After 137 days of daily meditation practice, I realized that true purpose of meditation. If your’e anything like me, we live in a modern world filled with noise, desire and future plans. Inundating feelings of doubt, greed, unworthiness, fear, confusion may plague your daily experience. The art of meditation cuts through this noise – the silence becomes louder.
The result of sitting in silence consistently is the ability to hear your inner voice LOUD and CLEAR. There is rooted wisdom inside each and everyone of us that is able to reveal itself in the silence. It wraps you up with a blanket of love and contentment through understanding that you aren’t all the noise but the one who hears it. A daily meditation practice brings awareness, wisdom and grace on your path. – your future SELF thanks you for beginning.
In this blog post, I’ll share through personal experience, analogies and shared knowledge the following:
- What is Meditation?
- Why should one meditate?
- How to meditate: 3 styles of meditation
- The true purpose of Meditation
What is Meditation
Meditation is the practice of two things: stillness of the body and observation of the mind. Best done in a quiet, safe space, meditation gives your soul space to process emotions, observe thoughts and invite stillness within your inner space. This stillness practice – is a quantum spiritual tool that helps you gain awareness of your SELF, the realest aspect of you.
If you’ve been here for a moment, Awareness is a concept I speak on often. Awareness holds the key to transformation and resolution. Through meditation, you are gradually becoming more aware of your mind, thoughts and emotions. That is what makes the practice very transformation. This awareness creates the space for your inner voice to become more apparent to your conscious mind.
Meditation isn’t only experienced in a seated position with silence. I’ve come to experience flow-based meditation when I am present with an engaging task like biking, yoga, and writing. You may experience this type of meditation on a long drive, engaging in your favorite hobby or reading a book. The types of meditation we dive into in this post is the practice of stillness.
Why should you Meditate
The average human experiences over 30,000* thoughts per day. From your grocery list to the last chat with your uncle, our minds are unconsciously inundated with information that was useful but often re-cycles into useless information. All of these thoughts are not you. They may not even be accurate. Often our thoughts are perceptions of past events or future anticipation of what is to come. Little do we ‘think’ about the present moment. Because in the present moment, the only option is to exist. (More of that please 🙋🏾♀️) In this sweet spot, stillness is available to you at ANY time.
By incorporating a daily practice of meditation, you will view your quiet moments as sanctuary from the day to day routines. With time and intention, these moments become a deeper and deeper experience for you. I like to think of meditation like an internal shower that removes and releases what is no longer useful but being held by the ego. The more often you internally shower the more space you’ll have on the inside. The space to think clearer, to feel deeper and to be more open to life & love. By bringing more awareness to our internal world – our external world has no choice but to raise to that level and shift in a more loving and higher direction. That is the power of stillness.
Three Styles of Meditation
With a sweep of all the spiritual, wellness, health blogs out there, there is no shortage of types of meditations people use to ease their mind. I’ve learned from experience the more simple and sincere the deeper the meditation. I’ll share with you 3 styles of meditation that I use interchangeably and made a bit more unique.
Vipassana Meditation comes directly from Buddhist teachings. This style of meditation cultivates awareness of the breath. Here is how you practice this style:
- Sit in a comfortable position with your back straight – cross legged or in a chair whichever is accessible.
- Ease into your body. Begin to observe your breath.
- Bring deeper awareness to the rise and fall of your abdomen with each inhale and exhale
- Whenever a thought comes in and awareness drifts – gently label it ‘thinking’ to bring your attention back to your breath
This is a continual practice to bring your awareness back to the breath whenever outside (and inside) stimuli arise. Vipassana Meditation is a powerful way to observe the tendency of your mind. Drifting to thoughts often is normal, especially if your’e new to stillness. Give yourself grace in each moment, you meditate perfectly by showing up.
‘I am not the body’ meditation has been guided by Sahdguru. a internationally recognized mystic who helps beings with inner engineering.
This a term coined by Sahdguru himself to transform lives and build a foundation of joy and bliss. The guided meditation offered brings you into a state of ‘ No Thing’ with repetitive statement “I am not the body. I am not even the mind.” This is an extremely powerful meditation to drop into the quantum field. I love to utilize this meditation often on my spiritual journey. Click this link for this guided meditation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kAKagUSmsnk
Gratitude Meditation is a unique style I use when clients (or myself) are in a more agitated state.
This gratitude meditation brings you into a state of calm and peace. Being in a state of gratitude raises your frequency which in turn affects your manifestations, experiences and overall mood. Here is a step-by-step guide to the Gratitude Mediation:
- Begin by placing your hands on your heart and connected to your breath.
- As you deepen each breath, bring to your awareness what you are grateful for: ‘I am grateful for ___________.’
- Continue to breath deeply – if other thoughts come in (that aren’t serving this meditation) – say this: ” Thank you for being here. I release you.”
- Bring greater awareness to your breath as you end – thank yourself for carving out time for Soul Care.
To harness more appreciation and gratitude in your life, book a Reiki Healing session that helps unblock emotional stagnation, invite new energy in and integrate soul messages. Click this link to learn more.
Interested in learning about other styles of meditation? In my book, How to Meditate like a Goddess, I share 5 more styles of meditation that I use personally and guide my Reiki clients with. Click this link to align with the e-handbook.
The True Purpose of Meditation
Imagine that you are a cup. It could be a mug, mason jar, wine glass… Sometimes you fill the cup with water, matcha, hot chocolate, fresh juice or tea. Regardless you enjoy the contents and use them to nourish you and quench your thirst. There are so many types of drinks that you fill the cup with. Does the cup ever become the drink, its contents? Of course not.
It’s clear to see that a cup is never its contents. But you are the cup. You aren’t your contents: the past experiences, the future, emotions, thoughts and desires. You experience your contents and observe them but you ARE NOT THEM. This is the realization that meditation brings. It solidifies with a daily practice. The question becomes.. will you accept that you are not the contents but the cup?
There is a misconception on meditation that to do it ‘correctly’ you must experience no thoughts. While that can be a goal over your journey — It is possible. Having no thoughts is not the only way to meditation. Meditation – stillness practice – is a quantum spiritual tool that helps you gain awareness of your SELF, the realest aspect of you. Check out my book here for deeper insight on this concept, the ancient practice and different styles of practice.
The true purpose of meditation is not to have NO thought but to realize that your thoughts are NOT YOU.
My Deepest Gratitude, Till the next one ~ Sai 🪬
*research article average on number of thoughts per day
