“Seven good reasons why i can’t meditate” ;  )

Those are some of the things i heard over the years from good people while i was trying to teach meditation (Vipassana / Mindfulness Meditation):

And when i speak of meditation i don’t talk about sitting down sometimes with headphones and listening to a guided inner journey (which is nice!) and also i don’t mean to participate in group meditations where being with this group is the motivation.

I mean a consistent solitary meditation practice, all by yourself and for yourself. With no aid or convenience needed.

Something you do every day in the morning just like you brush your teeth or have a nice cup of coffee.

Something we should consider as mental/spiritual hygiene ;  )

Or building the spiritual muscle.

Something that could be part of the daily routine in kindergarten and part of the curriculum at school. This would be really a nice thing!

Anyway, here is a list of reasons, complains and challenges (or excuses) our mind comes up with when it comes to establishing a regular meditation practice.

Definitely i have heard all of the following uttered by my own mind (or rather whispered into my ear ;  )

– I Can’t Find The Time

– I Am Falling Asleep When I Meditate

– I Can’t Concentrate

– I Can’t Sit for Long Hours (Or Even Shorter Periods)

– I Am Dealing with Negative Astral Influences

– I Don’t See Any Results

– I’m Just Not Up for It

Well, i say, lets see if we can remedy that!

Here are some rather practical, reasonable and time-tested remedies that i suggest:

I Can’t Find The Time

That’s a good one, simply because it is true!

Nowadays, with our kind of western lifestyle there is never enough time in a day to all the things we ought to do, we simply have to do, we should do and we actually want to do. And our backlog of unread emails is in the 100s, right?

I see no other way out of that trap than:

Priorities, Discipline, Commitment

uuuups, i said it!

Lets rephrase those scary big words:

– a clear priority to make meditation a natural part of your day

It helps to tell somebody about your intention (buddy systems work!)

– a little bit of smart & practical discipline

It helps to set a nice wakeup tune on your phone 20 min earlier than usual.

It helps to put a reminder on your desk to have a break during the day to relax, breath and meditate for 10 minutes before going back to your important task at hand – refreshed.

– a pledge to strengthen your commitment

It helps to remind yourself that you can do anything and everything more effective when you are in a relaxed and balanced state of mind. When you are present in the here and now and in connection with your self. This should be enough reason to be committed and not let the practice slide because of outer circumstances.

~~~

I am falling asleep when i meditate

That’s good one too, because i know it well.

I remember, i must say.

During the first year of my journey into meditation i experienced 3 or so months when i fell asleep the moment i sat down on the meditation cushion. Just napped away in sitting and more often than not just fell forward soaring.

Nothing i tried could prevent that, my attempts and feelings of failure were simply pathetic.

Then my – then – good spirit gave me this perfect advice:

“Enjoy the sleep” she said, it is not real sleep but a kind of trance. As long as you hold on to your intention and not go to bed instead, you will be in a special kind of brainwave while you “sleep” there on the floor.

And it is just a period, it will pass.

And pass it did and i never had this “problem” again in my life (till now ;  )

So, the remedy is simple: It will pass!

Of course, on the pragmatic level we can do a few things:

– find enough good sleep every night. 7 – 9 hours per night is the perfect thing, this is what the specialists claim.

– have a real good sleep with no phones notifications, computer peeping and such, no tv before bedtime and such. Just what your mother would recommend ;  )

– read up on brainwave states, get informed what actually happens when you sleep and which phases and states you experience while you are “gone”.

A lot of cool stuff that will make you appreciate sleepy time in a whole new way. 

~~~

I Can’t Concentrate

Well dear, you are certainly not alone with that. And it’s not your fault either. (Not that this helps a lot with this problem, right? ;  )

But it is a fact that we are no Buddhist monks in a Himalayan monastery, trained from childhood to focus our mind, living in an environment that naturally emphasizes silence, stillness, meditation.

Very much on the contrary we eat distraction for breakfast, lunch and dinner ;  ).

It seems in our day and age the more distraction and entertainment we can handle the more cool we are. Twitter, instagram notification, facebook doom-scrolling, random TikTok video-ing, 1001 business emails. … ADHD is almost a must in such an environment.

Not to mention the cacophony of the ever-faster news cycle and fake-news onslaught.

How to handle that, how to counter that, how to meditate in such a world?

Again, my answer is pretty simple, the remedy is quite practical:

Meditation is not concentration

“What?”, you say: “Are you kidding man?”

No, i say, i am really serious ;  )

You really don’t need to be a worlmasteru in concentration to meditate.

You just need to sit and “meditate”

Sit and observe how your awareness slips from focussing on your breathing, slips into thinking about this and that and so on …

And when you notice this, you simply bring awareness back to the breath.

Breath in, breath out …

Thats all.

For now.

Over time you will notice how you will be able to stay with the breath longer and longer and your breath will get deeper and deeper and you will stay in the here and now more and more … naturally.

Your concentration-muscle will have become strong and reliable without you noticing it.

Meditation will happen without you needing to concentrate :  )

Easy, right?    ;  )

~~~

I Can’t Sit for Long Hours (Or Even Shorter Periods)

Hahaha, come on! Thats not a very good excuse!

Everybody can sit for 10 minutes or even 20 on a chair. Right?

Remedy 1:

Find a nice chair with a straight back, sit on it, meditate :  )

Remedy 2:

Sit on the floor on a meditation cushion by the wall, lean on the wall and put a soft cushion between your lower back and the wall.

Remedy 3:

Don’t do that!

  ~~~

I am Dealing with Negative Astral Influences

I know, this is happening to some people, its not a phantasy and it needs to be dealt with responsibly. It can be frightening but it should not be reason to stop to meditate.

I think there are two reasons for such experiences:

1 – People who are heavily addicted in some way, mostly to drugs, but could also be sex, they have holes in their Astral Bodies or rips where astral beings – called elementals – may try to attach in order to feed on such addictions.

My remedy:

Find yourself a spiritual healer who can mend the rips in the fabric of your Astralbody.

Find yourself a spiritual teacher who can show you how to seal your aura with Christ Light.

2 – Sometimes those experiences / voices / entities are not really astral vampires but parts of your own psyche. They are representing unfinished business from your past that wishes to be solved and integrated.

Like in dreams, they take on form to communicate with you.

My remedy:

Talk with them, those voices, ask them what they want, get to know them.

This will trigger a process of bringing them into the present and integrating those aspects into your whole Self.

Basic advice: Never be afraid of what is coming into your field of awareness when you meditate. It is always just another part of reality. So best is to deal with it.

~~~

I don’t see any results

No results on investment here, right? ;  )

What exactly are you looking for and how would you measure results?

Cosmic lights, Nirvana, ecstatic states, enlightenment, inner peace, levitation ;  ) …. ?

We definitely have been fed a lot of funny ideas / stereotypes about what the “goal” is of meditation.

And in reality – at least in my version of reality – meditation is a paradox where none of those stereotypes fit.

Remedy Nr 1:

Although meditation aims toward The Ultimate – Pure Consciousness, Absolute Freedom, Unconditional Love, True Essence –

it is only by letting go of all expectation, letting go of practically any goal and allowing yourself to surrender to what is, All That Is that ….

Well, probably then it is better not to say a word anymore, but :  )

Remedy Nr 2:

Sit and Meditate.

~~~

I’m Just Really Not Up for It

Thank’s for being so honest :  )

Saves us a lot of troubles!

The remedy for that again is pretty simple and straight forward:

Don’t do it!!!

But for the rest of us, i wish us a blissful time in 2021!

Blast off

You may also want to read this: How to Meditate, a bit more serious this time.

Or this: Dealing with the monkey mind. A quick primer on how to meditate