How To Meditate

Hi welcome or welcome back to my blog- this time I’m talking about how to meditate, because for me there are so many benefits to meditating, which people don’t always talk about! My previous post was all about why meditating is beneficial, so if you haven’t checked it out I highly recommend you do to ensure you understand the incentive towards meditating.

When I started meditating I found it quite difficult to let go of my thoughts and initially this does still happen during the first minute of meditation, but once you overcome this it is really effective. As I didn’t know much about meditation I just started with 5 minute meditations that I found on YouTube- I always liked doing one after a workout or before I started the day. Spotify also has some great meditations and as you progress there are longer meditations to follow. Simply search meditation on Spotify or YouTube and lots of things come up- it is so accessible!

Once you know the basics to meditation, such as breathing techniques, focusing on your body, centering yourself etc you can start to meditate without videos or podcasts to aid you. I still set a timer to ensure I don’t keep checking the time, as this brings you out of the present moment. Everytime I try to meditate for a bit longer to test myself and increase the benefits of meditation even more.

A typical meditation for me would begin with normal breathing (I don’t alter my regular breathing pattern at all) in an initial attempt to centre myself- I just do this for as long as I feel necessary. As cringey as this sounds it is all about going with the flow and listening to your body.

Next I properly focus on my breathing, so I breathe in for a count of 4, hold my breath for a count of 4 and breathe out for a count of 4. This is really good at stopping your mind from wondering. If your mind still wonders imagine the positive energy you are breathing in and the negative energy you are breathing out.

After this I bring my awareness to my body by starting with my feet, as I find this really soothing and it makes me realise the areas of tension. I breathe into each body part until I end with my head and mind. Once you have done this really focus on the tension areas and breathe extra into these, whilst imagining the air cleansing these areas.

Once I’ve done this I breathe in and out slowly whilst repeating words such as ‘strength, positivity and confidence’ as I breathe in and words like ‘stress, worry and doubt’ as I breathe out. This usually takes me a while as I really like to focus on different words each time.

Now I like to say positive affirmations, for example ‘I am beautiful’, because even if you don’t believe this over time you will, and you can learn to love and appreciate yourself, which will make you more positive overall.

Finally, if my timer hasn’t gone off and I still have time I finish with positive visualisation, where I imagine myself achieving my goals and living the exact life I want to live. I personally feel as though this really motivates me. You can also live ‘as if’ so imagine you have already got everything you are currently desiring and this will help you to accomplish your goals.

Thank you so much for reading my blog post- I really hope this was helpful and gave you some new meditating techniques to try- they may not work for you, but these are some of my faves. If you have any suggestions or thoughts I would really appreciate it if you comment them in the section below. If you like or share my post that would mean the world to me!