Meditation

The stereotype of a meditating person sitting down in sukhasana, eyes closed for 10 minutes, 20 minutes,  or another arbitrary number is slowly disappearing. If you ever felt uncomfortable meditating, said words like "I don't meditate" or "meditation is not for me",  were uncomfortable physically or were not feeling authentic, you were right. Whatever meditation you had tried at that time just was not the right one for you.
Meditating is not a cookie-cutter experience where "one size fits all",  it's a curated, personal journey of connecting with your True Self Within - your Atman. With so many apps, YouTube tutorials, books, etc. available on the subject I don't want to add to that clutter. What I intend to do here is to introduce a few simple meditation techniques/points/observations that work very well for both beginner and advanced meditators.

1) Find a safe position or a safe situation where you will be able to forget about your physical body and to focus on your breath alone. It can be sitting in sukhasana, lying down on your back, knees bent or not, maybe even walking through nature, or walking your dog in the neighborhood. Any position and situation that allows you to let go of thoughts concerning your physical body is your starting point for meditating. If you don't like to close your eyes, keep them downcast or focused on one point.

2) Start focusing on your breath and feel even breaths entering and exiting your nostrils - notice everything about your breaths: the coolness of the inhales, the warmth of the exhales, the expansion of your lungs and side ribs, ANYTHING connected to your breath. We are mostly oblivious to the 28,000 breaths per day we produce, so make these few focused breaths count.

3) If a thought of the outside world intrudes, it's OK, it's probably impossible to remove all thoughts right now. Just acknowledge the thought, send it away on a cloud, and return to the focus on your breath.

4) Try using an empowering mantra with your breath rhythm. The simplest one is to say in your inner/mind voice "I am" on every inhale and an empowering word such as "safe", "strong", "confident", "able", "free", "enough" on the exhale. Repeat for as long as you feel necessary before letting go of the mantra and just staying with your breath. Other mantras I like to use are "I am safe and I am free" on the inhale and "Abundance lives within me" on the exhale, or "How do I feel?" on the inhale and "What do I need?" on the exhale. You can also create your own mantras.

5) When ending a meditation sequence, use a healing physical movement to signal your mind that you are finished - the simplest healing movements are placing both hands on the heart or gently covering your eyes with your palms, fingertips resting on the hairline.