Christopher Kilkenny
Mental Health Counselor
Tips for Meditation and Mindfulness
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Be open to thinking, then let it go. Most importantly, meditation is not trying hard to stay present and avoid thinking. This misconception keeps many people from trying meditation and frustrates many people who do try. Instead, meditation is observing the process of being present, becoming distracted, letting go of the distraction, and returning to the present.
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Mindfulness changes your relationship to thoughts. Rather than producing an ability to stop thinking, meditation and mindfulness change a person’s relationship with thoughts. As mindfulness develops, it will become more and more clear that thoughts are mental events including language and images happening in the present moment. However, thoughts have a dreamlike quality that make people feel as if they are in the past or the future. The ability to see thoughts as mental objects and avoid getting caught up in their dreamlike, illusory quality is called defusion. Defusion means looking at a thought rather than looking with a thought. The more a person practices mindfulness and meditation, the greater amount of defusion will develop. This provides insight into how the mind works, relief from anxiety over the future, and greater control over responses, decisions, and actions.
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Enjoy meditation. In order develop a meditation practice, it is important to cultivate an enjoyment of meditation. Sometimes meditation will be uncomfortable and difficult. Maintaining the practice during difficulty is an important aspect of the practice that helps you develop the ability to tolerate and let go of distress. However, it is best for your meditation practice to develop an overall sense of enjoyment. The best way to do this is to notice the things you enjoy about meditation, which may include having an opportunity to unplug from the busy world or a sense of feeling your mind settle. Relaxation may also play an important role in enjoyment and distress tolerance.
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The role of relaxation. Various approaches to meditation place different emphasis on relaxation. Meditation is fundamentally about using your attention, and relaxation should support this process rather than being the primary focus. However, relaxation can be very important. My suggestion is to begin meditation practice by noticing any obvious tension in the body and letting it go, if possible. If you feel that you have tension that you cannot release, that is fine also. Simply go ahead with the practice. Relax if it helps you, but avoid getting overly concerned about relaxation. You may notice a correlation between tension in the body and racing thoughts, and relaxation my help ease your mind. It may also help if you are feeling impatient.
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Techniques and anchors that may help your meditation. It is important to stick to one anchor during a meditation session. Changing anchors generally weakens your ability to observe the process of attention and distraction. However, you may want to experiment with different anchors during different sessions. Generally, focusing on the breath, the sensation of the body as a whole, or the ambient sounds around you are best. There are also a few techniques that you can try. First, try slowing the breath down slightly. Make sure that your breathing remains comfortable. It can help to count slowly and rhythmically to four as you breathe out and then count to four again as you breath in. If you sit for two minutes, you may want to do this slower breathing for the whole session. If you sit longer, let go of the slow breathing after a few minutes and use your natural breath as an anchor. In addition to breathing slowly, it may be helpful to breath out with a sense of letting go, mental space, and physical relaxation. If you do this, try to cultivate a feeling of spaciousness and relaxation and avoid being conceptual. Remember, the most important part is to observe the process of attention and distraction, and these are tools that may help. The tools should make the process clearer and more spacious, not more complicated or cluttered.
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How long should you meditate? Over time, it is most important to find a practice and time commitment that works for you and avoid overcommitting and getting discouraged. I recommend starting with two to five minutes per day and eventually extending to 20 minutes. When I started meditating, I found that there was a point at about 15 minutes when my mind would settle noticeably. Meditating for 20 to 30 minutes has been a standard for meditators in the west. It can also be helpful to meditate once in the morning and once in the evening. Most studies that demonstrate the benefits of meditation are based on about 40 minutes per day of combined meditation, yoga, and other mindfulness practice, but benefits have been shown with about 15 minutes per day.
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Make a commitment. Mindfulness and meditation are cultivated over time. It is more effective to stick to a committed schedule rather than practice occasionally when you feel like it. When I started meditating, I committed to practicing every day for a month. By the end of the month I was able to begin to see the great value of meditation. One recommendation is to commit to sitting 20 minutes per day for one month. Another is to follow the eight-week program described in the book Mindfulness: An Eight-Week Plan for Finding Peace in a Frantic World, by Mark Williams and Danny Penman.
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Get support. The overall purpose of meditation practice is just to continue observing the process of presence, distraction, letting go, and retuning over and over. I have done for over ten years and many people have done it for 30 or 40 years. Therefore, these recommendations that I have provided may be all that you need for years of practice. However, it is very helpful to practice mindfulness with groups and talk to meditation instructors about your practice for guidance.
Click here for a list of suggested sitting groups, instructors, and retreat centers.