Letters from a Friend

the art and benefits of meditation and mindfulness

The art and benefit of meditation and mindfulness

Now there is a common misconception that meditation and mindfulness are the same thing . They're not really, mindfulness may be an aspect of meditation but they are two different things. Sometimes the terms meditation and mindfulness can be scary to some people. I know someone who prefers to call mindfulness 'deep breathing' even though she is still drawing attention to her breath and her surroundings. Mindfulness is taking a moment and allowing yourself to experience the moment without any bias or judgement. Mindfulness could put someone into a meditative state when they can learn or reflect on their life or visualise something else, therefore no longer being in the present moment.

I have been practicing both meditation and mindfulness for about 6 years or so now. I started when I was in school and we had one of those sessions about 'exam stress' where my teacher played a meditation tape for us. I am personally not fond of being led by a female voice but I got over it soon enough -we are all different and all have different preferences -I quite liked the relaxing activity and decided to do it more when I got home . I found a playlist and I started to listen to it, I lay down in bed and of course I fell asleep. That's where I learnt that there were sleep meditations .Though I did get to the end of that video eventually -It was a meet your future self meditation by Jason Stephenson and Michael Sealey.

I had experimented quite a bit with searching YouTube for guided meditations -there's a really nice doctor who one and some good music / background noise for fictional places such as the Gryffindor common room or the shire- There really is something for everyone.

We all know that stress is bad for the body, from the causing of headaches to the loss of hair or early discolouration of hair. Meditation and mindfulness has been proven to reduce stress levels and therefore your overall health . I am not claiming that meditation or mindfulness is a miracle cure but for some of us that don't realize how busy and stressed our lives are , it could be a real help in the long run. Some think that they don't have time for meditation but if you want to practice during the day then you only need five minutes . that still leaves you with 1435 minutes of a day. Or -what I used to do a lot- you could put a sleep meditation on at night time, it could improve your sleep and perhaps give you nicer and more meaningful dreams.

You don't need to be a believer in anything to meditate or be mindful, some people think that you need to be Buddhist or pagan in order to do these things but no, everyone can do it. You don't need to believe in magic or anything outside of our earthly home . Mindfulness is bringing attention to your here and now , you don't need to believe in chakras in order to be grounded. You don't need to believe in spirits or paradise to visualise your own peace or guide.

What comes to your mind during meditation says a lot about your frame of mind and mental health, so the simple act fo meditation itself and being mindful about what you experience could give you the answers that you need in the first place.

Now I am going to share with you a few simple mindfulness activities that you could do in your everyday life

Tea meditation

Next time you are making a cup of tea -or coffee...but I don't have any experience in making coffee so I'm going to stick to tea in this post- be mindful about the steps that you are taking . take notice of the smell fo the tea that fills the room. Tke notice of the sounds of the kettle or the spoon hitting the side of the cup. Notice the change in colour once you've added milk. It's that simple !

Eating/drinking

When we eat we sometimes do it mindlessly, sometimes we are in a rush and we don't have time to fully enjoy the food that we are consuming. But taking that time that you have to eat your lunch dinner breakfast or a snack to be mindful is all that you need -and you're eating at the same time so there's no losing- take a moment to think about how your food smells, how it tastes, the texture of it in your mouth , take a moment to appreciate and slow down .

Pebble meditation -or in my case a bead meditation-

Okay so I'm not going to put the meditation here but it could really be done with anything and any feature/aspect of life. For example when I was in school my teacher did the bead meditation with me . she gave me one of those scooby things -you could just use strong- and four beads . we would attribute one positive affirmation to a bead for example I had a green flower one and it was attributed to 'I am fresh like a flower' and I put the beads on my watch where they stayed until it broke and I re-did it but you don't need to use individual beads you could use a bracelet or carry around some small stones...anything really!

So I hope that this article has helped or informed you in some way about the art of meditation.

If you have any questions please feel free to comment

Best wishes

Nadine