What I Have Learnt About Meditating
I did not have a good understanding of meditation in the past. Embarrassingly, I thought that it is weird to meditate. I don’t mean to be rude but I naively thought that only monks in temples meditate.
It was only until a few months ago that I learnt that I could not be more wrong about meditation 😬. Sorry!
A few people that I follow online talked about the benefits of meditation and I decided to find out more about it and give it a try. Since then, I’ve been meditating regularly and I’m happy to say that it has benefited me tremendously!
In this post, I would share what I have learnt about meditating after practising it for the past few months.
1. It is not about having no thoughts at all.
When I first started to meditate, I had the misconception that meditation is about not thinking about anything and having an empty mind. When I recommended meditation to a close friend recently, he had the same misconception too.
It’s about clearing all the thoughts in my mind right?
What I’ve learnt from Headspace, a meditation app, is that it is very hard to clear all the thoughts in our mind. Meditation is about being aware of those thoughts in our mind but not chase after them.
I guess an example of a mental conversation would be something like this:
I need to finish that piece of work tomorrow. Okay, got it. (Then bring my focus back to my breathing.)
instead of this:
I need to finish that piece of work tomorrow. What else am I left with? What time should I do it tomorrow? How long will I take?…
Even after practising meditation regularly for a few months, I still find my mind wander off and chase after thoughts. While it is not ideal, I could still feel the positive effects of meditation. Also, I read that I could get better at this by meditating more and practising it consistently 😊.
2. It helps me to be more mindful and calm.
The most obvious effect of meditation is that I am more aware of my thoughts and emotions and am better able to control how I react to different situations. Consequently, I am able to deal with various situations, especially unexpected ones, better.
2 weeks ago, I had a graded group presentation at my university. When it was my turn to present, I realised that my group mate loaded the wrong set of slides and about half of my slides were not in it.
The old me, before I started meditating, would probably have been quite upset by it. The presentation was graded and the effort I put into making the slides seemed to be wasted. However, I sent this message to my group after the presentation:
Although the mistake might have affected our grades, I felt that there wasn’t a point to be angry because it would not have changed the situation. So why not make everyone feel happier, instead of worrying about the mistake?
I feel that it was because I meditate, I was able to go through my thoughts properly before I act 😊.
3. I need to be consistent with meditating to enjoy the benefits.
Finally, meditation is a skill and like all other skills, constant practice is necessary.
Last December, when I was travelling, I was not disciplined with meditating daily. According to my Coach.Me statistics, I meditated only eight times in that month. I think I felt the difference when I meditated less. I felt anxious and panicky easily.
For the following two months, I tried to get back into the daily routine and mediated more regularly — twenty four times in January and nineteen times in February. I could feel that I’m calmer and more relaxed in general now.
All in all, I feel that meditating has made a positive impact on my life and I would continue to practise it regularly. If you have not tried meditating, I would recommend giving it a go! 😊
(This is my 2nd blog post of my 30in30 challenge — 30 blog posts in 30 days. I hope to feel comfortable, more confident and become better with writing through this challenge.
This post would be reposted on my personal blog, www.AlfredLua.com.)
