View Full Version : How much meditation?
Hello -
I am trying to get into meditation. I think it has had a postive impact in my life in the past - and would like for it to start again.
Any idea how much is too much? How much is enough? and how little is needed to be effective?
I have tried to meditate for 5 mins a day or so at the end of the night a few times a week - and seems to be having a positive impact. IE: I am less impulsive, reactive and carried away by emotion.
I do my meditation in the morning for about 1/2 an hour most days to get my thoughts sorted out. I think that whenever you feel some peace, you have done enough and it may take longer or shorter on different days.
The best *instruction* for meditation I've ever come across is "Everyday Zen" by Charlotte "Koko" Beck.
She talks about 30-40 minutes a day at home, plus continual practise throughout the day. She also advocates attending allday/multi-day sesshins.
Personally, I have troubles going past 10 minutes a day, so that is all I ask of myself at the moment. I had some early improvements. I am now pretty much on a plateau, now that the newness has worn off, and the monkey brain is used to the new routine. I think future benefits are going to come much more subtlely, and incrementally.
Five minutes a day or once a week is a fine start. I have a CD at home that contains a long block of time for which a bell rings every five minutes. The purpose is to break up the thoughts that may be overtaking the meditation. This might help you. You'll have a guide of sorts that can clearing define five minutes, than ten, etc.....
Meditation does not have to be confined to sitting quietly on a cushion. Zen has several styles of meditation including brush stroke drawing, archery and flower design. There is a tea ceremony as a form of meditation. I personally practice yoga as my meditation. I focus on the movement and the quiet space around me. A lovely thing indeed.
Forgot something.........it's also important to be warm enough, settled enough and quiet enough. I typically sit after a meal and bath. Of course, the minute I sit down one of my kitty cats insists on using me as his cushion. Poncho is an expert yogi and he never thought about whether it was five minutes. He'd be happy to sit quietly for five hours. :)
I think aiming for 5 minutes a day at first is a fine start. You can let yourself go longer if you want, or cut it short. Sometimes a group meditation once in awhile can help you get started. If you want music, experiment with various Pandora channels (www.pandora.com). That provides you with a variety so you can figure out if you want to buy anything. Search words I've used are 'om', 'meditation' 'Steven Halpern', etc. Right now I'm listening to a Healing Earth channel that is quite lovely.
The best *instruction* for meditation I've ever come across is "Everyday Zen" by Charlotte "Koko" Beck.
She talks about 30-40 minutes a day at home, plus continual practise throughout the day. She also advocates attending allday/multi-day sesshins.
Personally, I have troubles going past 10 minutes a day, so that is all I ask of myself at the moment. I had some early improvements. I am now pretty much on a plateau, now that the newness has worn off, and the monkey brain is used to the new routine. I think future benefits are going to come much more subtlely, and incrementally.
meditation is really about sitting quietly and being aware,
aware of what you're thinking, what you're feeling, what sensations are in the body etc...
another name for this is mindfulness
so yes mindfulness does not end when meditation ends,
you continue to be aware throughout the day, you continue to be mindful
but this is not something difficult
this is actually your true nature, your true nature is awareness
Hello -
I am trying to get into meditation. I think it has had a postive impact in my life in the past - and would like for it to start again.
Any idea how much is too much? How much is enough? and how little is needed to be effective?
I have tried to meditate for 5 mins a day or so at the end of the night a few times a week - and seems to be having a positive impact. IE: I am less impulsive, reactive and carried away by emotion.
Meditation is not something someone does to be effective. If one has a goal it is a hindrance to being present. One meditates for the love of balance, now. It's not something to be done, rather it is to allow what is, to emerge. If resistance to thoughts or discomfort arises then that is what you're there for.
The right amount of time is however much you do. I became aware of a motive when I would keep track of meditation time, so I stopped.
If it becomes another item on your "to do" list, I wouldn't bother with it anymore. Are you trying to become more peaceful from meditation in the future? The Buddha was once quoted as saying, 'the trouble with you is that you think you have time'.
Attention to the breath is the simplest and easiest meditation and it is possible whenever it comes to you. If your attention goes elsewhere, where did it go? How did you react? If you got impatient with yourself, why? Are you "doing it wrong"? Or does thought just have you like it always does? Do you think you can control it? Or should?
These questions are things one might want to contemplate because my experience is that your mind is not to be controlled, that is just ego trying to control ego: a cat chasing its tail. Let your mind do what it does which is to pump out thoughts and more thoughts. If your attention is distracted or enchanted by the parade, stories and spectacle then good, that is what is. If you fight it or think you can do better, also good. I'm just not sure it's really true.
I use 4 minutes 2 x a day as a general guideline for sitting/breath awareness meditation. I also try to incorporate conscious practice of mindfullness throughout the day. Staying in the present, noticing my habits of daydreaming, projecting, getting ahead of myself.... gentley bringing my focus back to a more complete experience of NOW.
I think anything that gets you started is good, and short times are fine to begin with. Right now I have a busy schedule which means short times but I find that most of the time I need at least 30 minutes to really work through getting my mind turned off, work through some boredom and a fidgety body, and then actually do more of what I sat down to do. I hate to start attempting to describe this because so many authors do a better job, but focusing on what I would call insight. I probably spent the first 10 years just sitting and getting my mind to shut up before I understood the focus part. And I am still doing an inadequete job describing it. So I would try to work up to 30 minutes a little at a time so you get past that boredom threshold.
I agree with Xmac about focusing on time being a distraction in and of itself, and also that if meditation becomes another thing on the to-do list, it's sort of missing the point, as is meditating solely to "get something out of it." However, I find that I feel/think/behave "better" when I regularly meditate, and in turn respond to others more positively and more compassionately, so I'm attached to that outcome! There's the old story about the man who goes to the yogi saying "Guru, I used to meditate an hour a day, but now my wife is sick and I'm taking care of the children, plus I also have to go to work, and clean the house, and cook the food, and take care of my wife, and I just don't have time to meditate. What should I do?" The yogi answers, "Meditate three hours a day."
So for me, meditation is kind of like exercise. For both, I have a history of doing for awhile, then dropping it for weeks or months, then picking it up again, and so on. I've stopped beating myself up about this pattern, but when I want to start meditating or exercising again, I do notice that I have to get back into it gradually. So for increasing my "endurance," I do the same thing with meditation as I do with walking. The first day, I set a small timer for, say, two minutes. I begin to meditate and when the timer goes off, I'm done for the day. The next day, I set it for three minutes, and so on. In about a month, I'm up to about thirty minutes, which is really my own personal "saturation point" so far. (With walking, when the timer goes off I simply turn around and retrace my steps until I reach my starting point...in a month you can get up to walking an hour a day!)
Thanks for inspiring me to get back to meditating, after a lapse of several months! :)
Selah,
it sounds to me as if the guru in your story was trying to point out that meditation is about attention which doesn't have to take the form of formal sitting meditation. Everything we do can be meditation if it is done with presence/attention. There's a Buddhist line about doing the dishes as if every dish was a baby Buddha.
I find it's really quite wonderful-feeling if I sit for 15 minutes each morning. ymmv. Try different things -- see how you feel inside. Only you know what's right for you.
It would be hard to add to the wonderful response you received from Din and Xmac!
I would tend copy and read those posts several times.
Sitting with eyes closed is 'special meditation' - the rest of the day is 'ordinary meditation'.
These two are like length and bredth - they must always be together or there is nothing.
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