How To ... Meditate

by Heather Long | More from this Blogger

02 Jul 2007 07:17 AM

I've talked about meditation here before - but I wanted to discuss more about how to meditate and why I meditate. When I was in junior high, I participated in the drama club and the speech club. We had a great teacher, her name was Mrs. Garza. She was a brilliant woman and she was excellent at coaching us through speeches, dramatic presentations and learning impromptu. One of the things she also taught was guided meditation - in part it was to help cope with stage fright and anxiety.

To understand, first of all, the meditations she used were not considered religious or philosophical in nature - what she did would walk us - mentally through a program, a drama or a story. The idea was to help put us in the mindset of the tale so that we could perform Romeo & Juliet or Othello. Since then, I've used meditation to help get through tough times at school, through grueling studies in college, to escape from the tedium of a job that kept me in front of a computer 12 hours a day and coping with the stress of being on call 24/7 1 week out of every 3. Meditation also helped me when I was pregnant and coping with a difficult time because everything seemed to go wrong for me. During those particular meditations, I would clear my mind of all the troubling thoughts - I wouldn't concentrate on what was going wrong, instead, I would focus on what was going right - the baby that was being developed inside me. I would imagine the little fingers and little toes. I would imagine what the first laugh would sound like. I would have conversations with myself about her and I could see her so clearly and each flutter of motion reminded me that she was there.

How To Meditate

Take 15 minutes today, right now - sit back, close your eyes and turn off the sounds around you. If it's too loud, consider focusing on just one of the sounds that you can hear. Listen to them and relax. Concentrate on your breathing. The idea is just to relax your heart, relax your mind and relax yourself. You don't have to visualize anything - no walks in the park, no waterfalls, no dew laden grass - just you and your heartbeat and your breathing.

I know some people who pray in these 15 minutes, they commune with their creator and they achieve much the same effect. They relax, they let go of the stress, and they get in touch with themselves. It's a wonderful feeling and it can help evaporate stress in nothing flat. Don't get caught up in the stereotype of who meditates and who doesn't - those 15 minutes you spend can help make you more productive, more fit, more relaxed and healthier.

So did you spend fifteen minutes today meditating?

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Learn more about Heather Long

Heather Long is 35 years old and currently lives in Wylie, Texas. She has been a freelance writer for six years. Her husband and she met while working together at America Online over ten years ago.

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