Meditation

Meditation is an ancient technique of quieting one's mind, something now classified under mind-body medicine and widely seen and followed as one of the proven and most effective alternative therapies.

Definition: The meaning or definition of meditation as it is known to most people is rather confusing or misleading. The dictionary meaning of meditation can be best interpreted as ‘concentrating on one thing – usually religious or mystical in nature – meanwhile not thinking about anything else , which eventually brings tranquility into the meditating person's mind.

The Eastern definition of meditation – as seen in Hindu, Buddhist or Taoist cults – tells about concentrating on the ‘all and everything' – the consciousness of the cosmic whole – and without thought, distraction or judgment.

Given the present stressed out life style of humans, everybody is finding it difficult to have a constant or consistent peace of mind and hence the reinvention of meditation and meditation techniques. Let's see how meditation can be a reliable stress buster.

Meditation helps bring a sense of fullness, the path to absolute tranquility of mind. The key to attaining tranquility is controlling the incredibly dynamic flow of ideas and stimuli that rush through the brain cells, at any given point of time.

The easiest of meditation techniques for a beginner is the ‘Concentration Meditation', the process by which relaxation of mind and body is attained by controlled breathing. This will be an ideal way for busting stress, given the demanding schedules of our professionals.

Let's see how this meditation technique works:

Find a quiet place – your bed can be a good enough place to try meditation. In meditation, lesser the sensory input, the better. It is always better to be in a well lit room. If you meditate in a dark room, your brain may interpret the darkness, when you close your eyes, as a signal to shut it down and it is only a matter of time before you fall into deep sleep. Yes, meditation can bring a sleep like hypnosis stage, but it is quite different from sleep. Meditation brings one to absolute peace of mind – as in sleep – but the mind will be awake and alert.

Take slow but long breaths, meanwhile listening to the sound of inhale and exhale. Focus entirely on breathing.

Your mind may wander – and it will indeed – but bring it back to breathing, but gently and sans recrimination. Bringing the mind back to the thing you were concentrating is the difficult part and the core of making meditation a success.

As you focus your awareness on the rhythm of exhale and inhale, the mind itself starts to synchronize with the pace of respiration and as the breathing becomes slower and deeper, your mind also becomes more tranquil and aware.

Apart from breathing exercises, there are other methods of meditation such as muscle relaxation and mirror or eye gazing. Which method of meditation to follow is entirely the choice of the person who wants to use it as a means for stress busting. But how good the results will be depends entirely on how disciplined one is in his/her meditation techniques.

Meditation is not an intuitive art shrouded in mystery. In fact it is fast on a path to be recognized as a technique which is scientific in its roots (studies have shown meditation influences brain cells). The tranquility meditation offers is something to be experienced rather than said or read. Do!