Meditation helps in several different ways which depend on your intention and reason for meditating. The benefits from meditation can be felt or experienced within just a few days of beginning a meditation practice.
There are three different areas of our lives that meditation helps us improve: Physical, Mental/Emotional, and Spiritual.
Meditation affects the mind by quieting the mental chatter. It is hard to be fully aware of our bodies and environment when we have too much mental chatter, worries, concerns, etc. A quiet mind is a happy mind. It’s a mind at peace. This is what meditation does and contrary to what most people think it is not about going blank and thinking nothing. The mind being clear is more about actually feeling what you are experiencing and being aware of it.
There are many different tips and techniques you can utilize such as using a candle in order to focus on the flame or using meditation guided audios or even just soft pleasant music.
It’s about paying attention to one thing, instead of having a million thoughts flowing through your mind. Even if you feel like you do not succeed at quieting the mind, if you are taking time to pay attention to one thing, you are receiving a significant benefit from your meditation. Your mind is slowing down. Believing anyone can go from having hundreds of thoughts in a minute to having absolutely no thoughts, immediately is ridiculous.
So the idea is to slow your thoughts, and eventually become clear and focused. You can sit and concentrate on how your breath feels to enter and exit your body. Do not try to change your breath just feel how it feels as you breathe. Pay attention, can you feel your lungs expand? How does air feel going into your nose? How does your body feel? Focusing on these things start making you pay attention to feeling your body or experiencing the sensations in your body, which means your mind is not thinking as much or having as many thoughts. Even if you have a few, you are having significantly less!!! This is exactly the purpose of meditation or I should say the reason people meditate.
This is what leads to other benefits. Such as the physical benefits, your body starts relaxing, your muscles relax, your blood pressure lowers, your immune system gets a boost. Emotionally you become more come, and then anxiety and stress are lessened. When your mind is going a millions miles an hour it is almost impossible to hear anything else other than the constant bombardment of our own thoughts, Meditations helps Spiritually as well because your mind is quieter you have more space to connect to whatever higher power you believe in. But remember all of these benefits are all because you are slowing down the mind.
Slowing the mind can be done enjoyably. Actually it is most beneficial when you enjoy the process. Meditation helps with hundreds of symptoms and can provide more benefit than you can imagine. Try different mediation techniques. Hopefully this has helped you see that meditation is not just sitting quietly with your eyes closed.
ANYTHING that slows your mind and quiets the mind is meditation. You can even walk and focus on every little movement in your body. That is meditation. There are thousands of techniques to use in order to meditate. Have FUN with it.