Meditation creates the moment

Meditation is a body-mind practice involving purposeful attention spent on a thought, moment, state, or experience. Different types of meditation include yoga, mindfulness meditation, Qi Gong, breathing exercises, guided meditations, and many other forms. Meditation cultivates a non-judgemental awareness of the practitioner's present physical and emotional state. High levels of perceived daily stress — defined as challenges that individuals view as taxing, or exceeding their ability to cope — are associated with lower levels of estrogen, luteinizing hormone, and progesterone, and with higher levels of follicle stimulating hormone. High perceived daily stress levels were also associated with increased rates of anovulation (a menstrual cycle where an egg is not released. However, even with these hormonal changes, high levels of daily stress were not associated with changes of menstrual cycle length and blood loss during menstruation.

Meditation  is a body-mind practice involving purposeful attention spent on a moment, state, or experience. There are many different types of meditation. My secular practices have been in Vipassan and Mindfulness-based Stress Reduction (MBSR) — both include letting go of thoughts and judgement, focusing on the breath, and observing physical sensations. Although meditation is rooted in altering the experience of the self, researchers in the West have discovered numerous psychosomatic (involving both the bodily/physical and mental/psychological) benefits of the practice. 

Meditation is the process of settling our mind in the present moment so that we are fully engaged with whatever we are doing at that moment, and consequently, it can apply to all aspects of our lives. For example, when we eat meditatively, we are fully present with eating, instead of eating with our mouth and planning the rest of our day with our minds. 

Through a meditation practice in its various forms including walking, eating, listening, and gentle hatha yoga. Careful attention will be given to the cultivation of non-judgmental, non-striving, moment to moment daily practice to create an optimal learning environ- ment for ongoing growth and development. The focus of attention is directed toward the develop- ment of student's first hand understanding of the body, mind, and body-mind interactions.

Most forms of meditation centre on the concept of mindfulness, which makes one aware of their moment-to-moment experiences; noticing and accepting their thoughts, feelings and emotions. This kind of meditation can be used in school to make students and teachers aware of how their daily experiences of school life are affecting their state of mind and, hopefully, to calm their reactions and thoughts throughout the rest of the school day.

Meditation involves a variety of approaches, which include repeating words with phonetic significance as in mantram meditation; paying attention or continually returning to the present moment as in mindfulness meditation; or tai chi and qigong, movement meditative practices that are components of traditional Chinese medicine.

First let’s consider the purpose of meditation and the forms it can take. Meditation is the art of creating a quiet mind and listening to the sound of silence. Where prayer is the act of talking with the Divine, meditation is the act of listening and truly hearing what God has to share with us. This can take place during special sacred moments that you set aside specifically for the purpose of meditation, or spontaneously. Activities when spontaneous meditations often occur are while brushing your teeth, in the shower, hiking, running, washing the dishes, mowing the lawn and yes, we have all had those auto-pilot moments while driving the car. 

And then there are the single meditations, which include walking, falling back asleep and meditations for anxious moments (like before interviews and exams). If there’s ever a moment when you could use some support (and some assistance processing the experience via meditation), Headspace is a brilliant resource. One potential challenge when first using this app is the possibility of overwhelm. Have you ever gone to the library and borrowed 20 books (which all sound like great reads), only to find yourself starting most of them and never finishing? Taking this approach with Headspace will likely leave you feeling lost and disheartened.

The beautiful part about meditation is "singular focus" — by that I mean, doing one thing and only that thing. When you sit to meditate, you have one goal — be there in that moment. It's easier said than done but the principle is what's important. If we apply that principle in our lives, it can serve us in many areas. When you're with your family or friends, be there in the conversation and moment. When you're coding, write code and focus on building. Meditation facilitates building this skill of living in the present. 

Although meditation is a purposeful activity in that you want to attain your goals by achieving a state of pres- ence in the moment, you should not be concerned with the purpose of meditation while you are meditating. While meditating, you guide your attention to the main activity of the moment, which in the initial practice is just sitting and breathing. Here you are using the breath as an object of meditation. Thoughts of why you are meditating, how well you are meditating, and what you are getting from meditating will arise.

Awareness of each breath in each moment brings about mindfulness. Mindfulness is a skill. It should be practiced and rehearsed in a controlled environment each day— this is meditation. When you rehearse full awareness of each moment in meditation, you carry this awareness into daily life. When you find yourself about to act on a poor impulse, mindfulness allows you to step back and return to the breath.

 Time creates history. Meditation creates the moment. Mediation on the Holy Scriptures, awakens our mind. Daily mediate and affirm the Scriptures; your mind and soul will be filled with pure thoughts.