You Don’t Need To Learn How To Meditate To Meditate

All you have to do is commit and show up to meditate every single day, at least once a day and you will be meditating. Regardless. Even if you think you aren’t. Because unlike you think, you can have thoughts and more thoughts coming in your way while meditating, you may need to still adjust your posture during it a few times, you can feel uncomfortable doing it for whatever the reason… You can even feel as if you are not meditating at all, but guess what? You are.

Image: Pixabay.

Because meditation is that time of the day that you choose to spend in your company. Mind, body, soul, spirit. All of you. The dark and the light side and every rainbow in between. It’s that moment that you chose to become more aware of you, of your breathe, even of your thoughts. The louder ones and the whispering ones.

And yes, if you get lucky from time to time you will gonna have that feeling, that experience of empty mind and the fullness of your own true self. But that is not the goal when you sit to meditate. The goal is to let those moments you spend meditating every day bring to your daily life a more serene approach to it, to get a sharper mind to focus and deal better if whatever it may come, to be more opened and compassionate with others, to align yourself with the Universe and flow with it, to be more aware and conscious of who you are, what is your bliss and be able to go for it, to help you go through heaven and hell right here on earth. That is what meditation is for.

And in order to get all the benefits of it you don’t need to learn or be the perfect Meditator. No. You just have to have to sit and breathe as deeply and slow as you can and let it be for some minutes every day. Consistently.

Can you do that?

Then you can meditate.

And if by any chance you said you can’t for this (oh, I don’t have time) or that (I can’t sit still for a few minutes), be aware that this is one big part of you speaking: your ego. Embrace it, hear it, give it a big hug and let it go. Your ego is just there to mess up with you and the way you interact with others and the world. It’s up to you to let it rule your life or not. Regarding meditation or any other subject.

Up to you. Like it’s to decide to give a chance to meditation.

Do This One Simple Thing After Meditating And Get The Most From Your Practice

And this one simple thing is… to rest. Yep, as in laying down, closing your eyes and just let it be. You can even take a nap if you have time for and feel like it. Or you can lay down on the floor on the Savasana (Corpse) pose. All possible.

For cats, resting is a serious business.
Photo by Ihsan Aditya from Pexels.

In any case you should rest. For at least 5 minutes right after Meditating. This seals your practice and make it more powerful, more efficient. This is when you let all the benefits from that particular practice sink in

Just give it a try and see for yourself.

One Minute Breath Meditation

Today in my Kundalini calendar with quotes and thoughts from Yogi Bhajan, there was this invitation to do this One Minute Breath Meditation. I am actually already doing it for the last 55 days, more or less, as a part of a Kriya I am doing everyday for 90 days. I just do a 3 minutes of it daily but it is quite powerful and interesting. Especially now that I can almost do the whole 200 seconds for each part.

“When you practice one breath a minute, then you become Pavan Guru—you become the light and knowledge of the prana, and then you know the Universe, the Universe knows you.”
-Yogi Bhajan 7/26/96

This is how you should do it:

Sit in a meditation posture. Spine straight, neck a bit pulled in. Breathe normally for a few seconds. Try to relax. Then you can start: inhale for 20 seconds, hold your breath for 20 seconds, exhale for 20 seconds. If you cannot do it for 20 seconds, try doing it for 10 seconds each. The important things here is do it the same amount of time for each part of this breathing meditation. And after a while try to go up til you reach the 20 seconds.

“Twenty seconds to inhale, twenty seconds to hold, twenty seconds to let it out. It takes one minute. And if you just practice eleven to thirty-one minutes, your blood itself will become a warrior against disease.” -Yogi Bhajan

You can do this meditation for 3 minutes, 7 minutes, 11 minutes, 31 minutes or 62 minutes.

In Kundalini we always start with a mantra Ong Namo Guru Dev Namo, chanted 3 times with hands in the prayer pose. And we close with a long Sat and a short Nam at the end.

The Benefits of This Meditation:

• It improves the cooperation between the brain hemispheres.
• It calms you down, your anxiety, fear and worries.
• It opens you to one’s presence and the presence of spirit.
• It helps to develop your intuition.

“If you want things to be done for you so you don’t have to do anything, then you must breathe from one to five or six breaths per minute. If you can practice that, then you can attract the Universe to you. It is no secret. It’s a simple thing. The longer and deeper your breath is, the more your psyche attracts everything to you—it’s a way to prosperity.”  -Yogi Bhajan

Source: 3HO. There you can find more info on this Meditation.

One Single Mistake You Should Not Make When You Start Meditating

And the mistake you should not make when you start meditating is to think that because you cannot keep your thoughts away, switch off your mind completely, therefore you are not meditating. NewsFlash: Even if thoughts show up you are indeed meditating. According to Transcendental Meditation (the one I practice every day, usually twice a day), thoughts are stress being released. They are not your problem, your enemy, the thing on your way to meditate. They are just a part of it. Embrace it. Let it be. And let it go. Just don’t be attached to any of them. In TM (Transcendental Meditation) we use a given mantra to mentally chant when thoughts pass by. The idea is to bring the mantra when thoughts show up and let it go as well. The mantra is personal, but you can actually choose one mantra and focus on it whenever a thought comes up. It helps.

I kind of liked the way my face looks like a version of yin and yang, darker from one side and lighter from the other. Hehehe

In my case, sometimes I just let the thoughts be. Because knowing that thoughts are stress being released helped me a lot to let wherever happen, happens when I sit to meditate. Without any need to control the experience. That was my a-ha moment, my breakthrough. And it was because I am a very mental person. My mind is always active, never shuts up. So fighting it, trying to control it was not helping me, au contraire. And ever since I just accept that as it is, my meditation has improved immensely.

And yes, thoughts are still very much part of it. An a-ha moments are very rare. But what I feel afterwards is that my mind is rested, more calm despite all the thoughts coming and going; I get more focus, more relaxed and yet feeling more energetic. That is why I meditate: to give myself this break to recharge.

So, don’t measure your meditation skill by how empty you let your mind be; measure by the way it makes you feel afterwards, when you go back to your daily life.

A Moving Meditation

I am still pretty new to Kundalini yoga, one of the things I am currently passionate about. I have been practicing it regularly for the past 4 months and obviously that I don’t know everything about it yet but I am very keen to explore it and experience it all. And I am because it does work for me in so many levels… It is really amazing! I will talk more about Kundalini yoga in another post, but for today I wanna share with you guys one of my last Kundalini findings that brought me such joy that I cannot keep it to myself. It is this moving meditation called Celestial Communication. And I think it is perfect to put you in the best mood for the New Year’s Eve. And yes, anyone can give it a try.

Also, it is gonna be great for those who always want and even try to meditate but standing quiet and still is not their cup of tea. And for those who are meditators, just try it anyways cause it really worths.

Anyways, Celestial Communication is a meditation that unifies your body, mind and spirit. It uplifts your soul, gives you energy and joy, enhances creativity, sets you in the prosperity vibe among other things.

This meditation is considered a moving one because it is done with a free choreography using arms and hands to the sound of uplifting spiritual songs or mantras. There is not just one choreography possible, but many. It is up to the teacher or practitioner to do their own. It is also up to them to choose the mantras or songs or even the mudras. Having said that, I loved the choreography and the song from the video below. And for those who never ever heard of the Celestial Communication before, this is a great introduction that I highly recommend.

You can do this meditation for as little as 3 minutes (as performed in the video) to begin with or as long as 11 or 31 minutes even. It is up to you. It is also good to point that your lower body doesn’t move during the meditation, just your upper body. It is important to breathe fully, inhaling deeply and exhaling completely. Keep your eyes opened and you may sing along or just enjoy the music. Also, if you are following the lead from a teacher or a video, you mirror the teacher’s image. Just as an example: if the instructor is bending to his/her left side you do it for your right one. Got it? If not, just pay attention on how the instructor and the people facing her are doing. You will get it.

Enjoy it!

Sat Nam.