time" you have left. It's similar to watching an hourglass, (which I would also recommend as a hypnotic tool).
5.) Meditate with tea:
(Good for Mindfulness)
Sometimes meditating is feeling gratitude. It can be hard to find gratitude when shit is happening, but a cup of tea or coffee can change anything. Let me walk you through a five minute tea meditation: - First, look into your tea and feel the energy exchange of warmth between you and the tea. - Now, think of all of the things that had to happen in order for you to have your cup of tea. Evaporation had to occur, water had to be filtered into a cloud and rained on to collect into a reservoir to be pumped through your faucet and into a kettle. Electricity had to be sent to your burner for your kettle to heat. Your kettle had to be made and the metal had to be harvested and manufactured. The same rain that collected in the reservoir had to feed the tea pant that was then harvested, dried, processed, packaged, branded, distributed, and then stocked in your local grocery store. Sun had to create a photosynthesis reaction in the tea plant in order for it to grow. You had to be attracted to that branding to pick that tea. If you have sugar of honey in your tea, your sweetener had to be pollinated by bees, harvested, and processed, and also distributed,branded and packaged, (not in that order). - Pick your tea up to your nose, smell it, sip it. Acknowledge the flavor profiles and scents of it. - Thank the universe for your tea, and realize that you're holding a small miracle. -Start to see everything in your life this way and feel gratitude.
Here's a guided tea/coffee meditation to practice mindfulness: For the record, this audio was given to me by a friend. I am not sure where it comes from, though I think it might be Plum Village and was included with his Spire stone
Extra pro tips: - It's proven, the first seventeen seconds you are awake, there's a window that sets the tone for your thoughts throughout the day. Whatever feeling are behind those thoughts are, what you will feel throughout the day. So if you awake, and apply the same concept as the tea meditation to your bed, and then get up and meditate, you will more than likely, be in a chipper mood regardless of what happens in your day. - Remember to focus on your inhale and exhale... breath connects mind and body and is the basis to life. A small meditation you can do to relieve yourself is to count to three on the inhale, and count to three on the exhale. This is proven to do wonders to your blood pressure/heart rate, and improve your brain function. - Keep a journal near you, and any thoughts that come up, without judgement, write them down. is takes the pressure off your mind to remember and kinda allows you to take charge of your brain.
Resources For Guided Meditation:
Try a guided meditation! Here are a few I like, (FYI With no context, you will think these are so weird. ) Aside from thee guided meditations, these people you should totally look up and study because their wisdom is beyond: Bob Proctor: https://youtu.be/kEHfhyHFv60?t=10 This is my favorite and the most effective for me. Bob Proctor is famous for helping people with manifestation and money mindset. You don't have to have any goals around money to do this however. Wayne Dyer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmNDC7Y3SNM I absolutely love Wayne Dyer. He is most famous for his philosophy about spirituality. His meditation linked is a focus around the words I AM, which are the only words god spoke directly in any religious text, in the book of Abraham. Now, I am not Christian, or Jewish, neither is Dyer, but he found it powerful that these were the only words spoken by God out of all religion, and he found it even more compelling that Moses responded with the same words. When God said to Moses, "I AM GOD." Moses responded, "I AM here." So anyway, Dyer took and translated I AM to hebrew and recorded notes that are mostly used when saying "I AM" and then made a meditation with those chords through out it. The thought it that I AM has god energy behind it, and that whenever you use the words "I AM" you are speaking with God force.
Esther Hicks: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FafbZRoYARQ Esther Hicks is famously known for channeling her higher conscious and creating a language around how the universe works between you and your higher conscious in terms of manifestation and otherwise. "The Vortex" is a term she coined to illustrate how manifestation works.