MEDITATION: WHAT IT REALLY MEANS

In my opinion, meditation is one of the greatest gifts you can give yourself and a very powerful tool to have in your wellness toolbox. I have been meditating for many years and have a daily practice, which enables me to reconnect with myself daily.

Most of us are distracted and live too much in our heads. Very rarely do we check in and come into our bodies and notice how we are feeling.

For years, I focused on external things such as money, career and boyfriends to bring me happiness, but I’ve learnt that true happiness and contentment comes from creating peace from the inside out.

It’s almost like reversing everything we have been told in our Western culture and truly understanding that we actually have everything we need to be happy within us already — we just need to tap into it and work with it. This takes time, patience and practice, but with some consistency and work, meditation is one of the most worthwhile and rewarding practices to include in your daily life.

It has been said if you want more well-being, inner peace, happiness and less stress in your life, then learn how to meditate. Researchers at Harvard University even found that during the practice of meditation, the body has what they call “the relaxation response”. This gives the body deep rest, one that’s actually deeper than the rest we get from sleep.

Now I know that beginning a meditation practice can seem intimidating and often confusing, because there are so many different types and trends out there today. Trying to quiet your mind can also seem like an impossible task — when I first began, I thought I had to stop my own thoughts!

The good news is that not only do you not have to stop your thoughts, but you can let them come and go with ease during your practice. After all, it’s impossible to stop your thoughts unless your are enlightened or, indeed, dead.

I have been trained in many different types of meditation, and it’s important to find what works for you, because we are all so different. There is plenty of support out there today in the form of apps, websites, online courses, books and more.

I don’t believe that one type of meditation is superior to another, and in my own practice I use different supports such as mantras, visualisation and breathing techniques when I feel I need them. It’s important to note that you learn to meditate by meditating and you will grow with your practice.

Meditation allows us the opportunity to work with our mind and understand that we are not our thoughts, and that we can change them, and, in time, even catch them before they catch us.

In a study by The University of Wisconsin-Madison, scientists found the first evidence of specific molecular changes in the body following a period of mindfulness meditation. This is truly amazing because it shows us that genes do not automatically determine your future. This field is called epigenetics, and it is actually mainstream science and not, as you might think, on the fringe.

Basically, how you live can have an effect on your genes; it’s almost like a volume control button. Based on your day-to-day experience, the dial either gets turned up or down.

By including meditation in your daily life, it has been shown to have a positive effect on your gene expression. If you have children, this expression can be passed down through generations. So, changing your lifestyle habits today, can also help the next generation become healthier.

So not only can meditation change our brain activity and structure it, it can also have an effect on our genes.

Wait, there’s more: because we know each aspect of us is interconnected, recent research is also looking at the connection between meditation and our gut health. Because meditation elicits a relaxation response, it has been shown to have a significant impact on clinical symptoms of gastro-intestinal disorders, irritable bowel syndrome and inflammatory bowel disease.