Learn the basics of meditation and its benefits. Understand how to start meditating with simple, step-by-step instructions and guided meditations. Overcome common challenges and discover different methods to integrate mindfulness into your daily life. Start your meditation journey today with expert guidance and support.
We hear the word meditation so often. It can feel like it’s so normal, why even bother to learn? Or it can seem so technical, or lofty, it’s impossible to do right.
Well, we think meditation, like just about any skill., is learnable, and in lots of ways. That it’s something special and that it can happen anywhere at all.
We like its spaciousness and we also like to be precise.
So let’s start with another word – mindfulness.
Mindfulness is a capacity of the mind (we all have it). When we feel what we’re feeling in a moment, when we know what we’re doing, as we do it, and are in touch with some ability to choose where to put our attention next – that awareness is mindfulness.
Meditation is an action we take (we choose to do it) to bring about mindfulness. When we meditate we practice being aware, and as a result of this practice it’s more likely that mindfulness will come up on its own in our everyday lives.
You could think of meditation as the practice you do ahead of time and mindfulness as what you’re capable of as a result.
When people meditate, they experience benefits [link to other blog post] related to mindfulness. Some of these are internal, like becoming less caught up in a recurring thought or self-criticism, and some are external, like being able to listen more fully to a loved one or a coworker. Sometimes meditation helps people feel calmer – or does offer another ‘quick fix.’ In the app we offer guided meditations to help calm down, but this isn’t the full story for us. We also go deeper, guiding towards benefits for the ‘now,’ and also the ‘why’ of our lives.
Meditation instructions can be very simple and brief: Sit and know you’re sitting. When you take a breath, are you aware that you’re breathing? Reading a few words like this might be enough.
For most of us, it helps to learn meditation through what’s called a ‘guided meditation.’
In a helpful guided meditation, an experienced meditation teacher will give you step-by-step prompts for where to place your attention and how. They’ll usually start with some calming words to help you settle into a posture of your choosing, then give suggestions for how to bring awareness to a meditative object, and eventually help you come back out of the meditation in a supportive way.
One wonderful thing about high-quality guided meditation is that the teacher is meditating too. So you’ll be learning not just by trying out what the teacher suggests, but also by letting your mind and nervous system travel along with theirs for a few minutes, and letting their calm and clarity support yours, as you listen.
So at this point we’re going to do a Public Service Announcement. Repetitive thoughts, sleepiness, boredom, big gripping feelings – these are not signs that you’re bad at meditation, or doing something wrong. If you’re noticing the thoughts, the sleepiness, the clench in your jaw as you think of that email – these are all indications your meditation is going quite well, technically speaking. Awareness is growing.
In the app we have guidance [link to blog post or FAQ] for all kinds of difficult experiences that can come up when we meditate. If you like exercise analogies, these challenges are the resistance that strengthens our muscles for mindfulness.
You could…
There’s really so many good ways to go.
We could just go ahead and get started. Feeling the in breath, the out… Feeling whatever you are feeling. What are you aware of now?
We’re right here if you’d like some company or guidance.
