Thursday, November 3, 2011

How To Create a Meditation Practice That Will Change Your Life?

For many years I struggled with my meditation practice.  When I would sit down to meditate my mind would race and I couldn't sit still.  Why wasn't I able to silence my mind and fall into what my teacher, Davidji calls "the gap"?  So I told myself and anyone else who would listen, "Meditation is not for me.  I'm an individual and this practice doesn't work for me."  But over the years I would continue to come back to meditation hoping to find the key to becoming a successful meditator. 

Now what you need to know about me is that I'm a control freak.  I'm Pitta.  I can do anything, even if it kills me.  So why wasn't I able to meditate?  In August of this year, I decided to give it another try.  I signed up for the Chopra Center's meditation intensive, Seduction of Silence.  I had two months to recommit to my meditation practice before the seminar and see if attending would make a difference.  Wow, did it make a difference!!

The key for me was letting go of all expectations that I had about my meditation practice.  One of the most common pitfalls that I think most meditators fall into is that meditation will silence the mind.  We have anywhere from 60,000-80,000 thoughts per day.  There is no way we can silence our thoughts.  What I learned, or should I say "re-learned", this past week was that meditation is a flow.  During meditation our mind flows between our thoughts and our breath or in my case between my thoughts and my mantra.  It's a beautiful dance and flow.

The next important realization was that the benefits of meditation don't come while you're meditating, they are felt in the other 23 hours of the day when you're not meditating.  I was waiting for some "miraculous" experience while I was meditating but what I've realized is that because I'm meditating my life is changing in "miraculous" ways everyday.

So, if you've tried to meditate and have found it challenging, check in with yourself and see if perhaps your expectations are sabotaging your efforts.


Follow this link for a simple meditation practice: So Hum Meditation 

To Your Health,
Karen