Meditation

Monday, April 25, 2011

Meditation and Earnestness

Perhaps the most important concept or discipline I can teach you is “Earnestness”. When I was younger, while I had been introduced to mediation, I wasn’t earnest in practicing it until later in life when I realized how mediation so closely related to my own growth as a person. For me, it was a process in learning how important meditation was to my life and my growth in life. I had to first realize that meditation was a good experience. I enjoyed it but, until I learned about how meditation was a basis for growth, I wasn’t earnest about it. Once I learned about how effective it was not only in my own growth as a person but also as a whole, I became passionate and more earnest in practicing it regularly. It has become a firm and solid foundation on which my daily life is built.

The side benefit I got from this earnestness was what the East describes as an “awakening”; the sense of being peaceful throughout the day even when I’m not meditating. You too may find this to happen once you learn to live 100% present in the moment when you approach meditation with earnestness.

Earnestness is truly the key to developing a practice that will work for you, as it has worked for me. If you haven’t found that key to whatever you are looking for, whether it’s happiness, growth, spirituality, awakening or whatever you call it – once you find that meditation is something that you want to do and make it a priority, I truly believe you will find that key. You will have to let other things go and make meditation a major part of who you really are; you will have to approach it with earnest and passion. When you approach mediation with earnestness, only then will you get the full benefits of it. You will develop a sense of “all is well”.

If you really want to develop and experience the wonderful, infinite benefits of meditation you have to be serious about it. You have to develop a sense of earnestness. You have to make the decision that meditation is going to be a central part of who and what you are. This may mean that you forego something else in your life to make time for your meditation. It may mean that sometimes, even when you’re tired, you still take 20 minutes to a half an hour to meditate. You will make it a big part of who you are, a big part of your life, and you will receive the affects of mediation and all it has to offer.

So the two keys of earnestness are first, believing in meditation and its affects and second to make it an important part of your life. I really think I can guarantee that once you do this you will love the benefits of making meditation a very large part of your life.

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Dr. Robert Puff, Ph.D. is a meditation expert, international speaker and the creator of the weekly Meditation For Health Podcast, available at http://www.MeditationForHealthPodcast.com He also creates a weekly podcast that explores the world of Enlightenment available at http://www.EnlightenmentPodcast.com If you would like to contact Dr. Puff, his e-mail address is DrPuff@cox.net

Thursday, April 21, 2011

Morning Meditation: A Peaceful Way to Start our Day

Morning meditation is such a key part to our day. I want to look at it together and explore how we can make it a wonderful, transforming experience so that our day can go well each and every day.

When we first wake up in the morning, we have echoes of the previous night; echoes of our dreams that often resonate with us when we first wake up. If you’ve had a restful, peaceful night of sleep because you mediated the night before, then you will probably wake up rested and peaceful. If you went to bed stressed, worried and your dreams reflected that experience, then you will probably wake up not very rested and beginning the day with worries and fears.

What can really be helpful is to change your morning experience into something positive, healthy and into something that can help you throughout the day. Here are some steps that I recommend you implement every morning so that you can have a beautiful morning with a beautiful experience each and every day. Of course you may not be able to do them right away or you may choose to make some changes and work towards having a beautiful, wonderful morning every day. It takes time and effort to implement these changes and many of us are very, very busy. It’s up to you how you approach it, but either way you will benefit from beginning your day in a more positive way by implementing these techniques.

First let me talk about what you can do to start your day off right. The first thing you will want to do is wake up in a gentle, calm way. I am very anti-alarm clock. The phrase itself portrays “stress”; alarm clock – waking you up with alarm. Instead, I recommend you set your wake up clock to beautiful gentle music. Have it play gentle, spa-like music. Your MP3 player, iPod or such are great for this.

Next you will want to wake up and drink a glass of water immediately. You’ve been dehydrated all night long and need to replenish your system with either cool or warm water, whichever is your preference. Be sure to drink water and not other substances such as a morning cup of coffee or orange juice, etc. as the water is what your body truly needs.

After you’ve had your water I highly suggest you grab an inspirational book you can read. Even if it’s just a few sentences or paragraphs you can read to set your mind on something good, calm and peaceful. Your thoughts and mind can now think about calming, peaceful and positive thoughts instead of the negative thoughts you may have woken up with.

Next I recommend doing a little yoga or stretching so that you can prepare your body for your meditation. After your stretching or yoga, you can begin your morning meditation. Find a quiet, peaceful place to meditate. Work towards meditating about 30 minutes or more every day but you can start off with just a few minutes; perhaps five or ten minutes to begin with. You need to sit quietly, comfortably and perhaps at first use a guided meditation. You may also want to use a mantra or prayer word to help guide you. As you breathe in you say “I am”; breathe out and say “peaceful”. You say this in your head each time as you breathe in and out calmly in a relaxing manner. It really is a beautiful way to start your day on a positive note.

As you’ve had more experience meditating you can follow your breath. As thoughts creep in, acknowledge them but release them and go back to concentrating your breathing again. This is what is called “Breath Meditation” and it truly is one of the most powerful ways to start your day. You present yourself to God and the Universe in a still, quiet, receptive mode and it is a beautiful way to start your day.

To finish off your beautiful beginning to the day I suggest you take a moment to connect yourself with the beautiful world around you. Go to your yard or someplace outside and soak in a little bit of the nature around you. If you live in a large, busy city you can even create something inside your own house that allows you to breathe in and soak in the beauty of nature. A few ideas are to use something as easy as a small bubbling fountain with a plant or two, placed next to a window that allows the morning sun to come in at you as you relax. It can be anything that allows you to connect yourself to the beauty of nature.

Then it’s time to go to your breakfast table. Take the time to sit and enjoy something “live”, unprocessed. Perhaps a piece of fruit, an apple, an orange or something healthy that will start your day off in a positive, healthy way. Try to stay away from processed foods, instead enjoying what nature has provided us to nourish our bodies. Infuse your body with vitamins and enzymes that are alive and nourishing.

Finally, perhaps as you sit down in your car to begin your journey into the day, take one last moment to pause and just thank the world for the beautiful day before you. Be thankful that you can be in this beautiful world, present and participating in it peacefully throughout the day. So as your busy day gets started, if you need to you can come back to how your day began and allow that peaceful start permeate throughout your day. Starting with a peaceful, calm, relaxing morning will make a world of difference in how you see the rest of your day, no matter how hectic it can become. You will always have that peaceful beginning to look back on.

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Monday, April 18, 2011

Living a Meditative Life

Meditation is a wonderful experience, but so often so many people out there stop meditating and their mind goes back to being extremely busy, active and non-attentive. They leave the meditative state of mind to go back to the every day world. I like to encourage people to truly keep their self in a present awareness all day long. This is actually the premise of the retreats I offer on a regular basis, focusing on a full day of living a meditative life.

Living a meditative life is different than just simply meditating. Many people who meditate often live different lives. They have their meditation and then they have their life. They have deep and wonderful, very present awareness experiences in meditation but the second they stop meditating they let their thoughts, their feelings and their egoic mind take over. They go back to living a very hectic, crazy life. You don’t have to live this way. You can practice meditation throughout the day in a variety of ways. The key, the foundation of it all, is to be 100% present in whatever you are doing. If you are eating, just be present with eating. If you are walking, be present only with your walk. If you’re smelling a flower, just be 100% present with that flower. If you’re listening to music, be 100% present with that music. If you’re with a friend, be 100% present and attentive with your friend.

Most of us lead our lives, all day long with our minds jumping all over the place. We hear commentary in our heads; “like”, “don’t like”, “want”, “don’t want”, “I wonder if…” and it goes on and on. All day long it’s like having a little person on your shoulder whispering in your ear. By the end of the day, we are exhausted from all that mind clutter. For most people the only time they get away from this constant mind clutter is by going to sleep. For those who meditate however, we can learn to quiet our mind during the day when we are awake. That is the beauty of meditation. What if you could keep that state of meditation throughout the day?

It is possible to keep that state of meditation going all day long! The key is to truly be present with one thing at a time, without all the mental commentary. Of course we need some commentary to help us make decisions and learn new things but overall most of what we do can be done very spontaneously. In one of my books I call it “being in the zone”, where you really learn to just trust and go with your natural instincts. You will find that when you do this, things flow very well.

It’s much like someone who’s playing sports. Once a person learns how to do something and do it well, when they get their mind out of the game and they simply trust and flow with their instincts they do it very well. They’re present with nothing but the current moment and doing what comes naturally in playing the game. Many athletes will even use the term that they are “in the zone”. It’s the same way with every day life. When you just trust and flow with what you are supposed to do then what you need to do will just come out of you and happen. When you need to make decisions you can ponder them but mostly you just flow with life, being present with life and quieting the mind. Quiet the mind in such a way that you can just flow with life, be with life, live life; ultimately, just being.

I’d like to share a technique that can be very helpful in being in the present moment throughout the day. This technique comes from your meditation practice. When you meditate, let’s say you’re just focusing on your breath – a breath meditation. When your mind wanders you simply go back to your breath. When your mind wanders you witness the thoughts, acknowledge them and then go back to your breath. Let me give you an example.

Say you are talking with someone and your mind wanders. Don’t try to suppress your mind from wandering, but acknowledge it and just go back to being with them. Perhaps you’re watching the sunset and your mind wanders to different thoughts. You recognize that your mind has wandered but you bring it back to that moment of just watching the sunset, being one with the sunset. Another example would be that perhaps you are going for a walk. You enjoy your surroundings, look around but suddenly your mind wanders to perhaps how hot it is or what you have to do tomorrow. Recognize that your mind has wandered and bring it back to focus on just the walk and the things around you. You don’t try to suppress your thoughts but you witness them, acknowledge them, but then bring your mind back to one thing, the walk. Be present with the day, with the moment you are in and experience the here and now.

I believe that if you can find a way to apply the principles of living a meditative life you will find you are living a much happier life. You will learn how to live in the now, concentrating on one thing at a time and not cluttering your mind with continuous thoughts. You will learn how to acknowledge your thoughts but then quickly re-focus your mind again on what you are doing. It’s almost like going into an automatic pilot mode in life.

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Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Meditation and Fear: How to Find Relief from Our Fears

What are fears? Fears are something that we have created in our mind after, usually, having a negative experience. I say “usually” because fears cannot only come from our own experiences but also from those of others also. A lot of people have different fears. The main ingredient of fears is that they are created in our minds, reinforced in our minds and sustained in our minds.

Outside of the fear of heights, which is an innate response and a “natural” fear that has been scientifically proven to be apparent in some very young children, all the rest of our fears are created in our mind. We have a negative event and we reinforce it through thinking about, fearing and analyzing the negative impact of our fears. Thus mediation can be extremely beneficial in helping us conquer or deal with our fears; as meditation is all about quieting the mind, getting the mind peaceful and still.

I’d like to share two techniques to use in order to help you deal with your fears. As an example I’m going to use the fear of snakes, as a lot of people have this fear. Let’s say you’re afraid of snakes. If you are put in a position of being placed in a moment that you have to deal with this fear; perhaps you walk into a room with snakes in it or you see a television program with snakes on it.

The simplest thing to do is to pause for a moment, breathe as deeply as you can, hold it and breathe out. The key here is to recognize the fear and that the fear is real; however, you are going to address it by breathing deeply in as long and hard as you can. Hold it for as long as you can. Breathe out slowly and deeply. As that fear is there keep breathing, taking your thoughts off the snake and concentrating on your breath. The key here is that you are re-focusing your mind on your breath. This technique can be used in most any instance when you’re feeling fearful. Because you are holding your breath you’re not thinking about what’s causing the fear, but instead concentrating on your breath. While you are not in a true state of meditation you have focused on your breath, removing your mind from the fear.

Now let’s apply this to your mediation practice. You’re following your breath, focusing on your breath. Unlike the technique above, you are not holding your breath but breathing slowly in and out. You may want to choose a mantra to think in your mind such as “I AM” as you breathe in and the word “PEACEFUL” as you breath out. You say these words in your mind as you breathe. Now that you have gotten into your relaxing meditative state, what you are going to do is focus on that which you are afraid of. Remain in this meditative state and focus on your fear; again, we will use the fear of snakes as an example again. Focus on snakes, just think about them. You will find your body tensing and becoming fearful again. Keep breathing slowly and deeply. You will find the anxiety building up again. As you feel the anxiety building up, take your mind off the snake and begin to focus on the breathing again. You will feel your body relax. As it does and you become relaxed again, think about your fear again. Imagine yourself being in the same room with your fear and think about it. As you feel the anxiety take over again, go back to breathing and saying your mantra. Repeat it over and over.

After a series of regular practices you will find that you will have a great relief of the stress caused by your fear. Some fears take longer than others and it depends upon the strength of the fear but don’t be easily disheartened, it takes time. As always, take the time to regularly meditate and begin to focus on those things which worry you and make you fearful. Remember to bring yourself back to your breathing when the anxiety begins and eventually you should find relief from your fear.

Monday, March 28, 2011

Meditation and Your Health

Imagine for a moment that you are holding your arm out to the side and you just hold it there. No big deal, right? But keep holding it there, and keep holding it there, and keep holding it there. With time your arm will begin to ache and become painful. Unless you do something, you will have to put your arm down because the pain will be too intense. Stress is very much like this. Stress is exposing yourself to something small over and over again for a short period of time. When it’s just for a short period of time it’s no big deal; however, after repeatedly exposing yourself to this stress over and over again it begins to take a toll on your body. It begins to wear on you and make you susceptible to illness or injury. It can end up as something as slight as aches and pains with muscles to slightly more severe as a cold or even more severe as cancer or heart disease. A good friend of mine who is a medical doctor once told me that he truly feels that about 80% of his patients he sees are in there because of stress related illnesses. He said that if he could help his patients alleviate the stress, many of them wouldn’t even need to be in to visit him.

Many people wrongly assume that stress is just “bad” things happening to you. This is not true. Many stressful events are wonderful and positive experiences also. For example if you spend a day in a big amusement park, it’s an enjoyable experience yet at the end of the day your body feels the aches and pains of the stress of the day. It was a positive event, yet it stressed your body and mind in many ways. The same holds true with events, such as weddings and parties. While the event itself is a positive experience and something we enjoy, preparing for the event and making sure things go well, getting through the entire process and finally enjoying the results will often lead you to collapsing in a chair at the end of the day from all the stress it has caused you. So stress is not always just negative events; however, negative stresses seem to be more obvious and stressful to us.

Meditation is a way to give your body “breaks” from this stress. It’s like putting that arm down and resting it and then putting it back up again. For most people, stress is a regular occurrence in life. Because stress is generally an everyday occurrence for many, I truly encourage meditating twice a day to give our bodies that break. It’s good for you in helping you to grow, find out who you are and develop a healthy, peaceful, wonderful life. It also is a good way to combat stress.

Stress breaks down our bodies much more quickly. Alleviating stress helps to keep our bodies running more smoothly. We all age, it’s a part of life; but also as a part of life is our body wearing down. Much like a car, the better care you take of it the longer it will last. Meditation will help you maintain your body, much like you maintain your car. It helps you to keep your body healthy and fit. It isn’t a guarantee of staying healthy but it does help our bodies deal with other things that we cannot control that happen in our bodies.

Since stress is a part of our life and is so hard on our bodies, I would like to encourage you to practice meditating regularly to counteract the attack of stress on your body. While meditating is not a guarantee to a healthy body with no illness I can say with confidence that it will help you endure the stressful times when you’re forced to deal with them. It will help both your body and mind, creating a better life in general.

Saturday, March 19, 2011

Eating Well and Mindfully: Living a Meditative Life

   You may ask yourself, “What do meditation and eating have to do with each other?” The answer is that they actually have a great deal to do with each other. What happens in the day is that we tend to get so busy that we’re not 100% present with “what is” and we really miss out on wonderful experiences that occur throughout the day. This includes important moments in everyday life, like eating.

            I’d like you to make a conscious effort of the moment you are in while eating. When you are eating, eat slowly. Eat with presence and be 100% aware of what it is you are eating. Take a bite of whatever it is that you are eating and feel it in your mouth. Taste it and recognize all of the flavor it actually has. You will realize that food is so much better when you take your time and you eat it mindfully, with presence.

            What often happens is that we can get so busy and caught up in our day that even the most scrumptious meal is lost in haste. Sometimes you will think back on a holiday that someone prepared a wonderful meal for you and you literally scoffed it down so quickly that you didn’t truly appreciate all the work, all the flavor and all the content of what you enjoyed. Perhaps your mother or your grandmother put so much work into making this meal and was so proud of it, yet you didn’t truly get the opportunity to enjoy it to its fullest because of the “rush” of the holiday. You rushed to continue on with the festivities and didn’t realize until later how wonderful or how much thought and love was put into that dinner created especially for you! It’s the same way in your everyday moments of eating. We get caught up in what has to be done and where we have to be next. We rush through a drive-thru and place a mindless order to simply fill our immediate need of quieting our stomach. Sometimes we even eat without realizing what or how much we eat. This is mindless eating and what I want you to start doing is the exact opposite of “mindless” eating. I want you to begin “mindful” eating. I want you to realize how good food can taste, how relaxing it can be to take the time to sit, relax and be in the moment with your food.

            What you will find when you take the time to eat with presence, with mindfulness, is that food is so much better. Meditation is all about following your breath, being present in the moment and using these techniques while eating will allow you to realize that the food tastes better. It will give you a pleasurable experience because you have taken the time to enjoy each and every little part of the food you are enjoying. When you are hurried through your eating what you really miss out on is allowing the food and the pleasure of eating it to occur.

            Why we suffer through life so much is because we often miss out on what’s around us. We don’t savor the moments, savor the view, or savor the life. It’s the same way with eating. You need to stop and savor the food. Enjoy being with the food, enjoy tasting the food and enjoy slowing down to enjoy the entire experience. Spend time with your taste buds that God gave you and you will find your meals will become a wonderful, pleasant experience.

            Of course this means that you need to set aside time for eating. Don’t rush; don’t eat while doing other things. You will begin to realize that food can have flavor and be a good, beautiful experience. A wonderful side effect of this is that you will find you have given your stomach the chance to realize it’s full. You will eat less because you are enjoying the food slowly. You will enjoy the moment with the food you have chosen and realize the flavors and the beautiful experience of nourishing your body with both mindful eating and mindful thoughts. I think you will be surprised at how much better your experience with food will be when you approach eating like you approach meditating. You will find enjoyment in taking the time to relax and eat slowly. Your body will enjoy the time it gets to truly experience the food you are giving it and it will repay you by acknowledging a feeling of content from the nourishment you have provided.

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Dr. Robert Puff, Ph.D. is a meditation expert, international speaker and the creator of the weekly Meditation For Health Podcast, available at http://www.MeditationForHealthPodcast.com He also creates a weekly podcast that explores the world of Enlightenment available at http://www.EnlightenmentPodcast.com If you would like to contact Dr. Puff, his e-mail address is DrPuff@cox.net

Meditators, Dancers, & Mind-Body Awareness

Have you ever gone through a day when you’re very, very busy and you have to get things done so even though you are hungry you just keep going and slowly that hunger sensation turns into a headache? I’ve seen this happen to my wife a lot when she’s busy and she just forgets about, or puts aside eating and a few hours later she gets a terrible headache. It can happen to a lot of us; we just get busy, we don’t focus on what our bodies are doing, and things go wrong. Our bodies and our minds are connected.

For example a patient of mine came in one time and before she even said anything I could tell something was wrong. She was hunched over, she looked very sad and her body reflected this sadness. I found out shortly later that her mother had just died and she was grieving for her mother. This is called the mind body connection. Our minds and our bodies are connected. Our bodies affect our minds and our minds affect our bodies.

Try this some time; just act as if you are really angry. Don’t really be angry but let your body be expressive of anger. Let your body be tense, taut, and ready for a fight and see if it doesn’t affect the way your mind feels. Or vice versa, start thinking about something that makes you very angry and see if your body doesn’t reflect your anger.

Researchers from the University of Berkley recently wanted to look into this mind body connection. They reported in the 2010 issue of Emotion, how people who have been practicing meditation for two years or longer are very good at reading the mind body connection. They’re much better than people who are dancers or just the general public. Let’s take a closer look, in depth at this research information.

The researchers were more interested in studying dancers because they spend a lot of time with their body, getting it strong, making it resilient, agile and very functional; so they wanted to find out if meditators or dancers were better at reading the mind body connection. They had three study groups. One group of 21 dancers had at least two years of training in modern dance or ballet. Group two was comprised of 21 seasoned meditators who had at least two years of Vipassana practice. Vipassana, or mindfulness meditation, is a technique focused on observing breathing, heartbeat, thoughts and feelings without judgement. They also had a control group of 21 regular people, not dancers or meditators.

All three groups were exposed to emotionally charged movies and at the same time they were to respond on how they were feeling inside at the time. They were hooked up to electrodes so that the scientists could read what their bodies were doing and whether their perception of how they were feeling was actually accurate to what the electrodes were saying their bodies were doing. What did they find? The dancers in the controlled group showed no correlation between their emotions and their accurately predicting the speed of their heart; however, the meditators showed a very strong correlation between their feelings and the speed of their heart.

So what does this mean to us? Why does this matter? I believe it’s important because if we are more in tune to our body we can then better respond to it, listen to it and make choices that keep us healthy. If we are not in tune to our body then things can go awry without us being aware of things. Awareness is my favorite word in the universe. We can’t change something unless we are aware of it. I believe what meditation does is make us become “super awareness” people. It’s not that things can’t go awry but we are probably going to be more aware that “yup, I’m going to get a headache here if I don’t eat” instead of “Oh, how did I get this headache?”

By being more in tune, more aware of our bodily sensations; of how we are feeling physically and emotionally, we can then better make choices to fix what’s happening inside of us. If we’re not aware and we’re more like puppets where life just happens to us, meditation helps us to make changes. It helps us to be more aware and in the long run, more healthy in so many ways.

So let’s start taking the time to meditate. I recommend twice a day, once in the morning when you first wake up and once in the evening just before going to bed. This truly is the most wonderful way to practice meditation and improve our mind body connection.

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