The biggest lie you tell yourself
The biggest lie we tell ourselves is that meditating is not a high priority.
First of all, if you don't realize how much science there is behind meditation, you must be living under a rock. And the book I’m currently kvelling over, The Happiness Advantage, says that meditation, just five minutes a day, is one of the most reliable ways to increase our natural tendency toward happiness.
But I don't want to sound too girly when I tell you to meditate. So I'm telling you instead that the Marine Corps is using meditation to help troops cope with the stress of warfare. Imagine fifty guys sitting cross-legged, eyes shut, with a rifle in every lap. The Marines were totally skeptical at first, of course, but in Men's Journal (one of my favorite magazines) there's a great article by Vanessa Gregory about how the Marines became believers. (This article is not online. Annoying. So here’s a link to a Science Daily article about Marines meditating.)
Also, I don't want to sound like an overly spiritualized hippie cliche, so I’m also telling you that I learned to meditate when I was playing professional beach volleyball. Many professional athletes meditate because at that level, everyone has the skills to be the best, but only a few have the mental strength to use those skills in the toughest moments.
And, in case you think this doesn’t apply to you, a marriage therapist once told me (and my boyfriend, when we were deciding to skip out on counseling so we could save money for new computers) that you judge a person, and a couple, and an athlete, not by how good they are when there is no pressure, but on how well they handle themselves when everything is going wrong. So people should learn to mediate when things don’t feel terrible. It’s like networking when you have a job: make a big change from a strong position.
Another thing, though. I don’t want to sound like a hypocrite when I tell you to meditate. Because, I know all this stuff and I’m not doing it.
Well, that’s not true. I have done it before. As I said, I did it for volleyball. I sat, quietly, for twenty minutes a night, visualizing serve receive. I was playing against the Olympic team nearly every tournament (yes, because I was ranked so low on the tour) and I had to really, really focus in order to make good passes from their serves.
When I was meditating, and playing on the beach five hours a day and lifting weights an hour a day, my favorite part of the day was meditating. But when I gave up volleyball, I gave up meditating.
Then I did yoga (which is about breathing, so it counts as meditation). I was doing such hard-core yoga that I was waking up at 5am, doing ninety minutes of yoga, going home to sleep from complete exhaustion, and going into work late. Five days a week. And I loved it. But when I got fired from the job (for being late, among other things) and I had all the time in the world as an unemployed person, I stopped doing yoga.
It’s insane not to meditate because it helps all aspects of your life—intellectual, emotional, physical. And it only takes five minutes. You just need to sit for five minutes, and even if you are terrible at meditating and your mind races and you struggle to sit still, those five minutes are still beneficial.
Beneficial because first of all, you get better and better at calming yourself with each five-minute stint you do. But also, some of the most influential (on me) research I’ve ever featured on this blog is from Roy Baumeister who shows (repeatedly) that self-discipline snowballs; if you add one, small thing that requires self-discipline, and do it day after day, exerting self-discipline in other areas because easier.
In the example I first read from Baumeister, he had students walk with a book on their head each day. They had to have good posture and think about what they were doing to do it—which is basic mindfulness about the book on the head. They did it only for a very short time each day, but without anyone in the study mentioning anything about eating, studying or sleep, the majority of the people walking with books on their head each day inadvertently improved in all three of those areas. Self-discipline begets self-discipline.
Also, I am stuck on Shawn Achor’s report that we have a limited degree of willpower. But we can improve it by adding small, soon-to-be-routine acts of self-discipline. And what could be easier than sitting still for five minutes? I mean, you don’t have to do anything. Just sit there. How can we not be able to do this?
I rack my brain every day for the reason I do not do it. I was thinking, if someone paid me $10 each time I sat for five minutes, I’d do it. I’d tell myself I would have $3650 to spend at the end of the year, and then every day, for a year, I’d look through catalogs figuring out how to spend my money.
So I definitely can do this.
What is stopping me? I’ve been thinking for a week, and I think it’s a fear of change. I think I know that sitting for five minutes a day will change me. First, I’ll like it, and I’ll sit a bit longer. Then I’ll be curious about what tips people give newbie meditators. And then I’ll get a little better.
And then, I worry that maybe I’ll be a nutcase. I mostly think people who meditate are nutcases. They are the ones who are always talking about how in touch with themselves they are. And how being where you are now is so important. It annoys me.
But I’m always talking about that stuff, too. So I think meditation maybe will push me over the top. Like, how can I be cool and meditate?
When I tell the farmer I worry about this, he points out that I am not cool anyway. He used to think I was cool, but then I took him to NYC to hang out with my friends there, and then he saw that I’m the dork of my NYC friends.
So, the truth is that I guess I am all those things I don’t want to be: I’m a little too girly for a blog that has a majority-male readership. And I’m a little too spiritual for a blog that tells people, ostensibly, how to make more money, and I’m a little too hypocritical. Because your biggest problem is that you are not meditating and it’s so easy to do. My biggest problem is that I am telling you to do it instead of doing it myself.
This isn’t the first time lately somebody’s told me I need to be meditating. It’s actually the third in as many weeks. So it’s time to stop resisting it! Thanks for the nudge, Penelope.
Penelope, Your seeming contradictions are what make your blog so different and arresting. I’ve been reading for only a short time, but I have come to appreciate your honesty. It’s kind of addictive. And, P.S., I hate the idea of meditating, even if it’s only for 5 minutes a day. When you do it, I’ll do it.
I wouldn’t go as far as to actually do it myself (you’d have to pay me a LOT more than $10 to just sit for five minutes….I don’t even go to the toilet without first grabbing some good reading material), but if you DO enjoy it and you believe it will help you, go do it….maybe you can do a Webinar where everybody just sits and goes “om”?
“Then I did yoga (which is about breathing, so it counts as meditation). I was doing such hard-core yoga that I was waking up at 5am, doing ninety minutes of yoga, going home to sleep from complete exhaustion, and going into work late. Five days a week. And I loved it. But when I got fired from the job (for being late, among other things) and I had all the time in the world as an unemployed person, I stopped doing yoga.”
Maybe you didn’t love doing the yoga. Maybe you hated the job.
Your article reminded me of this one.
http://youarenotsosmart.com/2010/10/27/procrastination/
That’s a great link. It makes me think harder about why I put stuff off. Well, it makes me think I need to think about why I put stuff off, so I bookmarked the link to do the thinking later. Seriously. I only noticed that now. As I write this comment….
Penelope
Yes, it is a very good article. However, as the comments of that article attest, I think it should have linked to the New Yorker piece – http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2010/10/11/101011crbo_books_surowiecki?currentPage=all . It’s interesting that all the links for the article are not within the body of the article but rather all grouped together at the end – different style.
Also there’s a short piece on procrastination in Slashdot – http://slashdot.org/submission/1381672/In-Praise-of-Procrastination? .
“I don't want to sound too girly when I tell you to meditate.”
Because girly = bad? Ouch. I think this point could be expressed without casting feminine behaviours in a negative light.
Feminist rant over now, and I liked the rest of the post.
Great post, Penelope. I started meditating in 2005, and it radically changed my life for the better. And yet, there are still times I realize it’s been weeks since I sat down. Or I’ll be stressed and my mentors will ask if I’ve been meditating and I’ll say “no, I haven’t had the time.” I know that if I meditated I’d get more focused and that would create more time, but sometimes I still don’t.
I think you’re right on that this resistance sometimes come from not wanting to change. I think some of us thrive on our own drama and stress from time to time. And I think that even though we KNOW the benefits of meditating, sometimes it still seems like it’d be more productive to clean the bathtub or write a blog than sit, get focused, and calm.
Thanks for the post. I’m going to go sit still for a bit.
Penelope, I’m not a male and I love your blog! As for meditation – I do yoga one or two times a week but do not meditate every day. May be, yes, out of fear that it would change me. I like hatha yoga and what it does to my joints and how it keeps me relaxed and flexible but that’s as far as I would go.
Lately, I’ve been thinking about the fact that I don’t want to be more efficient that I already am. Your posts about “having interesting life” and “having happy life” really resonate with me and my own life. I guess that the most difficult thing is to find this balance without conforming to either one.
“I'm the dork of my NYC friends.”…
I don’t think you give yourself enough credit. :) You’re the purest glimpse of human emotion in the vast sea of cybernetic society that is the internet.
Golly I do love girly – more women should try it. Smelling nice, with pretty flowery clothes and well brushed hair and a pleasant attitude is refreshing. I don’t want women trying to be men God didn’t plan it that way. Girly is God’s Gift!
Woody. The comments section always surprises me. Because ostensibly the comments are about the topic I start, but usually what I learn from the comments is something completely off topic.
What I learned from you is that I can be girly. From the very beginning of me as a writer, editors encouraged me to not be too female. My high male readership is relatively rare — I mean, having more male readers than female readers is a-typical for a female blogger, so I am careful to not mess that up. I am conscious of being too girly.
But I don’t really know what that is. I just think about it a lot. Now I’m thinking, though, that men like talking to smart, interesting women. So maybe if I am just consistently smart and interesting, men will like the blog, and I can be as girly as I want.
Penelope
It can be hard to keep your mind from wandering all over the place if you’re not used to meditating. I find guided meditation helpful. There are lots of guided meditations available free on youtube and other sites; the narrating voice is usually extremely slow, smooth, deep and (for some reason) British. I think it would be fun if you taped a guided meditation and posted it on your blog, I’m sure it would be very different than most!
I’ve been meditating 6 minutes a day (well, some days anyway). What really helped me start meditating was the idea that my thoughts will never go away, I’ll just be less attached to them. From the way meditation is often portrayed I had this idea that my mind had to be blank for it to count. Since I couldn’t get my mind blank I wasn’t doing it right. This new idea… that as I get more practice with meditation I will get less and less attached to those impatient thoughts zooming about changed my whole perception of meditating.
Try using stickk.com — it’ll give you a negative incentive to not meditate. (Basically, it’ll pay out to an anti-charity of your choice if you fail to meet your commitment to meditate). I’ve no affiliation with the company, but have found it useful from time to time, especially for getting new habits started.
Me; I meditate strangely. I weave. Weaving is, for me at least, the purest form of relaxation. I’ve gotten good enough that it’s all muscle memory, and I’m creating. The tempo reminds me to breathe evenly.
As a bonus, I create belts. But that’s a bonus. Mostly, what I do is think, quietly, about anything and everything (because, like I said, muscle memory). Half the time I finish weaving, put the shuttle down, and wander off to go write up a homework solution. This makes me very happy. :)
Penelope, thanks I needed the reminder. I teach my clients to meditate almost every day but of course, it is easy enough to lose track of it myself. I had a spiritual teacher once who confronted me on my lapse in meditation thusly: “You are clear that meditation allows you to feel at peace, empowered and at your fullest potential. So, the conscious decision not to meditate is simply self-harm. It’s like drinking too much, smoking, overeating, even cutting. Self harm.”
Well, when he put it like that…
You have a much higher male readership than female? I liked the post. This comment was the one that stood out though as it surprised me.
I totally needed to read this today. I started meditating about two years ago. I know about the great benefits yet I still have an undisciplined practice that goes in fits and starts. Thanks for reminding me that I’m not doing myself any favors by bounding out of bed and onto my computer most days. I may be an outlier but I’m a girly girl who absolutely loves your blog. I read it because you come to each post just being yourself. And I must confess that I’m enjoying learning about farm life.
You’re just in the first stage of change. It helps to do it at the same time every day and to make it palatable. Instead of 20 min, shoot for 3. Come one. You have three minutes. I was in your shoes about an year ago. I still occasionally blow it off, but the daily meditation (I’m up to about 13 minutes) has changed my life for the better.
Ha! Entertaining and to the point. Brava.
What a timely article. I know I need to take better care of myself, but can’t seem to figure out where to start. I think meditating would be a great way to start. When I can better focus, I’ll be better able to see the next thing to take up to change. Thank you!
Penelope, I have meditated for almost 40 years. I have practiced (or sometimes not practiced) pretty much the same type of sitting, but it has evolved to basically just sitting quietly. That is it.
At the beginning, your meditation is just about getting your butt in a chair. Or getting in the car to go to a meditation. Meditation has lots of trappings and dogmas if you let it. From my perspective, it is about being. It’s that simple. There is no trying involved. It is one of those maddening things that you can’t really “try” to do. Just show up for a few minutes a day and sit quietly. If you have thoughts, if you have emotions, you just say hello to them and continue sitting. Accept–you are not trying to get anywhere or reach any special level or blah-biddy blah. I am a crazy person about 2/3rds of the time, but I can also see the space between that craziness=ego, worry, blah, blah, blah and being. What are the thoughts and feelings that are running me? They are not me. So, having a practice, even if it is only 5 minutes a day, is a really good thing. Even if you sit there and fight with yourself for 5 minutes, you have an awareness that that is what you are doing. That is perfect.
Eckhart Tolle has a beautiful 5 minute or so meditation that you can do. It is in his book (a tiny book you can read in 15 minutes) the Practice of Now. Don’t make this another “thing” to feel guilty about. Just do it when you can and enjoy it.
I really like how you write about meditating, Sally. It’s more matter of facts that down to earth. I think that’s how I want to be. Well, if I could just meditate enough to even start talking about how I meditate…
Penelope
Penelope, I’m not sure you will relate to this, but there is a video talk of a person named Bart Marshall who talks about his experience of “awakening”. It is not high drama, but it may spark something in you. You have to be willing to spend the time to listen to it, but maybe you will want to. He talks about meditation as silence–which in some ways removes all the “stuff” around the whole idea of meditating.
Love,
Sally
oops, forgot the link: http://www.viddler.com/explore/ClearSightTV/videos/270/
Sally – I love your comment as well. I always think of Yoga tied to Buddhism, chanting, etc. Using your “normal” example and making it less intimidating to start is so helpful. Thanks for writing about this Penelope – it’s another one of those things I want to fit in but never do.
thank you for posting this today, of all days. i’ve been on myself to go back to meditating daily for some time, always believing i have too much to do.
i see that some are worried about straying during meditation. this is normal, and when you take the practice on, most experts say to acknowledge your distractions and allow them to pass.
there are myriad ways to take it on. i initially tried it via a buddhist community group here, yoga classes that included chanting, and many others. the one that stuck best with me was transcendental meditation. i was lucky to get a scholarship to study it at a particularly low time in life, and i credit it with righting my ship, so to speak.
TM asks that one clear 20+ minutes first thing in the morning, and again in the late afternoon, includes no vocal chanting, and provides an excellent chance for someone to take it on by allowing them unlimited follow-up sessions. while twice daily might seem a sacrifice to some, its benefit is well worth the time. i came to appreciate that i could create a quiet place for myself just about anywhere, including a crowded subway car.
lest i abuse a tired phrase, adherence to this would benefit society the more it’s taken on, and apt for these times.
I like that you’re genuine and I find your posts useful.
I’m going to start meditating and thought this article may help others – http://zenhabits.net/meditation-for-beginners-20-practical-tips-for-quieting-the-mind/
Thanks for your great contributions.
Signed,
Another Male Reader (Cali-Mike)
Self discipline may snowball, but there is also a finite supply of willpower
Try this: set up a random email or text from HassleMe with just the text “meditate for five minutes” and see if that helps. I wouldn’t do it every day at first because then you’ll get to used to it. Try it every three days at first, that way it will usually be a surprise.
First take away: Wait, your readership is mostly male?!
Second: I also appreciate the “nudge” in both suggesting meditation and the links re: self-discipline. Very true.
Third: I have remind myself it’s good to spend undisciplined time reading your blog because I almost always laugh out loud and learn something new.
Thanks!
I’m too undisciplined (read: way damn too lazy) to exercise. If I made the effort to work out, I could have a hot body; instead, I eat vanilla pudding & read your blog.
SO. If I can start meditating for 5 minutes a day – which reportedly leads to productivity in other areas of life – then maybe there’s hope for me yet ?
THANKS, PT: AWESOME POST !
I agree, girliness is good. Anyway, you played high level beach volleyball, which is a kinda classic example of girliness combined with raw, athletic power. So you don’t have to worry.
I tried to meditate and my head felt like it would explode.
Professional beach volley ball????????
Really?
You never cease to amaze and astound!
If you can do nothing for half an hour, you might be able to do something for half an hour.
Penelope,
Does meditation have to involve sitting cross-legged on the floor? I like to think I do my best meditation in the shower. I also frequently meditate while driving (dangerous, I know, but since we’re being honest). I consider it meditating anytime I’m doing something on autopilot, allowing my mind to gallop freely among the synapses.
And yes, it does make me happier!
I was thinking about Penelope’s post this morning. I’m not a big fan of the love beads and incense crowd, but when I laid my head back in the steaming water of my bathtub and ran my fingertips back slowly across my temples, and then backward through my hair – that’s not when I was thinking about the post, I was just reveling in the relaxing sensation.
But afterwards I considered that half an hour every morning is really more than is necessary for just getting yourself clean, and I wondered whether this might count as some sort of meditative function.
This is the first time I’m compelled to comment on a posting…only because meditating is something that I’ve been seriously been trying to do for the past three years. Through my interest in Buddhism, I’ve been told numerous times the great benefits of meditation. The “supernatural powers” are just the side symptoms of experiencing the true nectar of your efforts and that is freedom from suffering.
Aside from the spiritual relation there is hard science to prove how meditation will rock your world.
So right on point, Penelope! now let’s segway to – setting me up with your single colleague from a couple of farm postings ago…
For the record.
The following was taken from Wikipedia and verified –
“Hypocrisy is not simply failing to practice those virtues that one preaches. Samuel Johnson made this point when he wrote about the misuse of the charge of “hypocrisy” in Rambler No. 14: Nothing is more unjust, however common, than to charge with hypocrisy him that expresses zeal for those virtues which he neglects to practice; since he may be sincerely convinced of the advantages of conquering his passions, without having yet obtained the victory, as a man may be confident of the advantages of a voyage, or a journey, without having courage or industry to undertake it, and may honestly recommend to others, those attempts which he neglects himself. Thus, an alcoholic’s advocating temperance, for example, would not be considered an act of hypocrisy so long as the alcoholic made no pretense of constant sobriety.”
You are not a hypocrite IMO.
Also –
The greatest way to live with honor in this world is to be what we pretend to be. – Socrates' sayings on Hypocrisy
And finally –
http://games.dork.com/ and
http://games.dork.com/The-Idiot-Test/
because I guess dorks just know how to have fun. :)
Great add, Mark. Thanks for that definition of hypocrisy. I feel better about myself already!
Try 30 seconds of counting your breath 1-2-3-4 with your eyes closed. In bed before falling asleep. No more than that to start.
Isn’t it sad that what started as a peaceful, spiritual practice (meditation), is now being exploited by the US army in the name of effective killing.
I’m not an advocate of war or killing.
However, this sentence – “The program, called Mindfulness-based Mind Fitness Training (MMFT – ¢), aims to cultivate greater psychological resilience or “mental armor” by bolstering mindfulness.” as well as others in the article made me think that maybe this program will make it possible to have more of our veterans return home with a way of coping with their experiences in the war and their life ahead of them.
Pen,
It has been a while since I left a comment here.
Whether you meditate or not I will.
I finally went to a dentist after 48 years, with lots of plaque and a formally abscessed tooth that needed to be pulled along with the root from one that was broken from eating a frozen chocolate Easter Bunny 10 years ago. I still brushed and flossed every day with occasional lapses and only had two cavities in spite of a fear from an accident from a a filling by a student dentist when I was eight.
Sometime we are forced to do the best things for us in spite of our fear.
How do you know that your audience is mostly male? Interesting.
Maybe when you started the blog, or @ Yahoo.
It seems like the target audience now is mostly type B personalities, granted, both male and female.
Btw, you have a yummy writing; though lately the slant is a little touchy-feely for my taste.
You can’t directly tell who your audience is — aside from a few items (the “User Agent” field on the HTTP request that is sent when you comment includes some things about your browser version and its capabilities, but “penis” is not one of them) — but you would get clues from commenters and responders to any advertisements. If you get more ad revenue from condoms than from tampons your audience is probably mostly male (not that I’ve seen either product touted here, but there are probably less blatant examples.
Twitter support for meditating: #OMCru
I scoffed at your opening sentence, but read the whole article anyway. It turned out to be one of your best. Thanks for the advice and good luck following it yourself.
You comment that if someone paid you $10 a sit you’d probably do it. Interestingly, the influence of capitalism is so strong in our society that it works the other way too. If you shell out some money and take ongoing meditation classes you’ll be much more likely to show up for class and be motivated to get ‘bang for your buck’. In this way our rather distorted relationship to money can actually support you in taking time for you as Spirit. Hey whatever works right?
Great post! I felt like you were saying the things I think of; like I know how good it is for me … so why don’t I just do it!!?? Then I had to remind myself that I get little spurts of meditation like when I’m waiting to pick up my daughter from dance and I can sit there and tap my fingers waiting impatiently or just close my eyes and focus on breathing. I always feel better when I choose meditation even if it’s only for two minutes:) Thanks for the reminder:)
I noticed that I have a natural inclination to meditate in the drug store, which is great because you can usually find a 24-hour drug store and most people don’t bother you at the drug store..since its quite possible you are buying something that they don’t want to know anything about. When I need to relax and clear my head, I just go to the drug store and start browsing..eventually I end up in wherever that place is you go to when you meditate.
Perhaps the key to being better at meditating is to find out when you are doing it anyway…and take advantage of that.
Now if I could only do the same thing with exercise…
I struggle with meditation too. I tried to do it every day for a month and publicize it on zen habits to get the habit started but I still fail to do it as regularly as I would like even though I notice the effects.
Experiencing strong resistance is really common when trying meditation, I’ve heard. Even after years of practice. The best advice I found when I typed "resistance to meditation" in a search engine was to become mindful of the resistance itself. Sometimes, it works really well and you’ll find yourself meditating without even intending to.
Most beginning meditators get stuck on the very vague notion of “sitting still, relaxing, and just letting whatever happens be okay.” Not a great approach the only reason you have to start meditating is that something is not okay, or at the very least does not feel quite right.
Forget about sitting cross legged with your eyes closed for a moment and consider all the diffent ways you like to breathe. The way you breath while you are blogging is quite a bit different then the way you breathe when someone leaves a comment that upsets you. Why?
You are breathing on purpose, and you would rather feel as though you are in control of your life than not. So breathe on purpose until you can find a way to breathe that makes you comfortable. You can breath in many different ways, some of them useful and others not so much, but you always breathe for a reason, just like you blog for a reason, even if you don’t know exactly what your reason is.
Once you get good at breathing in a way that keeps you relaxed and attentive, you naturally begin to investigate the motions of your mind. Your breath can get just as interesting and invigorating as an mp3 or an avi. You breath can also get as crisp and nourishing as ice cold lemonade in the midst of summer. So stop telling yourself to meditate and just get better at breathing. You wont regret it.
Well Ms P., here we go again. As one of your commentators said, “Your seeming contradictions are what make your blog so different and arresting. I’ve been reading for only a short time, but I have come to appreciate your honesty. It’s kind of addictive.” So in spite of that, or because of that, we keep reading, and responding.
There is a big difference between ‘visualization’ (which is mostly what you are talking about) and meditating (see Maxwell Maltz, circa 1960). And there is a difference between reflective thinking (appreciating) and meditating. But the idea of meditation to enhance consciousness/mindfulness is profound. (see Susan Blackmore). And very difficult.
Let’s see if this comment works 4th time lucky on a different computer *fingers crossed* Thanks be to God and all that!!
Hi Penelope,
I love this post as I am grappling with exactly the same thing. Knowing what is good for me and “doing” what is good for me.
I’m working on my lousy posture at the minute. My deep tissue masseuse told me, (from experience) that people with poor posture are more susceptible to attracting negative energies from others. The better posture you have the stronger you are at repelling these negative energies… Might sound a little woo woo but you do “feel” better with a straighter back.
Now for the challenge!!
http://gxevents.com/free-stuff/take10
Best for beginners: Take Head Space’s Free 10 minutes for 10 days guided meditation challenge. (Available on GX Events link above and NOT on their site.) You’ll receive an email everyday for the next 10 Days with your downloadable “hold your hand” kind of audio meditation- In British accent no less for those tickled by such fancies.
Head Space seem like a pretty cool outfit. Love their ethos, their site and personally noticed changes, (being more positive generally) after the third day of their challenge.
It gave me a kick up the bum to begin, maybe it will help you and others too!!
Thank you, Penelope! You hit the bulls eye on a number of different levels :-) This is one of your best posts in a while. It gave me the nudge I need to start meditating again!
The biggest lie we tell ourselves is that we dont have time. No time for meditating , networking , calling up a friend, going to the gym – basically anything that involves self-discipline.
(BTW it takes more than 05 minutes to meditate- Im in a yoga class & its only when we do atleast 10-15mins of meditation that it works for me).
I’ve been trying to make it a priority. There are some really nice guided meditations with music on youtube that I’ve enjoyed recently.
Moving into meditation from another activity can sometimes feel mannered. There is a self-consciousness there. And then the worry about doing it right, that can have a religious feeling: I am being good! I find it’s better to think of meditation as a selfish act. This pushes all those other thoughts away and then I start enjoying it.
Meditation can be a struggle. I’ve learned to do it first thing in the morning before I have a chance to think of anything else. It’s been a huge boom to my confidence. I start with Yoga then meditate for five minutes, then pray for 1 minute. This routine is now something I can’t give up. It’s benefits outweigh anything else I could do.
That’s how I made it a habit. I found a way to make it feel more important than anything else I could do.
I loved the YouAreNotSoSmart link. It shows why entrepreneurs are so successful. They are willing to put in a lot of time, sweat, and passion into their work, so they can reap the rewards later.
I cannot get this to post to facebook for the life of me! (Two computers, multiple methods tried on both). Why?? I want to share!