Spirit in the Village

6 Steps for Letting Go of Mental Resistance

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

Last week I wrote a post called 5 tips to Un-Clutter the Mind and focus on What's Important. This one goes a little deeper and describes how to let go of mental resistance.

What is mental resistance?

The mind is where thinking originates. When combined with our ego we develop opinions, beliefs and judgments about ourselves, other people and events. Our thoughts, ego and emotion when combined cause us to take action. Action that flows from a positive state of mind is better or us, especially if our goal is balance and alignment with the natural flow of life.

Mental resistance occurs when our opinions, beliefs or judgments cause internal conflict; the result is negative emotion. Negative emotion can trigger negative thinking, can hurt the quality of our relationships, closes the doors of opportunity and sometimes causes us to take action that is not in alignment with our desired outcomes or goals.

Letting go of mental resistance is a good practice wherever possible.

Here’s an example,

A person you’ve known for years has just got engaged to your sister. You’ve never been close to him and in your opinion he’s arrogant, egotistical, demanding and too self-centered. He has a lot of money (more than you) and likes to flash his money, car and all his toys for everyone to see. Although you have known this person for years you never really liked him and now he’s marrying your sister. You’re going to be related!

What would you like from this situation?

Ideally to create a good relationship; but it's actually more important to let go of your mental resistance first.

Here are 6 steps for letting go of mental resistance:

Step 1 – Take Responsibility

Become aware that YOU are the one carrying the resistance or any negative opinion or emotion – it’s not them. We often like to blame others for our negative emotional states and some of us live our entire lives blaming everybody else.

Your emotional state is your responsibility and you have control.

Step 2 – Become aware of how this person triggers you.

What beliefs, insecurities or judgements about do they trigger in you? Write down how this person makes you feel.

An example

Joe is always such a jerk. He’s always been arrogant and hard to deal with. He never listens to anyone and always wants to be the center of attention. Even though he’s a jerk the girls still seem to love him. They must love him for his money. In my opinion people should be respectful, trustworthy, spiritually minded and not so arrogant. Joe pushes all my buttons around what I would call proper behavor. Joe brings out my insecurity that says I’m not good enough and makes me doubt my abilities. He makes almost twice the money I make and I always compare myself to him. I feel resentful about Joe and his success.

When you start getting to your core issue then you can begin to re-write the story in a more positive tone.

Step 3 - Re-Frame or Write a New Story

An example

You know you have to hand it to Joe. He’s always driving that blue T-Bird and has the women eating out of his hand. Now he’s engaged to my sister he’s obviously in my life for a reason, might as well make it positive. There’s a lot that I can learn from Joe and although we’re not alike there’s part of me that in some ways wishes I were more like him. Perhaps he can show me how to make more money.  Sometimes Joe makes me doubt my abilities but in reality I’m doing pretty good. I’ve got a good job, a nice house, nice family… all is well.

Notice how the re-framed story has a more positive tone.

Step 4 – Meditate or Contemplate

Meditation is about letting go of thought however what I do in this situation is take the re-framed positive story and read it before I meditate. By doing so your meditation should guide you to the more positive thought. If there is still negative feeling then there is still something unresolved; you can use meditation to find the negative belief, judgment or feeling and then go back to step 2.

Meditate until it feels good or the feeling is better than it was.
Always move towards the positive thought.

Step 5 – Action

Observe what happens when you meet this person. Is your feeling more positive? Do you feel less intimidated? Have you let go of some of your judgment or rigid beliefs?

If so celebrate that you’ve been able to change your mental focus and improve the quality of your experience of a relationship. If not then go back and see what triggers you.

Often by flipping the switch from a negative to a positive we can see real changes in how we respond to events and people in our life.

Step 6 - Check-in Periodically

As events unfold and relationships evolve it’s always good to check in periodically. Do I still feel positive about this person or are there new negative feelings?

Sometimes relationships are not meant to be close but we can let go of our resistance.

These techniques can be applied to any area of our lives and I’ll cover this topic again.

5 Tips to Un-clutter your Mind and Focus on what’s Important

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

Back in January I started the Meditation Project as a way to let go of some of the distractions and stresses in my life. During this time I’ve learned to prioritize, clear my mind and focus on what’s important with respect to my career, relationships and health.

Here are some tips that have helped me to let go of the clutter in my mind.

Ask Questions

• What do I like / dislike about my life?
• Where is my stress level? How am I sleeping?
• Am I feeling balanced or overwhelmed with my life?
• Are there some tasks or activities that waste my time?
• What am I passionate about? What is important to me?
• If I didn’t have to work for a living what would I do?

Write it Down (Keep a Journal)

• Write down answers to all the questions above.
• Write down a paragraph or so outlining what you want in the following areas:

1. Career & Income
2. Relationships
3. Health
4. Personal Interests
5. Other

Keep the journal close by and write down new insights, ideas or information. The habit of writing will help you get clearer on what you want.

Listen to your Intuition

There are a number of ways to listen to your intuition.

• Meditate – connect with your thoughts, feelings and your body.
• Exercise – Weights, Cardio, Sports, Tai Chi, Yoga – all can be meditative.
• Record your Dreams – Dreams often have insights. Check out the Inner Noodle.
• Become aware of your thoughts or ideas. Write them down.

Listening to your intuition allows you to become clear on what’s important and where to direct your focus.

Organize & Prioritize

When you start asking questions you will start to observe those activities that take you off track and away from what’s important. For example, if you’re text messaging your friends for 3 hours a day, addicted to Facebook or talking on the phone with your mother-in-law about what her sister did 50 years ago, you’ll soon realize some of these activities are not important. Make a decision to let them go.

When your organize making a list is good as long as you don’t get too attached to getting it all done today. Make your list focused but flexible giving you options should your schedule or circumstances change.

Take some Time Off

In our fast pace society we often neglect our own need for downtime. Give yourself a break. If you can manage it take a day or a few days off work. Turn off phones, computers and forget about the goals or to-do lists.

There’s a great Beatles song lyric Turn off your mind, relax and float downstream.

My FREE E-Book on the Meditation Project will soon be available.

Stay Tuned!

The Law of Give & Take, Natural Rhythm and Flow

Posted by Kevin Boon. Follow me on Twitter.

Sometimes an idea for a post can come from the most interesting places. Last night the inspiration came from dream. It’s not often that a dream gives me ideas but when it does I’ve learned to listen, write it down and not ask too many questions. Paul McCartney said the song Yesterday (video) came to him in a dream and who’s going to argue with Paul.

My first understanding of the Law of Give and Take (Receiving) came from the concept of Karma from some of the Eastern philosophies, what you give out comes back to you. Christians have a similar philosophy, what you sow you shalt reap.

What does it all really mean?

The Law of Give and Take in Business World

There are different examples of give and take in the business world, some positive and some negative. Let’s say you are an employee working for a company where there was an open door policy, good communication, good relationship between management and employees, opportunity for advancement and recognition. The feeling created would be a good one and if the company aligns those values with a common purpose to drive revenue or sales, the organization would prosper and people would feel good about working there.

The opposite is also true for organizations that create a closed environment, create fear, treat employees poorly and only look at profits and the bottom line. While these organizations still may succeed financially they sacrifice the heart of their business by creating distrust, hostility and a stressful workplace.

The Law of Give and Take in our Personal Lives

The same is true on a personal level. In our relationships if we encourage, support, listen to and empower others then most of the time our relationships blossom and others will reciprocate. The opposite is true when we treat someone poorly by being critical, unsupportive, demanding, or if we threaten or refuse to listen to their needs.

People can get confused with the law of give and take. We expect others to reciprocate our good deeds. You might give to one person and they might lash out at you. Their response made you angry you lash back and an argument begins. Each negative statement builds on the last and before you know it two people who are good friends intensely dislike each other.

The way to break this cycle is when you feel like lashing out give instead, encourage, listen, say nothing, or if that's not possible send the other person good thoughts. You’ll be amazed at how fast a hostile environment can change to something positive.

There are extreme behaviours to give and take.

The Martyr Syndrome

A martyr is someone who is constantly giving but doesn’t like to receive. They give usually at the expense of their own needs and refuse to receive because of low self esteem. What happens is an energy gap is created and the person over time feels tired and worn out.

The solution for the martyr is to learn to receive and let go of their guilt about receiving.

A common opinion is that Mother Theresa would be a Martyr. This is not true because although she gave tirelessly of her services (to the poor and disenfranchised) she knew how to receive what she wanted and needed for her cause. (ie. money, volunteers, political support, etc.)

The Taker

The taker is the other extreme. This is a person who is constantly taking or receiving but never gives back. When we come into contact with takers our common feeling is they are just trying to get something from us, they’re slimy and we don’t trust them. We sense from their actions that they’re out for themselves and seem lack compassion for others.

Takers can find more balance from learning to give without any expectation of receiving.

Applying the Law of Give and Take into your Life

Finding the balance between giving and receiving is one of the best ways to find balance. You can give or receive in many ways including money, words of encouragement, support, empowering others, helping, listening, etc. Be warned that giving money requires some thought in itself because some acts of giving are empowering and others disempowering to the receiver. This will be a topic for a future post.

Ideas for giving:

• Develop your ability to listen. Most people want to be heard but few of us take time to listen. When you do listen you establish a greater level of trust.
• Offer words of encouragement or tell a co-worker they’re doing a great job.
• Hold the door open or let someone go in front of you at the checkout line.
• Be courteous and let that driver go in front of you.
• Pay for lunch.

Learn to give without expecting anything in return.

Ideas for receiving:

• Let someone else buy lunch.
• When someone is courteous, holds the door open, or gives encouragement say thank you.

Learn to receive without feeling guilty or feeling obligated to do anything in return.

In our society we can apply conditions to giving. If I pay for lunch today you might feel guilty and obligated to pay next time. The law does not keep a checklist. If you can get into a flow and natural rhythm with the law of give and take then it will just happen naturally. You might give to one person but you’ll receive from another.

You will feel balanced and content.

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Using Meditation to Get Back on Track

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We all have those days where nothing goes as planned. Our schedule is in place we’re ready to go and then a call comes from the school saying your child’s sick. Everything gets put on hold as you rush home to take care of your child. Other times we’re just not in a productive state of mind. Tuesday was like that for me.

Now that I’m writing more frequently I’ve found that I need to give myself downtime. Typically that comes on the weekend where I don’t post and if I do work it’s more free-flow writing, planning or organizing. Weekends can also get busy and this past weekend was very busy helping my wife with a tradeshow and having family in town for a visit.

As I’m building readership for my blog I have developed a to-do list with some specific goals such as registering at various sites to increase traffic, commenting and networking with other bloggers, setting up affiliate programs, re-design and creating a new banner for my site, business cards, etc…, plus I want to write good content. The list is quite long and will likely take a few weeks to get everything in place.

Distractions

On Monday we had a holiday in Ontario so I was back working and posting on Tuesday. With my to-do list in hand I was ready to go, however…

Tuesday did not flow at all. I got distracted early in the day and you can waste a lot of time with email, Twitter or other social networking sites. My to-do list seemed overwhelming and by the afternoon I was feeling frustrated, uninspired and upset that nothing was getting done. I meditated which helped me to relax but there was still that part of me that was off track.

Pressure, To-Do Lists & the Ego

The pressure of the to-do list was getting to me and I realized it was that voice in my head (my ego) telling me I had to get it all done and panicking that it wouldn’t get done and this blogging is never going to work. Why don’t you go and get a real job, etc. Once I observed that it was my ego creating all this stress it was then time for me to relax and do nothing, become the observer. Taking some of the tips I learned from Law of Attraction methods I took the ego’s words an reframed them, “nothing needs to be done tonight and all will come together and happen as it’s supposed to. This is going to come together." The ego side disappeared I was able to relax, enjoy my evening and get ready for the next day.

Wednesday arrived (yesterday). I did my usual 20 minutes meditation but in that time I had my to-do list beside me, I wrote down 2 or 3 things that were most important for the day and meditated. I allowed myself to relax and let whatever thoughts flow. The experience was calming, relaxing and allowed me to get back on track.

The Lesson: Letting Go of Rigid Thinking

• When we hold on to rigid thinking we create stress.
• Rigid thinking mostly comes out of fear (the ego).
• When we let go of being rigid by reframing our thoughts we begin to relax and let go of our fear.
• Relaxing eases my mind and allows us to get back into the flow.

Meditation allows us to become aware of and release rigid thinking and create more flow to our lives.

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Basic Principles: Walking Meditation

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Over the years I have meditated on and off. When my mind is too active or things are too busy I find it’s easy to talk myself into not meditating.

The Meditation Project - My Experience

After making the commitment in January to meditate every day for at least 20 minutes something has changed. First, the chatter (or stream of thought flowing through my mind) has reduced significantly. When I started the chatter was constant, now that stream seems more subtle and sometimes my mind is totally quiet. Second, I notice that I am not triggered as much by events as I was before. I’m more relaxed and centered. Third, when I meditate I feel like I’m in an incubator (don’t know how else to describe it). I’m totally at peace, my mind is totally relaxed and often I don’t want the experience to end.

This is last post in this series about basic principles of meditation. These ideas have come from my own experience and I’m sure will evolve over time. For a sitting meditation I’ve talked about becoming the observer of your thoughts, breath and emotions. A greater awareness of your ego is another step which allows you to go deeper. And finally learning to direct your thought and emotion toward the positive is one of the basic principles of the Law of Attraction.

Walking Meditation

To bring this experience full circle the next step is to start to apply these techniques into your daily life. This is what I call a Walking Meditation. Most of us run on autopilot for most of our day from our jobs, running around after the kids or doing errands. Rarely do we take time for ourselves to become centered.

Here are a couple of suggestions.

Next time you get into your car. Let’s say you’re driving to work. Turn off the radio, cell phones or any distraction. Focus on your breath and observe how your body feels. Focus on your thoughts. What are you thinking about? Allow the thought to come in, be aware and then let it go… go back to your breath. Get into the practice of bringing your awareness into the present moment. You can practice this at any stage during your day.

If I’m in a business situation (let’s a say a board meeting) quite often I’ll bring my awareness into that moment. I’ll look around the room and observe who’s in the room, the general mood or feeling and then I’ll then bring my attention to myself and become aware of my breathing, my thoughts and so on. This tends to make me more centered, focused and alert to whatever is going on.

Life can get pretty distracting and it’s easy to go back into autopilot. However if you practice a little bit at a time you develop an awareness muscle that can help you to be more centered as you go about your day.

This is the end of this series of posts on the Basic Principles of Meditation. Stay tuned, my E-Book will soon be available and more interesting posts to come. Be sure to subscribe to my blog in either in reader or via email below.

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Basic Principles: Meditation and the Law of Attraction

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Over the past week I have shared some basic principles of Meditation that include developing an awareness of our thoughts, breath, emotions and our ego. Now I want to take some time to speak about Meditation and the Law of Attraction. For years I struggled integrating these two concepts.

Meditation as I understood was about silencing the mind, releasing thought and becoming the observer of our lives. My interpretation of silence was “let go of all thought”. Law of Attraction and books like Think and Grow Rich on the other hand said use your thoughts to focus on what you want. There was a conflict for me but I later found it was from my lack of understanding.

In 2008 I came back to the Law of Attraction, this time with a set of books by Jerry and Ester Hicks. What I learned is that our thoughts do create our reality and it is important to keep our thoughts and expectation positive. Our guidance system is our feelings and we can use our feelings or emotions to tell if we’re on track. The Hick’s teachings say, by moving toward positive feeling we can align with the natural flow of our lives. Law of Attraction I discovered is know what you want, keep your thoughts and emotions focused on the positive, and then allow yourself to get into the natural flow or rhythm of your life. When you learn these principles your wants and desires unfold naturally.

With this teaching I have come to understand that Law of Attraction fits perfectly within a meditation practice.

So how have I combined these two teachings?

First I had to recognize my error. Silencing the chatter within my mind was important but that doesn’t mean we eliminate thought. For many years I carried that image of spiritual guru withdrawing from the world and living in a cave for 20 years. Quietly I always wondered if that’s what I had to do. Fortunately I discovered that I can live a completely normal, productive life with a career, family and even technology, but I can use these principles to make my life more balanced, centered and happy.

Here is how I have incorporated Law of Attraction teachings into my life.

1. Start by writing down what you want This might include what you want for a career, health, weight loss, exercise, relationships, etc.. Jerry & Ester Hick’s books & DVDs are source information. On the web you can check out Good Vibe Coach. You don’t have to get it perfect. What you write down today will change as you develop your own understanding of what you really want. I have written and re-written my goals probably over a dozen times since I started this process.
2. Focus on the positive thought or feeling This aligns perfectly within my meditation practice because when a negative thought or emotion comes up I have learned to re-frame my thinking toward the positive or in the direction of the outcome that I want.
3. Allow your desires and let the flow of your life happen naturally This aligns with meditation because for each thought or desire I use my meditation practice to become aware of the thought, focus and then let the thought go. What I’ve found is my goals and desires start to unfold naturally.
4. Finally, develop the practice of Walking Meditation which will be my last and final post on the Basic Principles of Meditation.

Basic Principles: Meditation and our Ego

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In the first 3 parts on the Basic Principles of Meditation I have spoken about the core of Meditation and how it relates to our thoughts, breath and emotions. Today I want to talk about the ego. Once you understand the ego and how it impacts your life you’ll be able to approach your life from a whole new perspective.

What is the Ego?

The ego is the collection of all your thoughts, opinions, beliefs and emotions that you use to create and establish your identity. For example, your career and job title is an identity that you’ve established. Race, gender, sexual orientation, nationality, political affiliation and religion are all identities. We identify ourselves as man or woman, a parent, brother, sister, plumber, electrician, photographer, CEO, etc… We take on roles in our lives and we act in accordance with those roles.

The ego is also the “I AM” part of you that establishes your identity. So if you say to yourself I’m good looking, I’m funny, I’m a professional, I’m depressed, I’m angry, I’m pissed off!; these are identities and part of the ego. We establish these identities and then form the belief; this is who I am. The danger of locking ourselves into a role or identity is that we become stuck and this can limit our ability to grow or make positive change in our lives.

In the last post on emotions I introduced the concept of learning to be the observer of your thoughts and emotions. We can also become the observer of our ego.

When you begin to observe your ego you start to witness the roles and identities that you create for yourself. One that comes up often is the role of political affiliation. It’s always interesting to watch a flag waving, Obama loving Democrat sit in the same room with a card carrying Republican and member of the NRA. Both are so engrained in their identity (ego) that it makes them sick to their stomach to have to sit in the same room. Usually the conversation starts as a statement that absolutely insults or irritates the other, the other person responds and before you know it you have two people lashing out taking cheap shots, trying to get the upper hand and justifying why their view is right.

No wonder nothing ever gets done in Government. Forget government we have those battles daily in our media, over the Internet and in our coffee shops. The ego within us likes to take sides.

Pick a topic, race, sexual orientation, religion, nationality and you’ll see that people cling fiercely to their identity and ego. The source of most of the worlds problems are due to our identification with our ego and as Eckhart Tolle says, “…the dysfunction that every human being carries within: the ego.”

How can this apply to your life or meditation practice?

An Exercise

As you go about your daily life (or meditate) start to become aware of the roles or identities that you have either inherited or create in your life. If you say you’re depressed, ask yourself the question, Am I depressed or am I just taking on the role of being depressed right now?

If you’re an American (or whatever nationality) start to observe how you have developed your identity as an American. Look at what you were taught in school, on TV or from friends and family and start to observe your own beliefs. Then ask the question, What would my life look like if I wasn’t an American, what if I was born in China or Singapore or whatever country? Take a few minutes to look outside your own national identity and ask what identity would you have taken on had you been born somewhere else.

These exercises do not make you lose your identity but do enable you to start looking at your ego and the roles and identities you have created.

I’m also going recommend that you read Eckhart Tolle’s book A New Earth to understand the workings of the ego.

Next post in this series will be on Meditation and the Law of Attraction

Basic Principles: Meditation and our Emotions

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In the first two posts of this series I spoke about becoming aware of our thoughts and our breath in both our everyday lives or during our meditation. The next area: Meditation and our emotions.

Everyone experiences emotion. Some people freely express emotions and you can see the raw energy out in the open for all to see. Others keep a lock on their emotions and few if any ever know what they’re feeling. Emotions are a natural state and expression in a healthy way is natural and good for our well being. Some of us carry anger or rage, others are resentful or hold grudges, and others feel sadness, hurt or guilt or even depression. Emotions can come to the surface during meditation and unlike thoughts can sometimes be more difficult to let go.

Our emotional ups and downs are interesting to watch.

Let me give you an example.

Let’s say you were with your girlfriend at a party and noticed she was taking quite a bit of time talking to this other guy. She seemed so excited to meet him and seemed entranced by every word he said. She even held his hand at one point. You said something to her, she got angry at you, you got angry back and you stormed off leaving her at the party. You went home with a mix of feelings from anger, rage, jealousy betrayal, sadness, rejection; you felt out of control… you were so angry… how could she do this?

The next day you get a call. It’s your girlfriend. She didn’t understand why you got so angry. The guy she was talking to was her cousin from Toronto; she hadn’t seen him for about 2 years since he went away to Australia. She was so excited to see him again and was going to introduce you to him; but you stormed off.

How would you feel now? Silly, stupid, embarrassed?

There are a couple of things to note here.

• Emotions are usually triggered by events in our lives, our thoughts, our beliefs and other emotions.
• Emotions are temporary and quite often can be changed by re-directing our thoughts, understanding our beliefs or recognizing how one emotion can trigger others.

One way to practice meditation is to allow yourself to take two roles while you meditate. One is the role of yourself going through all your experiences; the “I” or “me” as you call yourself. The other is the role of the observer which means you pretend you are looking down on your body. You become the observer of your thoughts, your breath and your emotions. As the observer there is no judgement. An emotion comes up and the observer part of you says, there’s the feeling of anger. While meditating you can sit and observe the anger in yourself, how it feels in your body and what thoughts and beliefs it may trigger in you.

By being aware of our emotions and observing how they move through your mind and body is a good practice. As the observer you gain a new perspective and recognize that your emotions are within your control. Emotions come though you based on events, life circumstances or beliefs and conditioning. Learning to manage your emotions can significantly improve the quality of your life.

Next in this series of basic principles is Meditation and our Ego…

Basic Principles: Meditation and our Breath

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In Western cultures we give more attention to the outside world rather than our inner world: our careers, cars, houses, possessions, relationships, children, television, computers, etc. Everything we do is outside of us and we’re conditioned to get out there, set goals and accomplish things. There is nothing wrong with setting goals or getting things things done but rarely are we taught balance. Few of us were ever taught as children to look at the world within ourselves. The inner search for many is usually something that comes later in life.

Breath is an integral part of our body’s ability to live, is the key to our survival and also helps us to connect to our inner world. If we stop breathing for any period of time, we die. Breathing happens naturally without our conscious attention to it.

Here are a couple of tips on how to breathe and why it’s important to become aware of your breath.

1. Bringing Awareness to your breathing helps you to connect to your body and your emotions in any given situation

Let me give you an example, “Suppose your working in a sales office and your manager calls a meeting. All your colleagues are there and your manager says, “If we don’t make $1 million dollars this month you’re all fired!” Can you imagine how it might feel in that environment? Would there be tension? How would your colleagues feel? How would you feel? You might feel a series of emotions from tension, to fear, to anger? What would happen to your breathing?

In most cases when we’re put into stressful circumstances our breathing tightens. We tend to take short breaths. We breathe more from our chest rather than our diaphragm. We breathe faster and that drives up our heart rate, blood pressure and can create tension through out our body.

If you imagine sitting in that same room with your manager and all of a sudden being aware of your breath you would soon realize that this outside event has been the cause of the change within you.

2. Once you are aware of your breathing in any given situation you can then choose to breathe deeper, find your center and in some cases be more in control as circumstances unfold around you

Learning to breathe takes practice and does not change everything overnight; however it’s worth the effort to become fully aware of your breath. Learning to breathe from our diaphragm is a great exercise and helps with relaxation. This is very popular for vocalists and is used in various forms of meditation. Here’s an example of breathing from the diaphragm.

The following video will give you some ideas how to start a meditation practice.

An Exercise

Take a notebook and as you go about your activities for the day take note of how you breathe in various situations. For example, how do certain people affect you, your boss, co-workers, your kids, your spouse, parents, or friends? Are there some who you feel more tension around? What happens when you’re in traffic, taking the subway, working at your computer, at the airport, text messaging, etc.? Make a note of how you feel and how you breathe in these circumstances? You will be amazed at how your breathing rhythm changes throughout the day.

My next post will be Meditation and our Emotions

Basic Principles: Meditation and our Thoughts

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Some people have a difficult time grasping why anyone would want to meditate. To them the whole process seems boring and the misperception is that you simply sit and do nothing. We live in an action oriented society and our jobs, family, responsibilities and technologies influence everything we do. Our minds are constantly being stimulated by the environment around us. Meditation is an opportunity for us to connect more fully with our thoughts, understand how our mind works and most importantly reduce or eliminate completely the excess chatter within our mind.

If you sit silently for just a few minutes and listen to your thoughts what do you hear? If you’re like most people your mind will go something like: "I’m supposed to go to the gym today… my wife wanted me to get groceries… I have to pick up the kids at 4… oh my God, I am supposed to call my mother… what’s that rattle in my car" If we listen closely, the stream of thought can be endless and if we live our days without at least connecting to what's going on in our mind then our lives can feel overwhelming and stressful.

A simple way to start with meditation is to observe what am I thinking about? Are my thoughts generally positive or negative? Just listen. Take a few minutes, close your eyes and listen. You’ll be amazed at how many thoughts flow through in just a few minutes.

If you observe one thought it might flow something like this: "I’m supposed to go to the gym today… I didn’t go yesterday… or Monday… how am I going to do it today I’m so busy... I just can’t seem to get anything right… I’m so frustrated…" You will start to understand how one thought leads to another, leads to another and then can take your whole feeling about your self into a positive or negative direction. That’s why people generally are so irritable.

The main principle is to become aware of your thinking and how your thoughts can create stress and control your life. Start by getting into the habit of listening to your mind chatter, reflect on what’s flowing through your mind and see what direction your thought takes. Is it positive or negative? Better yet, take some time to meditate. Turn off all distractions including cell phones, Blackberry’s, computers, TV and find somewhere quiet to sit, close your eyes and focus on your breathing. Meditation will allow you to not only reflect on the thought but will allow you to release the it from your mind. Releasing thought is the cornerstone of creating a silent mind.

For More Information on the Meditation Project click here.
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The next principle: Meditation and our Breathing