Does anybody here have a good way to meditate? I’ve never done it before but wanted to experiment with it.
The only way I can keep my mind from wandering is to use a guided meditation tape. It works surprisingly well, imo.
I really liked this book: The Joy Of Living
Focusing solely on breathing worked for me.
Work on keeping silent in your mind. But don’t try to ‘force’ yourself to be silent because the act of forcing is in and of itself a thought.
When a thought comes unbidden into your head work on diminishing it slowly until you are no longer thinking it and it goes away. At the beginning stages it usually happens that you will just replace one thought with another.
Ohming is a good way to meditate as well, or some kind of meditative exercise like Qi Gong, Tai Chi or Yoga.
Another interesting one is contemplating a candle flame or a bowl of water or some other elemental physical object.
Deep intentional breathing is key. Take your breath into different parts of your body until you are breathing with your whole body at once.
But meditation is best taught in a class ultimately.
I use a simple method learned while reading Theravada texts. The idea is to use your breath as a way to distract yourself from your thoughts. Sit somewhere quietly and feel the breath coming in and out. Perhaps add “ooomm” or some other sound (doesnt matter which) if that gets too boring. At first, 3 minutes will be torture then 5 minutes wont be so bad and after a short while you’ll be doing 10-15 minutes with ease. The idea with this simple method is just to silence the constant steam of thoughts in your head. Feel free to PM me if you have any questions.
Here’s an excellent writeup:
I use a breath-counting method. Count inhales (or exhales, or whatever) from 1-10. When you get to 10, go back to 1 and start again. If you get distracted, start again at 1 once you realise. You can’t really control or stop your thoughts, so the idea is to just notice them, and watch them pass through your mind, like clouds passing across the sky. They will try to suck you into thinking they are really important, and need to be taken seriously, so you have to practise letting them go.
Grounding & Centering always works for me.
Sit real still and breath in 4 seconds and out 8 seconds.
Almost fall asleep, but don’t…aw, go ahead sleep.