4 steps to start meditating and make it a daily routine

Meditating once is easy. But doing it every day is something else. And if meditation doesn’t become a daily habit, you can’t get all the benefits that this practice provides.

Jack Kornfield has been meditating for 40 years and is one of the leading teachers of the Buddhist tradition in the West. After the ecstasy, the laundry (Ed. The Books of the March Hare, 2001) is one of his most recommended books and stands out for its simple and humane way of explaining everything related to meditation practice and spirituality.

1. Choose the time and place where you will always meditate

In the same style, he explains today how introduce meditation into our daily routines, like showering, eating or cleaning the house. Convince yourself that meditating is a hygienic habit that gives you serenity and well-being.

Kornfield’s first recommendation is choose a suitable place to meditate. It will always be the same. You wash in the bathroom, eat at the table, read in your chair and meditate in your meditation corner.

It must be a place where it is possible sit without being interrupted. It can be one of the corners of the bedroom or the living room. Or any other place that seems appropriate in the house.

put in this place a meditation cushion Eliminate objects that remind you of other activities and place others that you only associate with meditation: a mandala, a candle, a Buddha image or a salt lamp, for example.

You can start with just 10 minutes

Also, set a time of day when you are comfortable meditating, taking into account your other routines and your personality. If you are a person who likes to get up early, it will not cost you much set aside 10 to 20 minutes for your meditation practice before or after breakfast, for example.

The time you dedicate to meditation can increase. You can extend the session or do it twice a day.

Take three deep breaths and watch the air travel and everything that happens in the body in its path. Just watch, don’t wonder, don’t offer yourself answers.

Then breathe normally, continue to observe the movements of the breath, feel more and more relaxed.

2. Do not get carried away by thoughts

After a few minutes, you may lose concentration and get carried away by some thought that comes to mind. At that moment Bring your attention back to your breath.

Don’t think about thoughts. Just watch them for a moment and return to focusing on your breath.

3. Remember your goal

Some days you will find it easier than others keep meditating the 10-20 minutes provided. Someday you may be convinced by the thought that you are wasting your time and it is more urgent to do something else. Reflect and remember that meditating is precisely that, stop doing anything else.

After a few weeks it will come completely natural start meditating and quickly enter a state of deep relaxation, calmly connecting with your body-mind unit.

4. Find your posture and start meditating

Meditation is not an exclusively mental processas is often believed: depends on the relaxed balance of the body.

there is a relationship between the posture of the body and the attitude of the mind. Hence, all unnecessary bodily tension translates into tension in the mind, and vice versa.

On the contrary, if you are able to carry the body to a state of alignment, relaxation and elasticitythe mind it starts to appease and expand in turn.

As the person turns more aware of your bodythe activity of your inner monologue subsides.

To meditate, the technique is not as important as knowing how to interpret the spirit of the meditation, but certain basic indications are useful.

How should the posture be to favor meditation?

comfortable posture We sit with our legs crossed and our hands resting on our knees or comfortably. It is not necessary to assume the full lotus position. If necessary, cushions can be used so that the pelvis is above the knees, or a chair can be used to sit on. If we do it on the floor, it is preferable to sit on a rug or mat.Straight back. You have to try to align the spine around an imaginary vertical axis, until you find the point where gravity plays in favor of verticality and not against it. At that point, which is constantly readjusting, you feel the serene stillness of a mountain: stable without effort.deliver the weight. Alignment is important because it allows you to surrender your body weight to the gravitational pull and experience the sensation of relaxation. As a body relaxes, it becomes more elastic: it moves subtly, like a skyscraper or a tall tree, which would otherwise break. Keeping the body still is exhausting.

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Open eyes. In some traditions the eyes are kept open and one looks down. If you are very sensitive to external disturbances, you can start by closing them. The tongue touches the palate.Visualize and relax. The different segments of the back, neck and head are visualized as blocks stacked on top of each other and the body is allowed to effortlessly readjust and align.Attention to breathing. We feel the elasticity of the body when breathing: how the spine lengthens when inhaling and recovers its curves when exhaling. We let the points of tension disappear.

Find a position on the cushion in which you can remain sitting up straight, but without rigidity. The body must be well supported on the ground. Hands rest relaxed. The eyelids close.

Feels like tensions in the body are reduced and how the speed of thought slows down. You no longer have anything to think about. Direct your attention exclusively to the breath, as if it were the only thing that exists.