meditate every day

I found making my first, and second, mandalas an amazingly contemplative, soothing and revelational process. My boyfriend was deeply taken by the idea and upped pencils for the first time in years to produce a delightfully bold and complex first mandala which he took lots of time over.

I really think this is a great outlet and a lovely way to spend time- I’m going to make it a goal in its own right.

I’m not giving up on this goal as I KNOW it’s something that will be so good for me if I can achieve it.

My life has been pretty disjointed recently, which is a time when meditation would serve me well, but also inevitably a time when I am least likely to be in the right mindset to just sit down and do it for a little while each day.

I’ve been trying to be conscious of the need for meditative activity, because I have more success with this kind of meditation. I’ve been doing alot of knitting, which I find very meditative, likewise cooking.

I’ve been going through another burst of knowledge seeking and reading about lots of different things- one of which is mandalas.

Last night I sat down and drew my first mandala- I’m really pleased with it and found it a cathartic and enjoyable process to watch the design flow and unfold from me, and to clearly recognise elements of my reality in the image.

My focus was loose, but was around the idea of my self and my current state/situation. I named it awakening energies. When I have a camera I’ll take a pic. It features softly swirling spirals of blue, green, purple and pink, semi-enclosed and partly pouring into and out of a sharply geometric perimeter of black and red triangles.

It was a nice meditative activity to do before bed and I might try to do one most nights before sleeping, I have just the right kind of square artists pad in 2 sizes, portable and lap sized, so maybe this is their calling!!

I’ve been managing to meditate in some way most days- often before I go to sleep at night, I’ve done an energy meditation, drawing green life energy from the earth and cleansing myself of all the negative gunk and emotion from the day. I find when I do it I sleep really well and wake up feeling great. I have struggled to engage with the exercise the last 2 nights and can certainly feel the difference.

Being at home with my family for the festive season has been wonderful but tough. The first week or so I felt such a big energy drain and loads of emotional turmoil- as my family is going through a difficult time I put it down to empathy. I can;t remember how I came by it but I found an article about empaths and everything it said made so much sense to me and would explain a lot. But I’m a bit unsure how seriously to take it, I’m wary of labels.

I have however been doing the clearing and rejuvenating exercises recommended and found they’ve helped, whether psychosomatically or energetically.

Anyone know anything about empaths or have any thoughts to share?

As seems to be the case with most people working on this goal, it has gone totally out of the window of late due, strangely enough, to leaving work, travellikng around seing family and friends and moving house.

When I am spending so much of my time talking and getting very emotionally involved with things I find I get to a point where I am just in my head the whole time and becoming anxious again.

I feel like I’ve almost completely lost the calmm, assured peaceful state that I’d discovered, so I need to devote time to regaining that lost ground and try to just take a little time each day to meditate, and also to reflect.

I’ve been allowing myself to become very anxious and worked up because I’ve been moving around places every day and spending lots of time alone in strange and new cities. When not doing that I’ve been spending time with people who are very far in their heads and worked up about exams, so the combined effect has been quite bad and I’ve been feeling physical effecs of anxiety alot.

I KNOW that this is within my control, and need to take back the reins. I’m going to meditate now and then read some eastern philosophy to try and reconnect with that calm place that I know exists for me.

I just read a section in A New Earth about breathing and being aware of the breath as a meditation.

The passage suggested the benefit of just being aware of your breathing whenever you can remember to, and the fact that Formal meditation is not substitute for bringing space consciousness into every day life.

This resonates with me. Even though I may not have time for formal meditation every day. Remembering to be present is living meditatively and the greater objective.

Thursday and Friday were busy days for me and I didn’t take time out to really meditate completely alone. But I spent time just chilling and being still which is halfway there.

Must try a little harder to make time.

I meditated for 10 minutes this morning, felt peaceful and still but didn’t really manage to let go. My music kept getting stuck and the building work outside was distracting. But also my mind was giving me an annoying narrative on my state and I struggled to quiet it for long.

Perseverance and practice.

Managed to have a successful meditation. By successful I mean I felt at peace and experienced a short period of presence.

I experienced this as a warm orange and purple pulsing glow around my head and coming from inside my body and a feeling of floating stillness. It was beautiful, but I was trying too hard to hold on to it and so obviously it didn’t last so long.

I’ve got to just start really. Not like I need any equipment.

I’m wondering whether to do guided meditation or not. My inclination is not. I reckon that everyone has a way or a method that suits them best, but I just want to sit quietly and observe and recognise what’s going on in my mind.

Is this a valid approach? It certainly won’t do any harm and I think it’s the right approach for me so let’s see how it goes.