Meditation

This is a common question for beginners. When should you meditate? Is it better in the morning or at night? Some people like to meditate before a big business presentation or sporting event. The process in many meditation practices helps clear your mind. Your focus improves, and your level of attention will as well.

This makes it perfect for the period just before you need to be attentive and focused.

What’s your schedule like? Many of us in this crazy, fast-paced world seemingly have little free time. Have you ever complained about that? We all do from now and again. When you think about it, you might have more spare time than you previously thought.

Sure, there might not be a full hour of uninterrupted time at your disposal. On the other hand, you might have several times during the day when you have a few minutes of free time.

That’s all you need. Meditation doesn’t have to be an hour-long process. You don’t need a specific environment or setting. There are so many different forms of meditation that you can find one that matches your daily routine perfectly. Just remember this.

Any Time Is the Right Time for Meditating

We are really not trying to dodge the question. There truly is no good or bad time for calming your mind and choosing peace and quiet over what’s usually a loud and distracting world.

Find a method that works well for you. There are dozens of different styles of meditation. Some people take one of the traditional forms and customize it, so it makes sense to them. That’s a smart thing to do.

You make your meditation practice your own. What works for you may not work for someone else. So you build a meditation practice that lets you quickly enter a calm and peaceful state of mind. This means the next time you only have four or five minutes available, you can enjoy a mini-meditation session.

Try Starting Your Day off with A Few Minutes of Meditation

If you’ve never meditated before, enjoy a few minutes as soon as you get up in the morning. You’ll find that this is like drinking a cup of coffee. It awakens and energizes you.

You feel focused and calm to start your morning. That’s a great way to begin a loud, noisy, and non-stop day. Then sprinkle in short meditation sessions throughout the day to improve your mood and enjoy less stress.

“I’d love to meditate more, but I just don’t have the time.” Is that really true? It may be. We are certainly not questioning you. You could be ridiculously busy most of the time. Sometimes though, a misconception about meditation keeps people from enjoying its many benefits.

Speaking of benefits, could you use less stress in your life? Who couldn’t? Stress negatively affects your mental and physical states. Chronic stress can lead to debilitating health problems. So you’re probably agreeing that you would love more stress relief.

Relief from stress is one of the cornerstone wellness benefits that meditation delivers.

While you’d like to stress less and chill out more, you don’t see where you have time for meditation. You might be incorrectly perceiving how long you have to meditate for some serious benefits.

5 Minutes Is All You Need

Honestly, why not clear your mind and take a few deep breaths if you only have a minute or two. Push away all your thoughts and worries for the day. Breathe in. Breathe out. Notice the process. Experience your breathing. Just be fully present in your body and mind.

Guess what? That’s meditating.

Do that a few times a day, and you will enjoy more focus and better concentration. Your emotions won’t be all over the road as often. You can form a sense of balance in your life, which is sometimes difficult in this busy, modern world.

If you can, start finding five-minute blocks of time where you can meditate during your day. Oddly, you can stretch that to five minutes if you have a free minute or two. This gives you enough time to prepare, meditate, and reenter your normal daily routine.

Do this three times a day, and at the end of the week, you’ve been meditating for 105 minutes! That’s closing in on two hours. The benefits of meditation are cumulative. In other words, while it’s nice to enjoy a 20 or 30-minute session when you can, smaller five-minute sessions will build up and deliver real rewards.

If you don’t have enough time to meditate, be honest with yourself. Most people have more free time than they really think they do.

Keep a journal. Write down everything you do and the times when you do them. You’ll find more than enough five-minute sessions during even the craziest of days to benefit from some micro-meditation sessions.

What do you think of when you hear the word “meditation”? You might envision rhythmic flute music and someone sitting in a cross-legged lotus position on a mat or a rug. Are romantic visions of ancient, enchanting India leaping into your mind?

Meditation did originate in India, as far as we can tell, thousands of years ago. And while sitting in the lotus position is common for some who meditate, it’s definitely not required. You can light candles if that helps create a calming, peaceful atmosphere, but that’s not an essential part of the practice.

You may have visions of incense and a wise-looking yogi chanting mantras. At least, this is sometimes the idea for people who have never practiced meditation. While you can make any or all of those experiences a part of your meditation practice, there is no right or wrong way to go about it.

Meditation Simply Means This

All you really need to know is that meditation helps calm your mind. You train your brain for better self-awareness. You can improve concentration and focus. Different forms of meditation help you quiet your racing mind, balance your emotions, and enjoy calm and peacefulness.

Because of those effects, many physical and mental health benefits are also yours.

Some meditation practices have you focus on a physical object with your eyes open. Others will have you close your eyes. You may be seated or lying on your back. Special breathing exercises can be used as a meditation practice on their own or to help you enter and exit a session.

Meditation is nothing more than blocking out the outside world and looking inward. You remove yourself from the busy, hectic daily routine you follow. There is a sense of getting to know yourself better and rejuvenating with peace, quiet, and inner reflection.

We mentioned shutting out the outside world.

That’s not what happens with certain forms of meditation. For example, mindfulness has your eyes open, and you are being absolutely mindful and aware of everything that’s going on around you. That said, most meditation practices aim to calm your mind and improve your concentration and self-awareness.

You can also reach another level of consciousness and knowledge of who you are. Because of the frantic, fast-paced lives many of us lead, many people enjoy the stress-relieving benefit of meditation. Just remember that there is no wrong or right way to meditate. Do what works to enjoy improved overall wellness from head to toe.

There are many misconceptions about meditation. One is that your mind shouldn’t wander. Some people believe you should be able to automatically and perfectly silence that nonstop, chattering, mostly negative inner voice that’s always talking to you.

People who have been practicing meditation their whole lives will tell you that it’s impossible to do it all the time.

Even the most experienced disciple of meditation will have their mind wander. It’s just normal and natural. There is no judgment to be made here. If your mind wanders while meditating, take notice of your thoughts and emotions. Don’t judge them. Recognize them.

Imagine That You Are an Objective Viewer

You don’t have an opinion. Let your thoughts be present. If your mind wanders from a clear state to the fact that you have to pay a big bill tomorrow and you’re a little short financially, just look at that thought. Don’t take an opinion. Imagine it’s not your experience but that of someone else.

It’s like watching a movie where you have no input. Tell yourself that this is just a thought, and let it be. Allow it to be present. You recognize your wondering mind objectively. This allows you to quickly return to a carefree mental state. That’s not the case if you judge yourself harshly for your mind wandering.

You May Want to Try Meditation with a Mantra

A mantra is a word or phrase repeated during meditation. This gives your mind something to do. Beginners will speak a mantra out loud. Over time you develop the ability to use this anchoring point silently in your mind.

It can help you reduce the number of times your mind wanders away. Transcendental meditation is one of the practices where mantras are used. The phrase or word you repeat is intended to help you keep your attention on your meditative state of mind.

Focusing on your breathing can also direct your attention away from outside thoughts. You breathe deeply, pause, and then slowly let out your breath. How does it feel? What is the breathing process like? Again, don’t be judgmental. Just recognize what you feel and what you hear as you breathe.

Breathing exercises and mantras might help you control a wandering mind. Remember that it is normal for your mind to drift off while meditating. It doesn’t mean you’re doing anything wrong. Observe your thoughts objectively and then reenter your meditative state.

Define spirituality. People often have their own personal views as to what that means. One’s spiritual nature is certainly something that can be defined in any way the individual wants.

The same is true with religion. Did you know there are thousands of different types of religions worldwide? That proves that what qualifies as a religious practice or belief for one person might not for another.

Some people don’t follow any particular religion. Some of these folks don’t consider themselves very spiritual, either. There are countless ways to view spirituality and religion.

Your view is right for you, and what someone else believes is right for them.

Now let’s look at how meditation applies to spirituality and religion. People in the Western world often relate meditating with Indian spirituality. This is because that’s where meditation began thousands of years ago. It slowly worked its way west and is now found all over the globe.

What began as a spiritual practice, a way to connect with something bigger than the individual is used today for non-spiritual and non-religious purposes. You will still find religions that practice meditation as an important part of their belief system. You are just not required to practice a certain religion or embrace a particular spiritual discipline to benefit from meditation.

Do What Works Best for You

In Western societies, meditation is sometimes thought to be a way to develop a closer relationship with God. Many Asian practices are more about exploring a person’s individual spirituality.

Catholic prayers are intended to send messages to God or to the saints. They are a form of meditation. Mindfulness is a practice that doesn’t ask for or require any belief in spirituality or religion. You become mindful of yourself and your surroundings to improve focus and attention and relieve stress.

We mentioned that there are thousands of different types of religions. There are dozens of different forms of meditation. Most of them don’t require that you have a particular religious outlook or spiritual belief system.

Taking a few minutes to calm your thoughts and reflect inward is a form of meditation. You mentally remove yourself from a busy, hectic world and enjoy peace and quiet. Whatever method of meditation you practice, you aren’t required to join a religion or become spiritual if you aren’t.

Additionally, your religious preference probably won’t view meditation as something that’s off-limits. It’s proven to offer so many mind and body benefits. Religious and nonreligious people can simultaneously improve their health and wellness with this ancient practice.

Many meditative practices will have you closing your eyes. The principal reason for this is that it’s a very easy way to shut off distractions. Your vision is the way you encounter most of the world initially. You may smell or hear something from time to time before you see it. Usually, though, your vision delivers the first dose of your environment.

This is why closing your eyes is suggested in many forms of meditation. We live in a very distracting and noisy world. Some video, audio, or otherwise electrically delivered stimulus is begging your attention at all times.

With eyes open, it can be hard for the most focused and devoted meditation practitioners to shut out what’s happening around them. Regular practice of meditation with your eyes closed programs your mind over time. The next time you close your eyes and begin a particular breathing routine, your mind understands it’s time for you to meditate.

So closing your eyes acts as a reminder of sorts. That’s not necessary for all forms of meditation.

What Are You Trying to Achieve?

One misconception about meditation is that all forms are the same. This isn’t true. You can practice different styles of meditation if you want to achieve different things.

Focused meditation sessions have you paying attention to a singular object. This can be an object or color in your mind. It’s often a physical object you have to view with your eyes open. This focused attention can take place if you are walking, sitting, and whether you are focusing on a single object or a group of objects.
Sometimes you’re not in an environment where you can sit or lie still and meditate. If you only have a few spare minutes when you are on the move physically, it’s probably smarter to keep your eyes open! You can still meditate in this physical state.

Close Your Eyes, Open Your Eyes, Do What You Like

A small minority of individuals may experience unfamiliar body sensations when they meditate with closed eyes. In this situation, open your eyes instead. Some forms of meditation will tell you to close your eyes. If that doesn’t work for you, if you don’t get the benefits you’re looking for, try that same style of meditation with your eyes open.

Meditation is a very personal thing. Don’t feel like you have to follow some set of rules to the letter.

Make your meditation work for you. Experiment with different types of meditation, eyes open or eyes closed, to find the form that gives you the most health and wellness benefits.

Imagine that you’re just beginning to meditate. You have a friend who told you she feels like she is more complete because of her meditation practice. She speaks of the many benefits to the mind and body that she has received, and you want to enjoy the same experience.

You ask her what a typical meditation session is like. She tells you she plans twice-a-day sessions ranging from 30 to 40 minutes each. That sounds like an awfully long time to you. It begs the question, “How long should I meditate as a beginner?”

While there isn’t really a hard answer for everyone, a specific number, you want to start with short sessions at first. Beginners to meditation often find it a difficult or unfamiliar process.

They have preconceived notions about meditating that may or may not be correct. As a novel practice you’re just beginning, you will need to develop some experience. Following a particular step-by-step meditating technique might be tough since you’re just starting out.

For All of These Reasons, Shoot for 5 to 10 Minutes

It doesn’t really take a long time to benefit from meditation. You can feel stress relief almost immediately in many cases, even as a beginner. If you can meditate outdoors with nature, in a grassy field, for example, you will find stress relief coming rapidly.

Wherever you meditate, start out with a five-minute session as a beginner. You can spend 30 seconds calming your mind and going through of breathing routine. Then spend four minutes meditating. Give yourself another 30 seconds to come out of the meditative state and reenter your environment.
There’s no right or wrong number year, but five minutes is a good starting point. You’ll eventually want to build up to 10 and then 20 minutes for a session. Everyone is different. You may not be able to meditate with focus and without distractions for more than 10 minutes. That’s okay.

You’ll find a session length that works best for you eventually. The key is to get started.

Most people find that meditation is very transformative in many ways. It truly can improve both your physical and mental states of being. You’ll become more self-aware and enjoy positive thoughts and fewer negative emotions. So get started, beginning with a five-minute session and only increasing that time when you don’t feel you are forcing yourself.

If you’re thinking about taking up meditation, you might want to know what you have to do to get started. That’s a reasonable thought. You want to get the most out of the practice because you’ve heard it’s a great stress reliever. You may have also been told that regular meditation practice can help improve your mental and physical health in several ways.

This is all true. Most forms of meditation deliver some pretty incredible benefits. You understand this. You also want to get started the right way to enjoy the proven rewards of this age-old practice. The best tip we can give beginners to meditation is to not overthink the process.

Just Get Started

Think back to when you were a child. You didn’t waste much time when you wanted to do something. You just did it. You jumped into any activity if it looked like it might be fun. You saw your friends playing baseball, so you asked them if you could play. You didn’t know what you were doing. You failed a lot, but you kept trying, and eventually, you were a pretty good baseball player.

Maybe you weren’t a baseball player as a child, but you get what we’re saying here. Kids don’t usually worry about failure. They just get started if they want to do something. There might be some bumps and bruises, but they don’t care. It’s all about not overthinking the process.

Be a child again. Just get started meditating. There are plenty of meditation manuals and courses out there. There’s no lack of information that can help you get started.

Look at it the same way you would if you wanted to swim in chilly seawater. The best thing to do is to back up, get a running start, and dive into the ocean. If you timidly dip a toe into the water to see what the temperature is like, you’re not committing. It might take too long to build up the courage to immerse yourself entirely.

It’s the same thing with meditation and so many other endeavors. You need to get started.

How Do I Start?

You start by starting. Just close your eyes and take a few deep breaths. Clear your mind. Be present in your body. Breathe deeply in and out, and if your thoughts distract you, move them away and calm your mind again.

Do this for a couple of minutes, and guess what? You’ve just been meditating.

You can also take guided courses where an instructor moves you through the process. Any way you decide to benefit from this calming stress reliever, start. Don’t judge yourself; remember, there’s no right or wrong way to meditate. Whether you choose guided meditation or start off on your own, you’ll enjoy better overall health and wellness.

Meditation is a wonderful stress reliever. You may have heard that it also delivers many other physical and mental health benefits. It honestly can be a life changer, especially in these hectic times we live in.

It seems we are constantly receiving some terrible news. Our television sets, mobile phones, and radios constantly tell us about unfortunate events. Commercials and marketing messages want us to buy products and spend our hard-earned money on many things.

We are told we are too short or skinny, fat or tall. Of course, following those messages are always miracle methods that the marketer promises will have us fixing those perceived problems, fitting into society, and being the best we can be.

If you think this constant barrage of distracting and sometimes troubling information is hard on your adult mind, imagine what children go through?

Kids these days have never existed without a computer. They happily stare at a television or computer screen for several hours daily. At school, some teaching lessons are delivered on monitors and displays.

You may have seen children as young as five or six years old with their own cell phones. If you’re enjoying a day with your child out shopping, that small, impressionable mind is inundated by so many electrically generated messages, visuals, and noises.

In other words, meditation is absolutely okay for children. You might even call it necessary in our noisy and fast-paced world.

How Old Does a Child Have To Be To Meditate

First, you have to understand what meditation is. It’s basically taking a little time to enter yourself. You shut off distractions and calm your racing thoughts. You give yourself time to exist in the present moment and be yourself.

If you’re an adult who has meditated before, you may have some step-by-step process you go through. That can be difficult for children to follow. So if you want your child to enjoy the many benefits of meditation, like less stress and better focus and attention, have them do some basic breathing techniques and get them in a calm, quiet, distraction-free area.

You can seek a meditation coach or teacher that specializes in helping children meditate. Whatever you do, get your children involved. There is no official age minimum that you must adhere to. Children of all ages can benefit greatly from more peace and quiet and less exposure to a loud, always-on, always-connected world.

Mindfulness is one of many forms of meditation. It can deliver stress relief, like most meditation practices. However, its goal is not to relieve stress or reach a higher level of spirituality, which is the point of some meditation techniques.

Comparing mindfulness to meditation is like comparing an orange to another fruit. Oranges are a type of fruit, but all fruits are not oranges.

Meditation should be considered as a single word that covers a vast field of practice. The word generally refers to a mental process that is used to train the mind. Different techniques are used to enhance or strengthen certain mental qualities. Meditation can help you focus better. If you have an issue with concentrating on keeping your mind on a single train of thought or subject, meditating can help.

Some people meditate simply for the amazing stress-relieving properties that it delivers. This isn’t so much a guaranteed benefit of mindfulness.

Mindfulness Simply Means Being Aware

A mindfulness practice has you opening your eyes to your world. A lot of meditation is done with your eyes closed. You look inward. You shut out the busy, crazy, hectic world that is often your reality. You clear your thoughts and focus on some results you’re trying to create.

When you practice mindfulness, you’re basically paying attention. The idea is to recognize your world and yourself with purpose. You only have to exist in the present moment while acting as an observer. You don’t judge yourself, your surroundings, or anything you encounter with your five senses. You recognize what is happening.

It’s a way of relating to whatever is occurring in your current reality.

When you think about it, your “right now” moment is all that you will ever experience in your life. Certainly, you have a past, and hopefully, you have a very long and happy future. But our perception of our lives as humans only exists in the millisecond that is now.

Mindfulness makes you more aware of your current “now” moment in time. Both mindfulness and other forms of meditation can deliver stress relief and a slew of important health benefits. They are simultaneously similar and different. One is not better or worse than the other. Practice the form of meditation that makes the most sense for you and takes you to the reality you’re trying to create.