Meditation has been scientifically demonstrated to affect the body's biochemistry, leading to a more balanced and less reactive state of being.  This is accomplished through the regular practice of meditation, which is often misunderstood to mean long hours spent in an uncomfortable position trying to stop your mind.  I don’t know about you, but I don’t think that would make me very calm!  

As the practice of meditation has become more popular, so has the misunderstanding of what meditation really is.  So first, let's start with what it's not.
 
Meditation is not:

• stopping your mind
• chanting
• praying
• necessarily a religious practice
• daydreaming
• spectacular imaginings
• escaping reality
• the playground of the devil

Meditation is:  the state of being fully present in the here and now without being swayed by the outer circumstances of your life or needing to run away.  Sounds impossible?  Well, you don’t just suddenly get there without any prior preparation, and at first these moments of clarity may be very short, few and far between.  Staying with a regular practice, however, can help you to deepen into a peacefulness and joy that is already present in you, waiting to be discovered.

 
Choosing versus reacting

Our minds tend to be reactive, and most of how we react is based on patterns that we have developed over years and years.  Many years ago I started a regular meditation practice.  It wasn’t particularly skillful, but I did it regularly.  I didn’t realize much effect until one day I was having an argument with my husband where I was angrily and insistently pressing my point of view.  Suddenly I had the thought that I could stop arguing right then if I wanted to.  That was my first experience of nonjudgmental awareness – a part of me that was able to see my habitual pattern of reactivity and realize that I could choose a different way. Meditation helps you develop the ability to choose a different way.

Opening to self-acceptance

If your mind is anything like mine, it is good at wandering into the past or imagining into the future.  Yet the past is over and the future hasn’t happened yet.  Most of what we worry about is what we imagine might happen in the future.  Much of our suffering comes from judgments or fears about painful experiences from the past.  Over the years we may even collect judgments about ourselves that cause us to dislike or even despise who we are.  What if you could reduce your fear of the future or learn to tolerate the pain from the past?  What if you could become comfortable with yourself as you are without all the judgments of past conditioning?  What if you could actually begin to love yourself as you are?  Meditation can help you to do that.

Many ways to get to 'here'

There are many techniques which can be used to for guiding your mind to be more present here and now and for developing compassion for yourself and others.  With BodyMind Therapy we will try to find a technique that works for you (and it doesn’t necessarily have to involve sitting still!).

Curious about starting a meditation practice?  Give me a call at 773-531-8513 and let's talk about how I might be able to help you begin a meditation practice or a BodyMind routine that includes meditation.