So I have been sharing questions I get as a meditation teacher.
And one that is pretty common is,
What if I don't have time for one more thing in my life?
I'm pretty sure most of us feel like that a lot.
We can't do anything else,
Right?
My answer to that is,
That is exactly what meditation can help you with.
It can help you with creating,
Finding,
And making more time for things that you enjoy,
For things that make you feel good,
For things that most of us ignore,
To be honest.
Meditation can help you manage all the things you feel are taking all of your energy and time.
So clearing the mind,
Setting intention,
Allowing yourself space to breathe,
To connect with yourself,
To recognize what you are feeling is incredibly powerful.
Meditation,
As you know,
Changed my life,
Which is why I learned to teach,
Because I knew that I could help others do the same thing that I did,
Right?
It has helped me slow down so that I can be intentional in what I do,
How I show up,
And the energy that I have.
Meditation helps train the brain to pause,
To put space between whatever trigger or stressor stimulus we might have and the action we take or our response to that thing.
I'm sure many of you can relate to this.
I can easily have a really short temper.
I can easily get really,
Really,
Really impatient if I'm not mindful of how my body,
How my mind responds to the situation in front of me,
Things happening in my life.
So meditation has trained me.
I have trained myself using the tool of meditation to slow down and to process the situation before flying off the handle,
Which for most of us,
We really do that with no good reason.
There is not necessarily any quote unquote good reason to lose our temper,
To fly off the handle,
To be impatient.
It's just a response the body has when it starts to feel stressed,
Starts to feel overwhelmed.
So here are some other things that have happened.
I've talked about the responses and putting that pause in that a lot.
So that is probably not something completely new to you,
But some other things that have happened through having meditation in my life.
I stopped saying yes to things that I knew would drain me.
So I used to say yes to a lot.
And it was because I didn't want to let other people down or I felt like they were asking me and so I felt like I had to say yes.
I couldn't tell them no.
I couldn't like if I didn't say no,
I always had to like quote unquote find a good reason to say no.
And now I can say no simply because I know it's not the right thing for me.
It's not something that I either can do well,
Have the space or time to actually like show up and commit to it,
Or it will drain my energy and therefore I will be miserable doing it.
So that's one thing.
Another thing is that I look for ways every day to incorporate more of what I enjoy,
The things that make me feel good.
I'm more aware of them.
I notice them.
And so I'm trying to find ways to incorporate that stuff as often as possible.
And then I don't let the rest of the world hijack my day.
So I start with the things I know I need to accomplish.
I have a plan.
I'm mindful of what I can physically,
Mentally,
Emotionally accomplish in one day.
And therefore I don't take on too much.
I try really hard to be mindful of social media.
I try very hard to stick to specific working hours,
Checking email,
Responding to messages,
Things like that,
Because that can really suck a lot of our time and our energy without us even realizing it.
So meditation,
Long story short,
Helped me see where I was wasting time,
Where I was losing energy and what I was letting into my life that had no business being there.
And I know that you know exactly what I mean here,
Because we all do it.
We all let things into our life that really don't have a purpose,
But we feel obligated or expected to do these things for some reason or another.
Another bonus is that because I am paying more attention to how I feel,
To how things impact my mood,
My energy,
It has helped me stay more positive.
And I am not an advocate for toxic positivity.
That is a thing and that can be a serious problem,
But it has helped me stay more positive in general.
And being positive,
Looking for the good before the bad has countless benefits.
We are bombarded by negativity from all around us.
It takes conscious effort to drown that out and not let it consume our thoughts and our energy.
So if you think of an example where you had a negative experience,
You came across something maybe that frustrated you on social media or in your work or whatever it might look like and it just drained your energy.
You were consumed by this thing.
We can break that pattern and we can stop losing energy and time and all the things with being attentive to our own feelings,
Our own experiences.
Having a positive attitude can improve your physical and mental health.
It can obviously impact our emotional health and our immune system.
Our immune system is bombarded by tons of things.
Yes,
Our thoughts and being negative and thinking the worst of everything is one of those things that can drain our immune system.
So I don't know about you,
But I would like to let my immune system have a break as often as possible so that I can stay healthy and strong.
So these probably all sound like good reasons to try to look for the silver lining.
I know that's kind of cliche and it's a thing that's really hard to do sometimes,
But if we remember the benefits of trying to stay positive and trying to learn lessons and grow instead of getting sucked into all the negativity,
It's really,
Really powerful.
So I invite you,
If you have been on the fence about trying meditation,
To give it a try.
Find a short session,
Reach out if you'd like help with this and make time for it in your day.
Just make a little bit of time.
You can find a couple of minutes to take a chance on yourself and how this could work for you in your life.
You might find really amazing things in your mindfulness journey.
I am pretty sure actually that you'll find really,
Really amazing things if you take this journey to being more mindful,
To being more intentional in your life.
It's really,
Really amazing.
