Meditation - am I doing it right!?!

This was a question that dominated my mind on a daily basis for years..literally!  

Meditation - we all know it's good for us and the health benefits are quite clear. However, there's so many different types/modalities out there!! Which one is right, and more importantly, which one can help us!

For around 3 years I was constantly on the search for the 'right type' of meditation for me.  Which 'type' would aid me in improving my health? Which 'type' could lessen my symptoms? I tried so many things - Mindfulness, Hypnotherapy tracks, Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR), Mind Calm..the list goes on! I had varying success, but what I really struggled with was the visual side of things - 'Imagine yourself sunbathing on your favourite beach feeling perfectly healthy...'  More often than not, I failed at achieving this states, primarily because my body was usually screaming with symptoms and ill feelings.  This in turn, often ramped up my anxiety levels because I couldn't achieve the desired relaxed state. I just got more and more anxious about my symptoms and frustrated that I couldn't change them.  So in actual fact, I often left a meditative session more anxious than when I started...and then I got anxious about being anxious. VICIOUS CYCLE!! I'm sure many of you have felt the same - a very head driven buzzy wiredness. Sound familiar?

I eventually stumbled across a form of meditation that was just right.  No visualisation, no breathing in feelings of health and sunny beaches..just being where you are and letting yourself know that that is ok.  When I first discovered it, this was a massive realisation for me, and everything started calming down a lot, in particular my mind! It soon dawned on me that all this time I had been trying to do meditation perfectly, and it was those perfection patterns that were actually hindering my progress with meditation.  As one with a bit of an Achiever personality, I felt I 'had to get it right.' Ironically, it was this 'having to get it right,' that hindered my progress health wise and in meditation.  
It was this learning 'to be' and accepting where I was at in that moment when I noticed shifts happening.  It's interesting isn't it, how we spend so much time in our heads and so little time in our bodies.  No wonder we get so stressed, and oftentimes lose control of our health.          

This type of 'Beingness' is one of just being present in the moment..separated from our thoughts, stress, and anxiety.  It sounds Spiritual almost, but it's really not.  It's just the process of being here, right now. A process of focusing on our breath, our arms, our legs, our muscles.  I usually do this 2/3 times a day, around 10 minutes each time and find it wonderfully powerful and rejuvenating.  On the other hand, Catastrophising thoughts, mental tennis, stress, are all pretty exhausting, and are certainly things we could do with less of, especially if you are on a recovery path.    

I came across a wonderful Meditation Teacher, Linda Hall, who has herself recovered from a Chronic Illness, M.E./CFS, after suffering from the condition for 8 years and making a full recovery. Her style is extremely soothing and therapeutic, and speaks to people at any level, no matter how healthy or ill you are.  

Here is a few of her short meditations (about 10 mins in length) Worth a go : 

Linda also has her own website, where she sells Meditation downloads that are specific for M.E.  I even did one of her telephone tutorial courses and it was great! All that and more are offered on her site : http://www.audiomeditation.co.uk/

Adam

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Mindfulness : Are We Doing it Right?

In just a few decades, Mindfulness Meditation has gone from being a specialist element of Buddhist teaching to the must have app for celebs, and corporate businesses use it to boost productivity and to reduce staff stress levels.  It's even prescribed on the NHS now for health purposes.  So why has this become so popular in such a relatively short space of time?  There's so so much to say about this, of which I will delve into in later posts.  In this edition, I'm simply going to explore how it is being received and used in Western Culture.  Let's explore this...

[I'd like you to just become aware of your breath and allow it to become deeper, counting up to 3 on the inhale, and 3 on the exhale...notice any sensations in your body...feel the support of the ground beneath you...and just give yourself some time to notice the sounds around you...notice the room around you.] 

This is effectively coming into the Present, and this is the essence of Mindfulness Meditation.  It's really about awareness! Being aware of yourself.  It's likely you'll feel more grounded and calm in this moment.  A brief release from the stress of our everyday life.  When was the last time you actually did this?  Do you think you could benefit from doing this more often.  

I know what you're thinking...

1. I'm too busy for this.  What if I miss a deadline?
2. What if I become boring?  What if I become too relaxed?
3. How can I slow down my mind? Even if during these periods of Mindfulness, my mind becomes quieter and I feel more clarity, what about when I'm finished.  My mind speeds up again and I'm back where I started!
4. What if I become obsessed with it, give up all my belongings, and move to Thailand to become a Buddhist monk? (YES I'VE REALLY BEEN ASKED THIS!)

These are all really valid questions!  When I first started learning about Mindfulness, these were questions I was constantly asking myself.  I had this constant battle (known in Psychology as 'Mental Tennis') in my mind about how this could work for me.  My mind ran so fast, how could I slow it down safely without losing something important?

However, in my scenario, with the condition I was going through, Mindfulness Meditation was the only thing that could lessen my symptoms initially. I'm still not sure exactly how...but studies have shown that it calms down the nervous system and the stress response, and as a result, it probably released the anxiety and fear I was feeling about my relentless symptoms that had become my world 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.  

The most important thing I learnt was to not be scared of what was happening in my body, and that it was an ally in healing, not an enemy!  On hearing the body's messages,  it was simply trying to give me useful feedback i.e. you've overdone it today, you need to rest and take it easy this afternoon.

Anyway, I digress! Let me come back to the 4 questions above, in particular Q3.  This seems to be the most common problem associated with Mindfulness Meditation.  This seems to be the way it is taught in many large Corporate Businesses like Google, Starcom MediaVest (I know this one from experience!), and the big City banks.  They use the format of getting employees to sit down on a mat for 20 minutes at lunchtime once a week, focus on their breath, observe their thoughts, and just become aware of themselves in the room. Great!!

HOWEVER! This doesn't really address the core issue here...these employees are still being burdened with ever increasing workloads that are often beyond their capabilities, and are being subjected to 12-14 hour days.  If we're being honest, the old 9-5 working day paradigm simply doesn't exist anymore!  Therefore, what I'm advocating here, is not just being Mindful for those 20 minute sessions here and there, but being more mindful in life in general on a daily basis.  This is the REAL essence of Mindfulness 

This doesn't mean you need to sit and meditate all day every day.  By all means, have a daily connection practice of meditation for 10-20 minutes per day (perhaps just closing your eyes on the train to work), but how about going through your day simply....

• being mindful of what is happening in your environment
• being mindful of your thoughts but not attaching yourself to them
• being mindful of your reactions or emotions around other people (you're likely to notice different emotional feedback from different people)
• being mindful of your breath, your body, and its stillness (this is the best and easiest way to become Present)

That's all it takes! It's not easy at first, and takes practice, but it's likely that you'll find you have more energy freed up in your body, more clarity, and more detachment from intense situations.  The best thing is that anyone can learn this, it's the act of simply tuning into your body and your breathing.  At it's very core, it's an extremely calming, relieving, and satisfying feeling to experience!

Below is a short Mindfulness taster, led by Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn, is Professor of Medicine Emeritus and creator of the Stress Reduction Clinic and the Center for Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society at the University of Massachusetts Medical School.  It's quite amazing how simple, yet powerful this modality is!

An additional resource for us secular folk is by P Mark Williams, Professor of Psychiatry at Oxford University. Click here

Mindfulness isn't for everyone, and it certainly takes discipline, but I suppose the question to ask is : what have you got to lose?

Now breath deeply and relax my friends, because this particular journey through Mindfulness has come to an end :-)

Did You Know that our Brain is in Fact Plastic

Taken From Here

“I saw people rewire their brains with their thoughts, to cure previously incurable obsessions and traumas.” Dr. Norman Doidge

In my last post I discussed the power of positive-thinking (or affirmations) and how this has a decisive impact on our physiology. A couple of you wanted to understand how this works.  Well, let me tell you.

It all comes down to Neuroplasticity, which is the brain's ability to reorganize & re-mould itself by forming new neural connections throughout life. Since its discovery, this has had stress reduction, well-being, & health groups, very interested.

Taken from Here

What does this mean for us - The Basics

The adult brain contains over 100 billion neurons, give or take a few. To put this into context, that matches the estimated number of galaxies in our whole universe. Given we only use a few thousand of these repeatedly every day, there are literally billions of unused neurons we which can utilise.  This gives us the incredible ability to create completely new personalities, observe different outcomes, and completely change our condition of living...as long as we make the conscious decision to do it. It blew my mind too..

The reason we feel the same emotions & experience the same outcomes day-in day-out, is because we're firing the same neural pathways over & over again, over & over again, over & over again. This is where we can get stuck in this loop of self-limiting thoughts or habits, which recharges the stress response we experience on a daily basis and effectively moulds our personal perception of reality. 

Dr Caroline Leaf, estimates that "87% to 95% of the illnesses that plague us today are a direct result of our thought life. What we think about affects us physically and emotionally. It’s an epidemic of toxic emotions…"  

Consistent affirmations (said in a congruent way) is just one way of breaking that loop, by using new neurons in our brain to observe a different outcome, & to positively affect your physiology & mindset. Dr. Joe Dispenza, Neuroscientist, speaker on What The Bleep Do We Know, and a bit of a hero, claims "The one thing I noticed about people who had changes in health had changed their thinking...Our thoughts have a direct connection to our direct level of health."

To conclude

I'm not saying that using our infinitely powerful brains will cure all our physical difficulties, but by learning the discourse of stress symptoms and illness we can discover what is being suppressed or ignored in our emotions, and how this is influencing our health & well-being. From this viewpoint we can observe a clear two-way communication going on between our body and mind that affects our physical, mental & emotional state. 

Affirmations (some good ones are listed in my last post) & meditation are both ways that help us deepen this understanding.  So be more kind to yourself and try using some affirmations, you may find it works wonders!  I've attached a great little bonus tutorial for you on Neuroplasticity, which really gives you the low-down on this truly fascinating phenomenon :

Next time I'll be looking deeper into how emotions effect us and how we can affect them.  

Over & Out,

Adam