Is Your Mind too Busy?

Start Meditating

I’m one of those people that like to keep busy, solve problems, and learn things.  If I am not busy or engaged in something, my mind sometimes just wanders and/or spins in circles. I don’t always find it easy or fulfilling to zone out and stream some TV show. Oftentimes what I truly need is to quiet my busy mind with meditation.

Awareness Meditation

Meditation is not always easy, but it is simple. The kind of meditation I do is nothing fancy and does not require any equipment or place. It only requires being alone for a few moments or longer. Its only real focus is on the breath. Deepening breaths in and out cause the mind to slow down. Gradually, those thought torrents made of real or imaginary problems start to resemble gently winding creeks. Please note that I am not a meditation instructor and I am only sharing this information as a personal example of what can work for the average busybody that wants to quiet their mind chatter.

Relaxed Body + Mind

Meditation gurus say that it is impossible for your mind to spin like a hamster on a wheel if your body is fully relaxed. And relaxing your mind (aka trying to quiet your thoughts) is much harder than simply relaxing your body through focused breathing. Breathing is so simple. We all do it. Try this:

1. Deep breath in, count of one, deep breath out, count of two (thinking about the numbers will do, no need to say it out loud).
2. Repeat until you get to 10, 50, or 100.
3. Anytime your mind wanders and you lose count, start over.
4. Sound boring? That’s the whole point.

By focusing, feeling, “being” your breath, you’re taking away attention from something you spend all your waking hours on: mental to-do lists and other incessant mind chatter (don’t believe you have incessant mind chatter? Then, my friend, you are either already enlightened – please be my teacher! – or more likely, in denial. 🙂

A Welcoming Mind

After a minute or more of focused breathing, the following should happen:

1. Your mind is a more welcoming and calm place;
2. Small problems tend to fade away;
3. Anxiety (a super-common ailment of our time) takes a backseat. Anxiety and worry project you into an (imaginary) future where you have no control over the situation. But the future doesn’t exist, so there is no need to focus on it;
4. Real problems, small and big, will appear clearer because you have calmed your mind’s inner hamster. The little hamster got off its wheel and you are not spinning your wheels anymore, either.

For best results, do it every day

If you keep at it longer (this day, and perhaps the next and the next), you will learn something new: to look forward to a daily ritual of calm. Someone more enlightened than me once said: we know to rest our bodies, but not our minds.

We are so attached to our devices and so detached from natural rhythms that now more than ever our minds need a little break.

Meditation can help many mind and mood issues. Are you easily angry, moody, anxious, depressed, judgmental, aggressive, etc? I am not a doctor and I am not recommending meditation instead of medicine. But when it comes to living with your mind, I know that you can cultivate it to be a more peaceful place. And since all world change starts from within, by changing yourself a little every day you will positively influence those around you. Who knows who you can inspire!

Resources

The Power of Now

Wherever you go, there you are