Sunday, March 25, 2012

meditation

Stony Batter, Waiheke Island, New Zealand

If we could take a pill which had no side effects and would eliminate our anxiety, frustration, anger, sadness, loneliness, feelings of unease and worthlessness would we take it? Of course we would. If twenty minutes of meditation a day could accomplish the same thing, would we do it? For some reason, the answer is usually "no."

Meditation has been proven to have extremely beneficial health effects and to increase our sense of well being and peace. It is simple to do, does not take much time, and is free! If we don't know how, there are a multitude of books, courses and information on how to do it. For example, we can do a simple mindfulness meditation by bringing our attention, without judgment, to our breathing. As our mind wanders and we realize it, we gently, without judgment, bring our attention back to our breathing.

All it takes is a bit of discipline and courage. Discipline is required because our ego will come up with an almost infinite number of excuses why we shouldn't do it. We need to be disciplined to override the strong impulses of our ego. Courage is required because we will face the thoughts and feelings which we pushed deep into our subconsciousness to keep ourselves from feeling the pain of things that occurred in our past.

Let's have the courage and discipline to meditate.

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