If you are among the people who had taking on meditation on their new year's resolution list, good for you. It's probably one of the healthiest decisions you'll ever make...if you actually manage to do it and reap the rewards, that is.
If this is your first go at it, you must be aware that the percentage of people that actually get the full benefits of restructuring their mind through meditation is small (compared to the number that decides to try it).
It's not easy
In other words, to mentally prepare for the process, be aware that root changes don't come easy and there will be obstacles along the way. The good news is that most of those obstacles are constructed and can be overcome in your mind, you just need to be aware of what's going on.
Excuses people have for giving meditation up
The process can be crudely compared to dieting, and most of us heard the voices that prevented us from establishing healthy eating habits. They come in a range of forms, anything from, "I'm way to busy," to, "it's not working fast enough.
The same voices, those of inertia and resistance to change, will whisper similar things on the road of taking on meditation. When push comes to shove, you'll find yourself thinking that meditation takes too much of your time or that you can relax just as well in front of the TV.
The voices will be there, have no doubt about it. They will also be wrong every time, don't doubt that either.rnProperly done, meditation is not a new-age fad. It goes back as far as 1,500 before CE (Common Era). Arm yourself with patience, ignore the voices resisting the change and go through the steps until they become your second nature. Don't succumb to common excuses to give up.
Tricking your" mind
One of the most common complaints "newbies" have is that meditation is boring. Again, it's an equivalent of saying that going to the gym. It's only when you feel the full effect that you start sincerely enjoying the experience you'll be able to get over yourself here.
To be practical, just diving in "cold turkey" is rarely practical. Use a bit of "trickery" to give the process some rhythm and enjoy it from the get-go.
Make it interesting
When we join a gym, we tend to buy ourselves new gym clothes. We do it for two reasons - we feel better about the whole thing, and we subconsciously know that if we spend more in the process, we're more likely to stick with the program.
Meditation is a spiritual experience, and the end-game (one aspect of it) is overcoming the obsession we have with the material. But, at the very beginning, rewarding yourself with an interesting gadget will not only keep it all more interesting but will speed the process of forming a habit along.
Preparation is key - drowning out the noise
Noise-cancelling headphones
If you ever found yourself day-dreaming about being able to hit pause on everything around you just like Adam Sandler does in "Click," you'll love the new technology in the noise-cancellation arena.
Modern noise cancellation doesn't mean muffling down the sounds around you; it's so much more than that. These days, active noise cancellation is used in a range of products, from headphones to sleep ear buds. "Active" here means that your headphones cancel out the noise by emitting sound waves of their own to intercept the incoming environmental noise.
How to use them for meditation?
Slipping away for 40 minutes after having fed 3 loud kids and before doing the laundry is not the way to approach your meditation plans.
It might offer you some me time, but it's not likely to yield long-lasting results.rnTo get most out of the time you dedicate to meditation, you'll want to wind down before it. In practice, this means that you can use that subway ride home to isolate yourself from the noise and the fast-paced images of thing happening around you.
It used to be true that over 90 % of all stimuli comes visually. Those numbers are based on studies, and research that's a few decades old and things have changed since, especially in urban environments. We're convinced that doing that kind of research today would yield different results - with much more of "noise pollution" involved.
The bottom line
Meditation or no meditation, you'll likely love what noise-cancelling headphones can offer.rnSpeaking in terms of meditation, they should be used before the actual dedicated time. The first (and more obvious benefit) is giving your brain a break from the noise. The second (probably just as important) benefit is establishing a routine that will "tell your brain" what's coming.
If you enjoy nice 30 minutes of relaxation ambient music before meditating each and every day, you'll soon have formed a conditioning behavior pattern. More about the ways you can put them to good use here.rnTo put it simply - your brain will be ready for those precious minutes of meditation.
The issue of price
We mentioned that the modern noise-cancellation technology is nothing short of revolutionary. The issue is that they come with a price tag to match.rnDon't splurge here, test the waters with a set of budget noise-cancelling headphones. You can get a solid pair even for under $100. You can see some recommendations for the
best models in the lower price range here
Final tip - don't rely on gadgets to do the work for you
It might sound contradictory but no matter how interesting of a gadget you get, remember what it's for - developing healthy meditation habits.
Some of them will give help you get some peace on their own. It's easy to enjoy that new-found peace and lose sight of the big picture. Do enjoy every minute of the process but do not take your "eye of the ball".rnYour goal is to re-set your brain and the way it processes information, not to get a short-lived relief from the everyday rat-race.rnStay calmrn