Whether you work in business, or you're on the shop floor, if a professional, a tradesman, a home-maker or person of leisure, you would benefit from meditation. If meditation was as much a part of your day as is having a wash or something to eat, it would radically improve your life. It takes 15 minutes, it's easy to do and the 15 minutes pays for itself many times over in increased efficiency. You have absolutely nothing to lose and everything to gain from making this incredibly easy and beneficial activity a daily habit. You don't need to join a class or sign up for a course - you can do it easily by yourself at home for free!
Meditation evokes a trance, a state of consciousness that is neither sleep nor wakefulness, but is a category in its own right. If it sounds a bit scary to go into a trance, you may be surprised to learn that you go into a trance several times every day, but you have probably never realised that’s what you were in fact doing. You probably call it being in "a world of my own", "zoning out" "mind-wandering" a "daydream" or being "miles away". This trance state usually occurs when the environment is neither stimulating nor threatening – boring in other words! Queues, driving, walking, running, waiting and monotonous tasks are common situations that cause people to go into a trance.
Unfortunately, in modern civilisation the mind just doesn’t get enough of this"downtime". Boredom is considered an unhappy and uncomfortable state to be avoided, so we actually actively create and obtain distractions to prevent it – the mobile handset in particular now means that we can occupy our minds even in places we formerly couldn’t, such as in queues. In the same way that labour-saving devices mean we avoid getting the exercise we need, we are now not getting the mental downtime we need. This is why everyone seems to be so much angrier and impatient now!
There is a rapidly obvious physical benefit to meditation. It triggers the Parasympathetic Nervous System, a whole bodily mechanism that is often nicknamed "rest, repair and digest", designed to keep other systems in mind and body in optimum condition. The following body subsystems are activated:
Cell regeneration
– healing and replacement of damaged and worn out bodily tissues takes place.The Immune System
: All cells and bodily substances dedicated to fighting infection are activated and energised.Homeostasis
: Balance is restored to the body’s levels of essential substances in the blood, such as water, salt, sugars, minerals, proteins and hormones, so they are at the optimum levels.
…Small wonder then that people who meditate regularly feel better! The physical benefits alone would make meditation worthwhile. But there’s more! There are equally beneficial benefits for the mind:
You will be less sensitive
– instead of the slightest thing upsetting you, it takes a lot more to do it. You will still have your "raw nerves" that will hurt when trod on, and you will not be invincible, but the level of provocation you can tolerate will be considerably higher.
You will feel relaxed most of the time
– hormones that promote relaxation and pleasure are stimulated by meditation, particularly dopamine and endorphins.
You will gain enhanced perspective
– you will be able to distinguish the important from the unimportant and prioritise much more easily, which means you feel much less stressed and more able to cope with everything you need to do.
You will become more open-minded to possibilities
– meditation breaks down beliefs about limitation and doors seem to appear where there were previously walls. Being less stressed and preoccupied, your eyes are opened to views and paths to which your mind was previously closed.
If you have a spiritual dimension, you will find it enhanced and deepened.
This will fire up your enthusiasm for life in general.There are many simple meditation techniques easily discovered online, but I describe a particularly easy-peasy one in my book EMOTIONAL MANAGEMENT FOR BEGINNERS. If you would like more details about the book or a free meditation instruction sheet, just contact me at info@garyblonder.co.uk
