You’ve probably heard of meditation by now, but perhaps you’ve never tried it. You may think of sitting with your eyes closed not thinking of anything to be pointless. You may just think you can’t sit still and quiet for that long. In both cases, I think you’ll find that it can be extremely helpful and that you can sit still for that long, and even enjoy it.
So what is meditation?
Meditation simply involves sitting relaxed and focusing your mind.
What is a meditation not?
Meditation is not clearing your mind of all thoughts.
Rather you are focusing on something, your breath or a mantra, while you acknowledge thoughts then let them go.
This makes me think of a story when I was little. I had a hard time sleeping so I went out to ask my mom what to do. She said, “stop thinking”. Um, can we talk about the hardest and most impossible thing to do while you’re laying alone in the dark? Not thinking of anything.
It is not reasonable to stop our minds from thinking. But it is reasonable and wonderful to focus our minds.
What does meditation do for stress?
In short, meditation teaches us how to slow down and be less triggered by things that may cause us stress. It also can teach us how to better react to stress and manage it when it does happen.
Specifically, meditation helps us to:
Calm Mind & Body
One of the main parts of meditation is focusing on your breathing. Either counting breaths, acknowledging the breath, or deepening the breath. This all triggers a relaxation response.
A Positive Mood
As you emerge from your meditation, you will feel recharged. Often in a better mood than when you started.
Clearer Perspective
Meditation helps us to quiet the world around us. By stopping time in a sense, we are given a moment to reevaluate what is really important. In other words, what is worth stressing over and what is not a good use of our time.
A New Tool to React to Stress
Meditation is not just a tool we can utilize once a day. If we feel stress hitting us, we can do a mini-meditation session, even just a few seconds, to breathe. Allowing ourselves a moment to breathe in the face of stress can help to calm our mind, normalize our blood pressure, and react calmer than we may have otherwise.
Meditation is an amazing tool utilized by many people for many, many years. It is an amazing tool, that when practiced daily, can have a profound impact on our lives and help us reduce our stress substantially.
Need help reducing your stress?