I am distracted by the difficulty in setting the right posture for my body while doing meditation.
Because my inability and issues with my hips and legs,
It's difficult to keep my back straight while I am meditating.
So there is a close relationship between body and mind.
So meditation,
Health of the physical body is important to meditation.
But physical health is not the essence of meditation.
So meditation is about focusing your mind.
However,
The basis of that is your physical body.
And if you lie down,
You would have experienced that your body is relaxed,
So is your mind.
But after a little bit,
Either you feel drowsy lying down or you have a lot of distracting thoughts.
So it becomes dull although your body is relaxed.
But if you stand up,
You are not drowsy anymore.
Your mind is clear.
However,
You are a little anxious.
Of course,
After you have been practicing a bit,
It is entirely possible to meditate while standing or even walking.
However,
To the beginning meditators,
Your mind is more relaxed sitting down than when you are standing.
And of course,
Your mind is not as dull as you are lying down.
So no matter what type of meditation tradition throughout the world,
For the beginners,
They all recommend sitting down as the optimal position.
So if you do have physical challenges and obstacles,
Sitting on a chair or lying down is possible.
But if you are not in a good position,
You may not be able to sit down.
So if you do have physical challenges and obstacles,
Sitting on a chair or lying down is possible.
But if you are not in a good position,
You may not be able to sit down.
But if we develop the habit early on to sit down like this in this position,
Obviously it would be a lot easier.
But we haven't.
Your body is going to resist.
And that resistance takes a form of pain.
But even pain that you feel on just cutting off blood flow to your leg or cutting your legs off,
After a while,
Actually it does get better.
But majority of people who give up actually cannot overcome that physical pain.
But if you are at all healthy physically,
Maintaining this posture and sticking with it will actually do you good after a while.
That's why for a beginner,
Although focusing your mind and maintaining equilibrium of the mind is important,
However one of these goals should be to also discipline your body to maintain this optimal posture.
So during meditation,
Obviously pain is an issue,
But also your body tends to relax and kind of not maintain the disciplined posture.
It basically goes back to its original comfort posture.
That's why if that happens while maintaining focus on your breath,
You should slowly correct your posture.
And if you have trouble maintaining a straight spine,
Put either 10 centimeters,
15,
Or however height centimeters of cushion underneath the back so that you can maintain the straight spine.
So if you have a problem with that,
You can put either 10 centimeters,
15,
Or however height centimeters of cushion underneath the back so that you can maintain the straight spine.
So you only really experience the physical pain in the beginning and eventually it's actually going to do you good because what you're doing is going back to your natural straight posture.
However,
If you have a physical disability or if the pain is too much,
Then you shouldn't be too attached on the physical position itself because that's the situation you face and you have to adapt.
