Learning Meditation

Silent meditation was the first method I learned. Maybe I’m biased, but I think it’s the simplest. It doesn’t require any accouterments like prayer beads or affirmations. It just requires that you sit still.

Before you begin, set a timer for 20 minutes. For silent meditation, you find a comfortable place to sit. It can be on the toilet seat in the morning if that’s the only space you can find. Once you are sitting, continue to breathe as you normally would, but begin to observe your breath. Feel the air passing into your nostrils, down through your throat and into your lungs. Follow it as it makes the trip out.

Once you are following your breath, begin to breathe into your belly. You can try it now. If you are beginning, put your hands on your belly. As you breathe in feel your hands raise off your belly and as you breathe out feel them come in. This is sometimes called belly breathing or deep breathing.

In silent meditation, you focus on your breath. If your mind drifts, and it probably will, bring it gently back to your breath. Once you bring it back, you might find that you are no longer belly breathing. Slow the pace of your thoughts, breathe into your belly, and bring your attention back to following your breath.

At some point in the meditation, your mind will go blank. You won’t really be concentrating on your breath, but you won’t be thinking either. And you’ll be fully awake. You will drop into stillness. This may not happen the first, second, or even tenth time, but it will happen. Don’t go in chasing it or wanting it. You’ll also find that the moment you recognize yourself in that place, you will be out of it.