Meditation Stress Relief
“Relieving stress and finding meaning in everyday life” – D. Nichol & B. Birchard
Introduction
In this short article I will explain the benefits of a regular meditation praxis. Meditation is one way to achieve better stress management. Better stress management is one key to better time management.
My three main thesis regarding mediation are like this:
- Meditation is really good for managing stress and developing your mind
- Meditation is easy – you can do it too
- It is very hard to keep up with a regular meditation praxis
Before I go on I want to stress out that my recommendation is not based on any far-Eastern philosophy. I fully respect such views to meditation and acknowledge it may be from where meditation originates. At the same time, however, meditation has benefits on pure physiological and psychological levels. These benefits have also been proved in different studies. Hence the esoteric aspects to meditation are irrelevant.
Meditation is often associated with far-Eastern believes, including different energy points and channels. However, at Time Management Solutions we concentrate purely on the stress management benefits derived from the relaxation that comes with meditation.
Let us start with a short discussion on how you would know if meditation could be something for you.
So, What’s With Meditation?
If you are like most people, there exists an endless chatter in your mind. Nichole and Birchard (in their book “The One Minute Meditator”) do a great job describing the mind of a teenager :
You can imagine the types of thinking that play over and over: Can I make my grades? Do I like chemistry? Why am I even taking chemistry? Will I pass the class? Am I ever going to get a girlfriend (boyfriend)? Should I be in school? The one-minute mind runs back and forth over this and other territory time and time again.
Never ending thinking is however not a problem of teenagers only. Except for certain gurus of the mind, we all do it.
All the action inside our heads make it hard for us to stop and just sit down. In stead we constantly feel the urge of having to do something… so we watch television, go for a smoke, drink alcohol, have sex, go shopping… get excited over all kinds of real and imaginary thoughts in our head.
For me one of the main purpose of meditation is to silence this inner voice – to shut it up – giving room for inner peace and moments for true rest.
We all know how this true silence feels, as we most likely have had our minds shut up during:
- Flow – doing something you love and you master.
- Peak Performance – those moments when everything have gone just right during some performance, e.g. during sports.
- Peak Moments – moments that have been so beautiful that they have just stopped your mind. This can happen e.g. in nature.
In short, meditation brings you from the state of mindlessness, into the zone of mindfulness. When you are mindful you are truly present. Your mind is not in the past, it is not in the future, it is not day dreaming. In stead you are in the moment.
The Physical Benefits of Meditation
Many studies have shown that meditation has positive health benefits. Two often quoted persons having studied the effects of meditation are Herbert Benson and Jon Kabat-Zin. In their studies they have found beneficial effects in fields like:
- Lowering experienced stress
- Reducing blood pressure
- Reducing experienced anxiety
- Reducing experienced chronic pain
- In fighting dependencies (as the mind calms down people felt less need to escape into drugs and alchohol)
Still, I personally want to highlight the aspect of developing your mind. With meditation you will get closer to to your sensations, thoughts and perceptions. You may also catch them before you are about to overreact, feel fear, get an urge to act in some irrational way, or judging something you see. You will begin to make truly conscious decisions.
How to Meditate in Order to Relieve Stress?
The meditation I recommend is simply put “breathing, without thoughts”. As easy as it sounds, it is not. But please try.
In order to get into a meditation mood, you might use some soft music in the background. I normally don’t use music and prefer silence, but relaxing music is sometimes a welcome addition also for me. The music should in that case give a calm ambiance, and be without lyrics, or you might be distracted. Alternatively you could use some sounds from nature (from a cd or generator).
Do like this:
- Sit upright with your back straight and hands on your knees. Don’t “sink” into the chair. Alternatively you can lie down. When lying I prefer lying on the floor and to use a pillow. Remember that meditation is something you do, it is not sleeping or resting. It is not meant that you fall into sleep.
- Breathe through your nose and with your belly. Some people breathe IN through the nose but OUT through the mouth, and that is ok too, but using only the nose is more simple.
- Feel the air going in and out. Concentrate on how it feels in your nostrils and the top of your nose when the air flows.
- As you continue to breathe, run a relaxation pattern starting from the top of your head and going to your toes. Just feel and think about one area in your body and ensure it is relaxed. You can use e.g. this order: top of head, forehead, eyes, nose, cheeks, lips, mouth, vocal chords, chin, throat, shoulders, arms, fingers, chest, belly, hips, groin, thighs, knees, feet and toes. This takes 30 seconds to 5 minutes,
- After the relaxation pattern, choose a second focus point, in addition to the air flow and your breaghing. In addition you can also (at the same time) concentrate on how your belly moves in and out, or then you can concentrate on the sound of your breathing. The main goal is to have two focus points at the same time. This calms your mind and makes silences somewhat your internal chatter.
- This is now the state that you should maintain from 3-30 minutes. You are now meditating.
- As you breathe, thoughts WILL arise from the endless chatter of your mind. This is normal and a part of meditating. It is an especially strong tendency the very first times you meditate, and it can be very distracting. When thoughts or worries pop up, just acknowledge them, but refocus on breathing. Don’t start to think about the thoughts that arise. Do also not judge them in any way, or judge yourself for the fact that you can’t shut up your thinking. Just accept the situation. Forgive and be gentle to yourself. Aknowlegde the thought, forgive yourself and refocus on the breathing. Most likely you will have to do this again, again and again.
- With some training you will start to experience moments without thoughts. This is progress. You are now in the moment.
- Continue 5-30 minutes. My own preference is about 15 minutes.
- When you decide to stop, give your mind 10 seconds to reactivate. Imagine yourself activating your circuit board and restarting your systems.
After the meditation you should feel refreshed. Your mind should be more relaxed. After the first times it could be just confused.
As you learn, you really start loosing your sense of time. Therefore I recommend using a meditation timer which come in many forms: a computer software, a mobile phone add-on, or just some sort of clock.
Meditation as a Part of Your Everyday Life
Meditation will not work if you don’t commit to a regular praxis. I recommend you start by trying it for at least ten days. For the first five days you could meditate for 10 minutes. The next five days you could meditate 15 minutes. Only after this period you should make up your mind – could meditation suit you? There is no way you will “get it” during the first days.
After your introduction period, you could choose to have a regular daily meditation routine, or you could aim at 3-5 times a week. Have patience. The benefits will come with time. You should judge your overall benefits only after 2-3 months.
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