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Meditation Books
Stephan Bodian
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Published:
May 23, 2016

Meditation For Dummies

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Overview

Take an inward journey for a happier, healthier life

Meditation has been used for centuries to reduce stress, increase energy, and enhance overall health and well-being—so it's no wonder more and more people in today's fast-paced and stress-centric world are adopting this age-old practice. If you want to achieve a greater state of calmness, physical relaxation, and psychological balance, Meditation For Dummies is your life raft. Covering the latest research on the health benefits of meditation, this new edition explains in plain English how you can put meditation into practice today and start reaping the benefits of living a more mindful life.

Whether you're new to meditation or a seasoned practitioner coming back for a refresher course, this plain-English guide provides a wealth of tips and techniques for sitting (or lying) down with your mind to meditate successfully. From preparing your body for meditation to focusing your awareness and being open to the present moment, it covers everything you need to put distractions to rest and open yourself up to a meditation practice that works for you.

  • Provides the latest research on the causes of happiness and how meditation can improve your mood
  • Includes a new chapter on the growing trend of meditation in the workplace
  • Explains how meditation and other mindfulness practices have made their way into hospitals, schools, prison, and military groups
  • Illustrates the benefits of taking time to consciously cultivate mindfulness through meditation

If you're ready to find some zen and benefit from all meditation has to offer, this friendly guide sets you up for success.

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About The Author

An internationally known author, psychotherapist, and teacher of mindfulness and spiritual awakening, Stephan Bodian leads regular intensives and retreats and offers spiritual counseling and mentoring to people throughout the world.  His digital program Mindfulness Meditation (with Mental Workout) has been praised in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal.

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CHEAT SHEET

Meditation is an age-old practice that can help relieve a host of ills brought on by the fast pace of modern life. All you need to meditate is a quiet place to sit, the ability to direct your attention, and a simple meditation technique. As long as you give it a well-intentioned try, you can't go wrong.How to prepare for meditationMeditation is simple to do and doesn’t require any special equipment.
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When most folks first consider taking up the practice of meditation, they usually have a few questions they want to have answered — and when they get started, they come up with a few more. Here are the answers to ten common questions to get you started on your journey. Will meditation make me too relaxed or spaced out to succeed at work or school?
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Just as with any other activity that brings value to your life, you can maximize your meditation experience by following a few simple guidelines. Plan for meditation time: Do it consistently — day after day. Like running, playing tennis, or lifting weights, meditation requires regular practice if you want to build the appropriate muscles and skills.
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The practice of meditation teaches you how to let go of your preoccupations with past and future and instead develop the capacity to be present in the moment for whatever life brings. As with any sport or other skill-based activity, the more you practice, the more your capacity grows. Mindful awareness is like a muscle you build through meditation and use throughout your life.
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If you choose to seek a meditation teacher, make sure you know what you are looking for before you begin. If you’d like to play tennis but don’t know how, what do you do? You can watch other people play, maybe buy a book or two, and then head out to the court yourself and start practicing. But after you’ve mastered the basics, you may want to take a class or get some personal instruction to help you refine your stroke or eliminate the mistakes you’ve picked up along the way.
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Perhaps you’re so full of negative thoughts and feelings that you find it virtually impossible to concentrate, even in meditation. The voices (or images) in your head keep spewing forth worries, regrets, judgments, and criticism with such volume and velocity that you can barely hear yourself think. Or maybe you can focus on your breath or recite your mantra with some success, but when a particularly compelling story or pattern gets triggered, you’re swept away by the intensity.
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The latest buzzword in corporate America — besides mindfulness, at least—is resilience, a collection of qualities that allow people to adapt to change, deal with challenges, and bounce back from hardship. But of course you don't have to work in an HR department to know that everyone can use a healthy dose of resilience to cope with stress in these difficult times.
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Meditation requires discipline. If you’re like most folks, the word discipline may be a bit of a turnoff. Perhaps it reminds you of some bossy teacher who made you stay after school or childhood punishments that were intended to “set you straight.” But the discipline discussed here is quite different.The discipline discussed here is the kind of self-discipline that prompts top athletes like LeBron James and Novak Djokovic to get up every morning and run several miles and then practice their shot or their stroke over and over, long after they’ve gotten it right.
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Mediation offers healing power through imagery. In her book Staying Well with Guided Imagery, psychotherapist and guided-imagery pioneer Belleruth Naparstek cites extensive research that establishes three basic principles behind the healing power of imagery. These principles help explain the effectiveness of meditations that use imagery extensively.
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In centuries past, ordinary folks didn’t have the opportunity to thumb through a copy of Meditation For Dummies, pick and choose their favorite meditation techniques, and then sample them like connoisseurs at a wine tasting. Instead, they considered themselves extremely fortunate if they happened upon a teacher willing to impart some secret method.
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Armed with the latest information on how the brain works, researchers have been studying the correlations between meditation, the activation of different parts of the brain, and changes in behavior, cognition, and emotion. The results are far from conclusive — they’re more like tantalizing glimpses of a vast new terrain of exploration — but they do point to meditation’s enormous potential for furthering human psychological and neurological development by activating, integrating, and coordinating various brain regions.
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Anything you do or experience can provide you with an opportunity to practice mindfulness meditation. But you may want to begin with some of your usual activities — the ones you may be doing now on automatic pilot while you daydream, space out, or obsess. The truth is, even the most routine tasks can prove enjoyable and enlivening when you do them with wholehearted care and attention.
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After you have a few guidelines for putting the various pieces together, you can fashion a meditation practice that you can do day after day. Remember to keep it simple. After all, the point of meditation is to relax your body and ease your busy mind, not make your life more complicated. Here are the basic stages for creating a regular practice that works for you: Choose a core technique.
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At some point, you may find yourself in need of a meditation teacher. Like other things in life, you can only get so far after reading a book and watching a few videos. The same is true for meditation. You may have discovered something wonderful with meditation, but know that you can’t get any further without help.
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To get the most from your meditation practice, you need to commit to it. When you start meditating regularly, you can reap myriad benefits — from lower stress and cholesterol to higher levels of satisfaction and happiness. Here are some tips for maximizing your meditation practice: Meditate regularly — preferably every day.
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It doesn't take much to meditate the right way — especially because there really isn't just one right way. If you're concerned about your meditation practice, ask yourself the following questions. The closer you get to yes in response to each question, the better you're doing! Do I relax when I meditate, instead of tensing up?
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If you’re a budding meditator, family life poses a twofold challenge. On the one hand, you may feel inclined to invite, encourage, or even coerce your loved ones to meditate with you. On the other, you may find that the people closest to you disturb your fragile, newfound peace of mind in ways that no one else can.
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Meditation is a practice that engages not only your mind, but also your body and spirit. Use the following tips to engage every aspect of your being in your meditation practice: Discover how to relax your body (if you don't already know) by practicing some deep relaxation techniques. Experiment with different sitting positions (cross-legged, kneeling, on a chair) until you find one you can hold comfortably for 10 to 15 minutes.
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Meditation is simple to do and doesn't require any special equipment. You can, however, prepare yourself and your space in a number of ways and make sure you have some basic amenities: Meditation cushion, bench, or favorite chair Quiet, tidy spot, preferably reserved for meditation Regular time slot, if
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You might find mindfulness meditation is a great way to start your workday. By the time you arrive at work in the morning, you may already be feeling stressed out. After a hectic hour or two preparing the kids for school or haggling with your partner or dealing with some emergency at home, followed by a commute through rush-hour traffic, you may have gotten your workday off to a harrowing start.
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The practice of meditation is actually quite simple: Just sit quietly and comfortably while you rest your awareness on the sensations of the breath as it enters and leaves your body. When you notice that your mind has wandered off, gently bring your awareness back to your breathing. Sure, you can refine and deepen your practice over time, if you want, but you can master these basics in just a few minutes.
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Meditation can help you with forgiveness. Over the years, most people accumulate a heavy backpack full of old hurts and resentments that gradually weigh them down and limit their happiness. Instead of living in the fullness and richness of the present moment — which is where happiness happens, after all — and focusing on the good things they have, they’re often trapped in the past, reliving the pain and disappointment they experienced back then.
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After you determine what motivates you to meditate, you may benefit from a few guidelines for developing a mindset and a lifestyle that support your practice. In other words, meditators over the centuries have discovered that how you act, what you think about, and which qualities you cultivate can have an immediate impact on the depth and stability of your meditation.
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All the great meditative traditions agree: Meditating with others confers extraordinary benefits that enhance your individual practice and accelerate your personal and spiritual unfolding. Buddhists regard the community of practitioners as one of the three jewels or treasures of practice, along with the awakened teacher and the truth itself.
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Meditation is an age-old practice that can help relieve a host of ills brought on by the fast pace of modern life. All you need to meditate is a quiet place to sit, the ability to direct your attention, and a simple meditation technique. As long as you give it a well-intentioned try, you can't go wrong.How to prepare for meditationMeditation is simple to do and doesn’t require any special equipment.
Read More
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Mindfulness is a powerful practice with a host of well-researched benefits, like reduced stress, better concentration, enhanced creativity, and greater emotional intelligence. But it won't be of any use to you unless you apply it to your everyday life, to the world of work, play, and personal relationships. The workplace is an especially important place to practice being present and attentive because it tends to be particularly stressful.
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Meditation techniques, like meditation itself, tend to be relatively simple. Following is a brief list of ten of the most commonly practiced ones. You can use one technique exclusively, experiment with several techniques, or try one for a few months and then switch to a different one. Repeating a meaningful word or phrase, known as a mantra Following or counting your breaths Paying attention to the sensations in your body Cultivating love, compassion, forgiveness, and other healing emotions Concentrating on a geometric shape or other simple visual object Visualizing a peaceful place or a healing energy or light Reflecting upon inspirational or sacred writings Gazing at a picture of a holy being or saint Contemplating the beauty to be found in nature, art, or music Bringing mindful awareness to the present moment Changing techniques frequently makes it hard to reap the full range of benefits you can realize by using a consistent technique for a period of time — a few weeks to a month at least.
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During the ’70s and ’80s, Transcendental Meditation (TM) and relaxation-response research dominated the scientific study of meditation, and the results revealed meditation’s exceptional benefits on a wide range of health measures, from blood pressure and cholesterol levels to longevity and frequency of doctor’s visits.
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Now that meditation has become so popular in the West, it has begun to infiltrate the culture in ways that were unimaginable a decade or two ago. From corporate boardrooms to elementary school classrooms, meditation is transforming the way people do business, educate children, conceptualize and deliver healthcare, and treat common psychological problems like anxiety and depression.
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Besides overcoming separation, basic meditation practices contribute to the healing process in a number of essential ways. For some help with meditation, check out these basic meditation practices. Love and connectedness As Dean Ornish, MD, reveals in his groundbreaking research, love is more important than any other factor in the healing process, including diet and exercise.
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Meditation can help you survive the 21st century. Meditation offers a time-honored antidote to fragmentation, alienation, isolation, and stress — even stress-related illnesses and depression. Although it won’t solve the external problems of your life, it does help you develop inner resilience, balance, and strength to roll with the punches and come up with creative solutions.
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Like any powerful technique with such well-researched benefits, meditation comes with some caveats and occasional adverse reactions, especially when practiced intensively for extended periods of time. Meditation is not necessarily the best practice for everyone all the time! Besides, the techniques for working with persistent patterns may prove inadequate for dealing with certain deeply rooted issues that are more problematic and resistant to change.
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