WHY YSK- Many people practice mindfulness and meditation as part of their lives, and some would like to but feel like they don’t have time to sit down and meditate properly. Once you’ve gotten used to doing it as a part of your daily activities, it becomes easy to simply take a few breaths and gain some peace from your everyday existence. You don’t need to wait for a time when you can sit and clear your mind completely. It’s a nice bonus, but not necessary for living a mindful life.
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This is right. People tend to think of meditation as a static body posture. But can be done anywhere and anytime. It is not about relaxation, it’s about being conscious of something like our breath or just the shape of a grape and bringing your mind constantly to it when it tries to generate thoughts. That exercise of bring your mind constantly to the thing you want, makes a massive benefit in the psyche. It doesn’t benefit from the amount of time you can keep con con concentration, is about that mentioned exercise.
Meditation while tuning or walking or exchanging on elliptical is amazing thing. It is easier to meditate and it helps you with exercise well.
i’ve been using a simple “box breathing” technique when i start to feel the anxiety begin to creep… it’s really effective for me…
breathing is a four stage process: inhale - hold - exhale - hold (edit: and repeat as necessary)
you force each stage to last 3-4 seconds… it’s hard to hold your lungs empty when you’re stressed, so forcing yourself to do this can sort of forcibly lower your anxiety level… it can be really effective, very quickly…
and as a breathing technique, it sort of qualifies as fundamental meditation as well
Thanks for this. It seems like something that can be done anywhere.
yeah i do it lying in bed, sitting at the computer, wherever
The world should have more meditation. Another great time to practice is when lying down for bed.
Edit: I suffer from sleeplessness, and do not use this help me fall asleep. I now recognize that my case may be user-specific, as I do NOT use this time for sleeping or falling asleep. I have other practices that help when that time comes, after meditation.
I disagree regarding lying down for bed. Never teach your body to associate the relaxation of meditation with sleep. Unless you only need it for immediately before you sleep to calm your mind.
I can now have mindfulness while doing activities (not driving ofc). Your body will do what you teach it, and I’ve stopped falling asleep meditating when I removed it from bedtime.
Yes, the world needs more meditation.
I don’t know, it’s worked fine for me to do before bed as well. My body hasn’t conditioned itself to sleep when I meditate. I think it’s a good potential side effect to be aware of, but I wouldn’t recommend against it.
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Mindfulness for me, now, is to be aware of myself and my surroundings. It started with meditation during a one year chronic pain remedy program, and helped with learning to deal with all the noise that comes up (pain, stress, intrusive thoughts). To not ignore them, but to observe them. Detach myself somewhat and just “look” at it. This helped me to eventually do this during monotonous activities: brushing my teeth, doing dishes, combing cats, vacuuming, even emptying litter boxes. Then to external activities where I am observing the things outside and inside me: waiting in line, sitting on the bus, hiking, drinking tea at a café.
When I exit the state I feel a bit more refreshed. If I need more, and have the ability, I will go and sit in my favourite spot and meditate deeper.
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i think the simplest way to look at is that, while you’re doing dishes, you clear your mind and just think: “i’m washing this dish”… instead of letting your mind sort of entertain itself with all the thoughts that want to take your attention away from the dishes… thoughts that might make you anxious or sad or something that dishes obviously wouldn’t… if you’re thinking about that argument you had while you’re doing dishes, you don’t really have your mind on that bowl in your hand… poor bowl… :(
basically just trying to give yourself a break from mentally being “somewhere else”
Strangely enough, it all clicked once you personified the bowl! It is what matters in that small moment, no matter how insignificant it may seem to be.
that’s super cool to hear, putting that emotion on the end did the same thing for me as i wrote it… thanks for sharing!
Personally, if I’m doing something that I find monotonous, I just focus on my breath and my body. You don’t have to find joy in the one thing you’re doing to meditate while doing it. You can shift the joy to just your breath and your body being a gift to you because you woke up today.
If I feel the need, I also allow my mind to do whatever it feels the need to for a little bit, which is usually planning for something that makes me anxious or thinking about something that happened earlier, then bring my thoughts back to just my breath and my body for a few seconds, and refocus on the thoughts that crept in. It’s okay to allow whatever thoughts want to creep up in, and then accept and acknowledge what you want to think about and why.
You can continue doing the dishes and meditate while allowing your mind to focus on the thoughts that wanted to creep in. You don’t have to block it all out. Just acknowledge it and make it part of the experience. Once you’ve acknowledged the other thoughts, you may find you can mix the two together–I’m anxious about this thing coming up, but I also appreciate the warm water running over my hands right now.
I’m sure it’s different for everyone. For me, it’s about recognizing that every day is a gift and I should do what I can to acknowledge the beauty that is around me. My body, my home that shelters me, my family and friends, my city and surrounding state… it’s all beautiful and all I have to do is take a few moments throughout each day to take it in while focusing on my breath.
I meditate while walking or cooking most days. I have a system for walking, where I know how many breaths I normally take while walking and breathing at a slow but steady pace. I start on the left foot and breath in, then switch to exhaling always on the right foot at the right amount of steps. It takes some practice but the whole point of it is to get some exercise and take in the scenery while breathing and focusing on your breath in the background of your mind. I live in a cold area, so when I first learned this I even used it as a method to walk around the house and pick things up that need to be put away since I oculdn['t get outside much.
When I’m cooking I enjoy the process and do it like the article I posted, letting my mind wander if it needs to for a few minutes and then bringing it back to my body and breath for a few seconds, and focusing on the food again. Cooking is something I love to do, so it’s easy to meditate while focusing on the aromas and the colors and just in the background of my brain making sure my breathing is even.
That’s calming down yourself for bed which is very different. Meditation is building mindfulness. Going to sleep is the opposite of mindfulness. If your goal is to meditate, then this doesn’t help.
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I was surprised at how many replies I’ve gotten. I am probably subscribed to both communities already. I should ]probably post there once in a while, too.
Link the communities! Please and Thank you.
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taking a walk or going to the gym switches my mind off, when it is usually overactive, so I’m not surprised
Running works the same for me.
yeah walking seems naturally meditative… like it just rocks your mind into a meditative state, especially if you keep up a bit of a rhythmic step… and intense workout always helps…
My girlfriend and I both have ADHD, but meditation has always been easy for me, especially at night.
You don’t have to do anything special, it can be while your in bed before sleep, for some people it’s just helpful to create a ritual or activity around it to occupy the part of your brain that’s liable to fixate on stress.
I’ve tried sitting with her for a guided meditation app she likes, but it makes it harder for me. Sometimes I feel like Ron Swanson talking outside the meditation class. “I have no idea what these guys are doing, my mind was completely blank”
I’ve always had trouble falling asleep and I recently started focusing on trying to “see” things while lying in bed with my eyes closed. As in, letting my mind try to associate the slight variance in shades of blackness with imagery; the same as people do with clouds.
It’s a kind of meditation because it requires focus and actively prevents wandering thoughts. It’s one of the most successful methods I’ve found to prevent my mind racing for hours. It often induces a kind of lucid dream like state too… When the vague imagery transitions to a vivid scene, it feels like peering through your 3rd eye into your dream state from the real world.
Great post OP
Practicing mindfulness has been the most important thing in my life for my own health and growth as a person.
I got into eastern philosophy in high school, and never really looked back, only building my own system tailored to me and extrapolating the principles into every possible facet, and every moment. It’s a battle to stay constantly on the point, but one I really enjoy having.
Thank you! I have been trying for years to stay on the path to mindfulness, but only recently has it really clicked that even when life is difficult or busy, it’s not a chore-it’s a relief to go back to my practice.
This kind of checking in with yourself during activities is one of the foundational techniques taught in some kinds of therapy as well, like cognitive behavior therapy and dialectic behavior therapy
Surely it will paint a picture to people who enjoys psychology and how it effects mindfulness so here goes my life story i guess, tldr is at the end.
First of all, I am not diagnosed with anything other than anxiety and depression so i can’t say that i have ADHD nor i am autistic, at least to some degree. But i felt clearly distressed whenever I tried to meditate to practice mindfulness instead of “having worries over small possibilities” and hereby said feck all this. Almost a year ago I am informed that If I feel uncomfortable I repeatedly t-t-t-t with my mouth. Apparently it is weird to my colleagues. So I imagined that has to be my answer to stress at my job and left at that. (My job is secure as it gets that I wish I could branch out but can not lol) Then today I saw this article and all that parts in my life clicked perfectly. Thanks me for being my own life coach today. If you read to this part thank you too!
Tldr: I just remembered that i am actually more stressed when trying to do nothing. I stim when I am stressed. I think this can be classified as active meditation. I can be wrong.
It can be whatever you need it to be if it is soothing to you. If you let those worries come and acknowledge them instead of trying to hold them back, you care for yourself in the way you need to be cared for. Just keep breathing in an even way and examine the worry. Is it something that needs to be taken care of or no? Make note of it as a “for later me” thing and return to focusing on your breath and the task.
I do this when biking to work, during sections that don’t require much attention/thinking. I just try to quiet my inner voice and instead just look at the passing scenery.
Meditation may be defined as the repetition of a word, sound, phrase, and/or movement, while adopting a passive mind frame - Herbert Benson, M.D. Author of Relaxation Response 1975 ISBN 978-0-688-02955-5
Juggling a soccer ball and shooting a basketball are two that work for me, running as well. I think the key is something that requires just a bit of your attention ( I like the dish washing example above) but once you’re able to do it without much thought that’s when your mind can lapse away from conscious stream of thought.
This is why cycling was so good for me and my mental health.
I like to meditate. Well, I say meditate because if I say nap people think I’m lazy.
I usually do sittinf meditation but yesterday I tried walking meditation, it was a guided one from balance, realised all my walks have been missing so much enjoyment that was there all along!
I’m so glad you tried it! Now you can take that skill with you on all your walks going forward.
