Mindful Monday – February 19, 2018
“Wherever you are is the perfect place to awaken. This moment is the exact place to practice compassion and loving awareness. You have all the ingredients to breathe and find freedom just where you are.” – Jack Kornfield
The answer is yes.
There will never be a perfect time to start meditating. You will always be too busy, too sleepy, too hungry, too distractible, or too stressed to meditate. Do it anyway. Meditating is like creative writing; you cannot wait for inspiration to strike, because you may be waiting forever.
There will never be a perfect place to meditate. It’s okay if you don’t have a quiet place to practice. I live on a busy road with a lot of traffic noise… sirens, honks, loud engines and booming music. All that racket was distracting me while I was meditating. So, I decided to make the road noise the anchor of my practice. Instead of struggling to ignore the sounds, I focused on them. Distractions will always be as much a part of your meditation as the pauses in-between them. Notice the thoughts, feelings, sounds, smells, sensations, that enter your consciousness, and return your attention to your anchor.
Meditation has become ‘trendy’ in the West over the past few decades largely because of Jon Kabat-Zinn, a professor emeritus of medicine who studies the effects of meditation on mental and physical health. Ongoing research suggests that regular meditation helps manage anxiety, depression, stress, high blood pressure, and more. Take advantage of these FREE health and mental health benefits, starting now! (Sounds like an infomercial, but truly, the only catch is your willingness to actually meditate). Whether you meditate for 1 minute or 1 hour, any amount of time is beneficial.
What made you decide to start meditating? What motivates you to continue? Comment below and let me know.
-Rebecca
Well put! There are always excuses, no better time to start than now. Great motivation :^)