I took some quiet time to meditate in my patio today as part of doing different things to get in the habit of meditating more. It was a beautiful sunny day and since I didn’t have time to go all the way to the beach, my little patio which doesn’t get much use, was a great alternative. The wind was rustling in the leaves of the trees nearby and it felt very peaceful. I also bought a butterfly plant and plan on buying some more so I can spend more time outside writing in nature and observing the process of the caterpillar transforming into a butterfly. U used to do that alot!
Artículo en Español: Limpie El Desorden Mental Y Encuentre La Voz Interior
To be able to get in a good flow of words, writing requires silence especially, in my case, where I want to share more thoughts from the heart. It’s that nudging inner voice that calls me. Since I was lucky to be able to dedicate alot of time in the past to quiet meditation and silence, I crave it more than chocolate and my favorite sushi meal. It gave me an experience of love as close to loving my own child.
Maybe that is why I feel inspired to write more about that. I want to share my experience of trusting that silent voice, of letting go and really letting God. It took me many years to completely trust that inner voice. I now hesitate sometimes only because my mind is so busy with so much technical stuff from my day to day work activities. It is hard to slow my mind down.
The good thing is that when I do sit to meditate, it’s like an elephant’s memory. It remembers and I usually can get in a good zone pretty quickly. To be able to get to that state, it requires discipline and changing some habits. It’s like getting in the habit of exercise or eating healthy, which I believe are two important components to getting into a peaceful state. I shared a video on tips to do exercise at home just to get motivated here.
Exercise releases endorphins and stress to clear out the mental chatter. I sometimes have my best meditations right after exercise or even during! Eating too many carbohydrates and fatty foods makes you more lethargic and heavy. Meditation is about feeling lighter!
Some of the things I will be doing more which I hope you join me in the process of finding more peace are:
- Put the cell phone away from the night table to not get distracted with last minute checking of email and or social media in the evening. I would turn it off, but I use that as my alarm clock.
- Find an hour long meditation music on You Tube. Turn that on while cooking instead of having the TV on. I usually do that when I clean the house. The one embedded above is an example I found on You Tube.
- Wake up an hour or earlier and meditate every day for 30 minutes and then write for the remainder of the hour. Right now I am meditating about 3x per week, but at random times. I would like to get back to doing it every day at the same time to stay consistent. If you haven’t meditated before, try starting out 3x per week and sit in silence. Don’t worry about a technique for now. Just enjoy the quiet time even if your mind is running with alot of thoughts. With practice, it will slow down.
- It is hard to stay away from Social Media because that is my work. I have to get online. But I can limit the amount of time I check my personal feeds.
- Take more time to plant a butterfly garden. I used to have one and those butterflies were my writing muses. But since I moved last year, I have a patio with some empty pots waiting for something fresh and new plants. I bought two the other day and plan to add more.
Things I already do:
- Reduced the amount of TV time to one hour every other day. I used to hardly ever turn on the TV. But the TV time was replaced with digital time online. I am reducing that now at night. I am starting to read inspirational books instead.
- Exercise at least three times per week. Eat lots of vegetables and fruit. I am not a vegetarian as I do enjoy meat, chicken and fish. But I eat in small portions throughout the day to not feel heavy at any one sitting.
- I cut down on networking events which made me crazy busy and hardly gave me any down time.
As time goes by, I will share more things that I do to help me get back to my prime flow of writing. Even if writing is not your thing, the quiet time will help you gather your thoughts to clear the clutter of noise in your mind. The purpose is to hear a clearer inner voice more often to help you find your own calling and then trust it. And who knows, you might get not only a clear voice, but a clearer vision of something new down the road for yourself. Let’s do it!