Guided Meditation
We all know that meditating is great for the
body, mind and soul. We plan to do it, try it out, and sometimes
end up with disappointing results.
Meditating when you want to can be extremely difficult.
You get distracted, thoughts keep passing through your head, and
you can't stop mentally talking to yourself. This is very common among beginners who are
just starting out. It might also be an occasional problem even for
those who have more experience.
Something that might help you through that
difficulty is guided meditation. This is meditating while listening to a voice
(usually an audio recording) which helps to guide the process. It
can give you wonderful results and leave you with a better sense
of accomplishment than unaided meditation.
You can either make a recording yourself to use in
your meditation sessions, or buy a ready made CD or tape.
The latter option will probably have better sound quality, but is
more expensive. Making
a recording yourself is a great way to test the waters and see if
this is something you like. If you want to continue with guided meditation,
you can buy a few CDs to use later.
If you plan to make a guided meditation audio yourself,
you'll need a microphone, a sound recorder, and maybe a CD burner
if you plan to play this recording on your CD player.
Or you can use the record feature on your tape player and a blank
tape if you choose.
You probably feel like you need some guidance to
help you through this recording, since it's new to most people.
That's not a problem – we all need a little help sometimes, which
doesn't mean we're spiritually inadequate.
Here are some guided meditation practices that make
a great meditation recording:
- Speak
slowly and clearly.
- You
may want to use some soft, relaxing music or binaural beats in
the background.
- State
your purpose or goals for the meditation right at the beginning
of a recording. Maybe
you want to reach a higher consciousness, or forgive an old friend.
This will help you to focus your meditations around them.
- Don't
expect too much of yourself.
It's okay if you stutter a few times or find yourself at a loss
for words. This shouldn't
have too much of an effect on your meditation.
- Allow
yourself lots of silence.
You don't need to talk throughout the entire recording. You should give yourself suggestions and positive
reinforcements in the recording, then allow time for the actual
meditating.
- Focus
on positivity and gratitude.
Meditating about those things will improve just about every aspect
of your life, so don't be shy about reminding yourself to focus
on it.
I encourage you
to give guided meditation sessions a try.
You don't have much to lose, and you may just find that it's your
favorite way to meditate. |