Recently a friend was complaining of fatigue and nightmares. After listening for a while I could see a reflection of my own control issues in her stories. I suggested that she learn to relax (I had a boss that asked me to be 'happy'. I was a bit taken aback by the abstract nature of her request. So I could see where asking my friend to 'relax' could be a bit frustrating.) We started talking about other, more tangible solutions. "Meditation" came up and she confessed that she had tried a number of times to 'get into' meditation.
The resistance to meditation has decreased since 2014 when Dan Harris wrote 10% Happier (link to Dan's YouTube: Learn Meditation in 5 minutes) but that doesn't mean it's 100% American.
I've had a hankering to "do meditation" for a number of years so I decided to make a plan.
(If you want to sidestep a convoluted exploration into meditation paths, go to Dan's YouTube or jump here. Another, more mindful alternative is The Dali Lama's Guide to Happiness,)
Depending on your religious beliefs, the word "meditation" brings to mind, either an implicit practice (Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and the Baha'I faith) or an explicit discipline (Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Jainism, and Sikhism). If you practice secularism, over the last 10 years the "meditation" has been replaced with "mindfulness" and become a discipline stripped of religious connections. Being ecumenical, I've identified the following guides to get me started (I compiled lists from Goodreads, NYTimes, Amazon best sellers, an MSRB practitioner, and A Skeptic's Path to Enlightenment; analyzed the compilation; and identified the top 7):
- feelings of being alienated from society
- trouble feeling comfortable in the world
- feeling that something is missing
No comments:
Post a Comment