Thoughts on Meditation

Hi All,

Hope your week is going great.  I'm having a pretty good week here in beautiful Phoenix, AZ.  The weather is cooling down a bit (low 100s), and even cooler at night.

Lately the topic of meditation has come up several times.  Just last night a friend was telling me about his new practice of meditation that his girlfriend helped him start, and how it's really helped him to be more calm and relaxed.  It's so good for that.

I've been thinking about starting a Wednesday afternoon meditation class/group.  I rent space to run my massage/therapy biz at a place called Beyond Today Co., here in Phoenix.  I was thinking a group would be great to help people who would like to try meditation, but feel like they can't on their own.  It would also be a good place for experienced meditators to come and share about their meditation practice, what they do, how it's going, etc.  And - we'd also do a group meditation every week as well.

So why would you want to meditate?  There are lots of reasons; better health for one; Physically and mentally.  For me personally it's a recharge and a reset.  It gives me a good recharge of energy - helps me really get going on as little as 15 to 20 minutes of deep rest or meditation.  Thomas Edison was famous for his 15 minute recharging "power naps."

It also is like a "reset," for the body, or like a "reboot."  When you reboot the computer it resets everything, helps all the little programing that get out of whack, get back into place and running at more efficient levels.  Meditation does that for the body and mind.  It calms you down, lowers blood pressure, and relieves stress.  It also helps in the same way mentally to quiet the mind chatter down and help you feel more peaceful.  Life is hectic and fast paced - when we get stressed out even the little things can start to bother us, and then we may even obsess about them.  Meditation helps to quiet that down.  After meditating I'll usually wonder why I even gave any of those crazy thoughts energy to begin with.

So what can we do to start?  It can be so healing to just start with 15 minutes a day of relaxing and quieting down the body and mind.  You can talk to yourself with that inner voice - tell yourself, guide yourself to relax.  Relax your body a piece at a time and get into a nice breathing rhythm.  Focus on your breathing and when you get distracted by some passing thoughts, come back to your breathing and focus on it.  Everything is connected...if you are thinking good thoughts, you'll naturally feel better.  If you're thinking about all the junk going on in the world and obsessing about things that are out of your control...it will make you feel worse.  That's just common sense right?  So when you meditate, you take the focus off of the negativity and impulsive thoughts - and into a good peaceful direction.  Simple.

Now I know some folks that may be concerned that meditation is related to a spiritual practice or religion that they don't want to be affiliated with.  Yes, there are meditation practices that are taken from various religions.  However - you can create your own practice, just like I described above.  People of all walks of life know that taking a quick power nap, or closing their eyes and resting for a little bit can be very rejuvenating.  That's meditation, it's just not labelled as meditation.  However, the results are the same.

So if you can, take a few minutes out of your day and take a little rest.  Relax your body and mind.  Who knows, it may help keep you out of the doctors office or help you feel a little more balanced.

Take care everyone and have a wonderful weekend.  Be kind to others...and be nice to yourself.  Treat yourself with the same kindness that you would extend to your friends.

Peace,

Tom

Holistic Therapy Solutions, LLC
http://holistictherapysolutions.weebly.com/