Easy Meditation Techniques that you need to include in your daily routine
What is Meditation?
Meditation is the practice of mindfulness, concentration, and awareness to achieve mental clarity and emotional calmness. Meditation practices can also offer a chance to improve physical well-being and reduce stress.
There is no “right way” to meditate, meaning you can explore the different types of meditations to figure out what works for you.
Types of Meditation
1. Mindfulness Meditation
Mindfulness is a form of meditation that involves being present in the moment. It encourages you to be aware of your present surroundings and situations, instead of dwelling on the past or worrying about the future.
Mindfulness meditation involves being aware of your breathing. You can practice this meditation by taking a seat and staying still in
Research suggests that mindfulness meditation can improve focus and concentration, increase memory, reduce stress, and relieve negative emotions. It can help reduce impulsive and over-emotional reactions and improve relationship satisfaction. Studies have found it can even help improve physical health like lower blood pressure.
2. Love-Kindness Meditation
Loving-Kindness meditation, also called Metta meditation, aims to create a feeling of love towards everything. Through this form of meditation, you learn to find kindness even towards people you dislike and circumstances that cause you stress.
By opening yourself to receiving love, you send a signal of love and kindness to others, both to your loved ones and the world in general. An example of this form of meditation is to repeat a specific loving message multiple times till you feel an attitude of kindness and compassion, for yourself and others.
Love-kindness meditation can help deal with anger, frustration, irritability, resentment, jealousy, and other negative emotions. You can avoid interpersonal conflict by working on your attitude through loving-kindness.
Studies have shown that this meditation increases positive emotions and can thus help to reduce depression, anxiety, and PTSD.
3. Body-Scan Meditation
Body-scan meditation, also known as progressive relaxation, is a type of meditation that helps you bring your attention to areas of tension in your body. The aim is to release these tensions through meditation.
In this form of meditation, you practice progressive relaxation by starting your focus at one end of your body (e.g.feet) and then working your way through the rest of your body. Some exercises include tensing and then relaxing your muscles and visualizing a wave passing through your body to release tension.
Body-scan meditation is known to promote calming, enhance relaxation, improve sleep and even reduce chronic pain.
4. Transcendental Meditation
Transcendental Meditation is a spiritual form of meditation, in which you take a seat, remain still, and breathe slowly and deeply. The aim is to rise above your current state of being and find purpose.
During this meditation, you may focus on a mantra, chant, or repeated word or phrase. In a guided session, the instructor chooses the mantra depending on certain complex factors, while in an unguided meditation, you can pick your phrase.
Those who have practiced transcendental meditation have reported heightened spiritual experiences and conscious awareness.
5. Breath Awareness Meditation
Breath awareness is a technique of mindful meditation that focuses on mindful breathing. During a session, you breathe slowly and deeply, counting your breaths. The objective is to keep your attention on your breathing and ignore other thoughts that may distract your mind.
Like mindfulness meditation, breath awareness meditation improves concentration and memory and reduces anxiety and stress.
6. Chakra Meditation
Chakra meditation is intended at keeping the body’s core chakras — centers of energy — open and aligned. Blocked or imbalanced chakras can cause both physical and mental discomfort. It not only affects your emotions and reactions but also your mindset and attitude in your relationships and various circumstances.
Chakra meditation can help to restore the balance of your chakras and transform your energy.
7. Kundalini Meditation
Kundalini yoga is a type of meditation that involves physical activity, deep breathing, and chanting.
This meditation is usually practiced with a teacher because it requires supervision to ensure proper postures of the poses. Like other forms of yoga, kundalini yoga can increase physical strength, improve concentration, reduce pain in muscles and joints, release stress and anxiety, increase energy and improve overall mental health.
8. Mantra Meditation
Mantra meditation is a type of transcendental meditation that uses a repetitive sound to clear the mind. You may repeat a word, phrase, or sound. You may repeat the mantra loudly or quietly.
This meditation originates from Hindu and Buddhist traditions and is prominent in both religious and spiritual teachings. It is popularly practiced with one of the most common sounds “Om”.
Chanting a mantra repeatedly calms your mind from racing thoughts, and makes you alert and in sync with your inner self as well as your environment. Chanting can create strong positive vibrations and allow you to experience a state of elevated awareness.
It is often recommended to start with mantra meditation because it is easier to focus on a word than on your breath.
9. Spiritual Meditation
Spiritual meditation is a meditation form that is practiced in religious and spiritual traditions.
The types of spiritual meditation vary across religions, cultures, and traditions. Irrespective of the way of meditation, this form aims to create a deep understanding of religion, an enhanced awareness of spirituality and a strengthened connection with a higher power.
10. Focused Meditation
Concentration meditation constitutes focusing on a single point. This can be anything from following your breath or repeating a word, staring at a candle flame, or counting beads to listening to a repetitive sound such as a gong.
In this type of meditation, you refocus your awareness on the chosen object of attention each time you notice your mind wandering. As the name suggests, you increase your concentration and focus by learning not to let go and not get distracted by thoughts that enter your mind.
Since focusing the mind is challenging, beginners may opt not to meditate in silence and may meditate for only a few minutes and gradually increase the duration.
10. Focused Meditation
Guided meditation is any meditation in which a teacher or certified professional guides you through the basic steps of the practice, either in person or through an app. The session can be private or in a group.
This meditation technique is particularly useful for beginners because a trusted and experienced teacher can help you to get the most out of the experience.
Other forms of meditation include sound bath, movement meditation, yoga meditation, and more.
Frequently Asked Questions
How often should you meditate?
There aren’t any rules. The more you do it, the better you get. For optimal results, we recommend practicing meditation daily. But be careful not to overwhelm yourself if you are just starting.
How long should you meditate?
For beginners, try to start with 5-10 minutes every day and gradually work up to a longer duration.
How long does it take to work?
Remember meditation is not a results-focused practice. Different meditations have different impacts on your physical and mental well-being.
While research suggests results can be seen as quickly as weeks or months, each body is different, and fixating too much on the results can induce anxiety that undermines the benefits of meditation.
How to make meditation a habit?
Practice. To make a habit, try to meditate at the same time every day. Decide what time of the day works best for you and try to stick to it. Essentially 'piggybacking' your meditation onto the back of an existing habit (such as just before sleeping or right after waking up) can help make it a habit.
Is there a Recommended Technique for Depression?
If you’re looking to reduce depression, anxiety, stress, and other psychological ailments through meditation, try practicing mindfulness or transcendental meditation.
What techniques are best for anger issues?
If you’re looking for inner peace, compassion, forgiveness, and letting go, try any form of movement meditation as well as metta meditation. These help you to let go of pent-up negative emotions.
Which Meditation is Best?
The type of meditation that is best for you depends on what you want to accomplish from your meditation at this stage in your life. However, no matter the meditation technique, all forms of meditation
Choose from a variety of meditation classes that we offer and pick what works best for you!
댓글