Reflections on Daily Meditation
At the end of 2020, I decided that I wanted to meditate every day for a month to help with my anxious and intrusive thoughts. To give a little context, I am someone who struggles to sit still and has tried to take up meditation several times in my life, but have stopped after a couple of days because of boredom. This time around, I wanted to do things differently. My workplace offered a free subscription to the Headspace app, which offers guided meditations for lots of topics from grief to anxiety to happiness. There are lots of apps, videos and workshops, both free and paid that exist for guided meditation. I knew I wanted to do guided meditation because as a beginner, it has always been difficult for me to know how to actively meditate.
So, what does meditating actively mean? For the longest time, I thought that meditation was a passive activity to calm yourself down using the breath. In my opinion, meditation is extremely active and participatory. I would go as far to compare it to a strenuous physical exercise like running, but for your mental health rather than your physical health. It also works like a physical activity in the sense that the more often you practice, the stronger you get, and the longer you can do that activity. After a month of practicing regularly, I found myself being able to sit still through the entire 10 minutes of meditation without checking my phone to see how many minutes had passed. It was a small victory, but a victory nonetheless.
Another important thing I’ve learned from meditation is the importance of setting an intention for why you are meditating in the first place. Meditation can serve a lot of purposes, but being able to focus on the why can be really helpful in making each meditation worthwhile. I wanted to be able to control my intrusive thoughts and manage my anxiety. Meditating is probably one of the only times during my day when I am alone with just my thoughts. The guided meditations have helped me learn how to recognize my wandering thoughts and bring myself back to my breath. Again, this is a very active process that requires a lot of intention and focus, but somehow, after the 10 minutes of meditation are over, I feel relaxed and calm.
Overall, meditation has helped me a lot. I am still at the very beginning of my journey, but I’ve noticed that if I miss my meditation in the morning, I tend to feel off-balance until I sit down and meditate for 10 minutes. Has it fixed all my problems? Absolutely not. However, I can feel myself getting a tiny bit stronger every day. To be honest, I don’t know if I could recommend meditation to everybody, but if it is something you’ve wanted to try but are nervous, I would say, go for it!
Guided Meditation Resources
Headspace (2 week free trial, $59.99/yr regular membership, $9.99/yr student membership)
Calm (1 week free trial, $59.99/yr regular membership)
There are also tons of free guided meditations on YouTube!
