After a few failed attempts to meditate daily, I eventually design my own meditation practice when I commit to building a habit of daily meditation.
In this article, I will break down and share:
(i) What’s wrong with the existing meditation that I ended up designing my own meditation practice
(ii) The idea behind my meditation design
(iii) Sharing the complete process of how I do my daily meditation
Part 1:
What’s wrong with the existing meditation?
1) too long
The typical meditation that I found existing is around 20–30 minutes, which is too long for a beginner like me. I found that one of the reasons I failed to build a habit of daily meditation is : I tend to procrastinate when I think about having to meditate and do nothing for 20–30 minutes. So I need something shorter but equally effective.
2) require external “gear”
A lot of the existing meditations could only be done with either:
- an app
- guided meditation recording
- meditation music
- specific instructions
And that did not work for me because the need for external “gear” feels like fiction and burden for me to start meditating, making it less convenient to start the meditation practice each time and increasing the rate of procrastination and abandonment.
3) I got bored and sleepy
When I only close my eyes and meditate, I feel bored and sleep easily. It seems to be a common problem but it’s one that I know I need to solve before I can consistently meditate to reap the benefits.
Part 2:
The idea behind the meditation design:
1) Taking advantage of my background as a certified yoga teacher
In the yoga teacher practice, I need to study the philosophy and principles behind meditation and it benefits me in designing and creating meditation that fits my criteria. My criteria are: (1) easy (2) can do anywhere anytime without any external gear or apps or music
2) Having an image in my head for better engagement in the meditation practice
There is an imaginary balloon in the meditation which I designed to give something for the mind to chew on. I have found that giving an image or vision in my head can help me engaged more in meditation, compared to when I just close my eyes and have to focus on “nothingness”.
3) Lengthen the breathe for better breathing and reduce anxiety
We inhale, exhale, repeat 25,000 times a day, nothing is more important to our physical and mental health than breathing. Yet, the average breathe we take is only 3.3 seconds (from the book “Breath: The New Science of a Lost Art” by James Nestor). Lengthening the time for each breathe can help us to clear our mind, re-focus, reduce anxiety and calm down, not to mention the fuller use of air and allow more oxygen to enter our cells.
Disclaimer: The benefits above come from research. I am not medical practitioner and not here to provide medical advice. If you would like to get medical advice please consult licensed medical professionals.
Part 3:
How I do my daily meditation:
Imagine that I have a air-filled balloon in my mouth — as we are breathing in,
count:
1
2
3
4
5
And see the imaginary balloon reduces in size as we breathe in
Then hold for:
1
2
3
4
5
Then as we are breathing out, count:
1
2
3
4
5
And see the imaginary balloon increases in size as we breathe out
Repeat the process
Each round of breathing would take 15 seconds, so for 30 seconds of meditation, you only need to do 2 rounds to complete the daily meditation practice to start with.
That’s the end of my sharing this time, hope you benefit from it. See you in the next article!
Connie is an Active Reader, Creator to 1 framework “Sustainable Simplified Soulful”, 3 programs “Rich Brain Installation, Knowledge to Cash, Easy Passive Investing”, Author to 1 book “Design your Day: How to Achieve More in a Day than Most Do in a Year”, Host at “Simplified Business Show” podcast. She shares about book recommendations, new learnings, and principles that she learned and practised in business and life.
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