This week I'm going to talk to you about mind control. I'm not talking about some kind of clandestine technique where you get to take control over someone elses mind. For now at least I'm going to tell you how to control your own mind...I'm sure that most of you have heard of hypnosis. This is a method to put someone into a suggestible state, and to then issue them commands that the subconscious can act on. Well, that's not what I'm going to tell you about...
Some of you will have heard of NLP, or Neuro Linguistic Programming. This is a set of rules to re-program the mind using the way that the brain works. This is also not what I'm going to talk about...
What I'm going to tell you about is a much older technique, one that has been about for thousands of years, and has been taught by some of the wisest people throughout history... I'm talking, of course, about meditation.
Meditation has many uses. Some meditation techniques are very complex, involving long visualisations, chants and activities to focus and re-program the mind. Some meditations use very similar techniques to hypnosis and NLP to re-direct the minds energies along different channels.
All of these things can be useful, but for now I'm going to tell you how to just calm the mind down. I used to have a mind that was out of control, as I'm sure many of you have. It is the normal human condition to have a little voice in our heads telling us things. Often we have no control over this little voice. Sometimes the voice is negative or critical. Sometimes we even think that the little voice is ourselves! Nothing could be further from the truth.
All that the little voice is is our thoughts. Our thoughts are generated by our mind in response to things that have happened in our past. We are not our thoughts... we are much more then that. It is natural for thoughts to arise. What creates problems is when we give too much validity to thoughts, chasing them around inside our head, allowing one to link to another, to link to another. I'm sure most of you have had sleepless nights where it seemed like our thoughts had a life of their own, running round and round inside our heads...
So. How can meditation help with this? In its simplest form all that meditation is is quieting the mind. The idea is to empty the mind. The easiest way to do this is to focus on one thing to the exclusion of anything else... And I don't mean focusing on the TV!
The best way to do this is to be somewhere reasonably quiet, and to make yourself comfortable. Not too comfortable... you don't want to fall asleep... but find a chair that you can sit in comfortably, or somewhere you can lie down. Set yourself an alarm for 10 minutes (to start, later you can go for 15, 20 even 30 minutes). Make sure you won't be disturbed. Turn off your phone. Turn off any distractions... TV, radio, music...
Once you are comfortable just focus your attention on one thing. The easiest thing to focus on is your breathing. This will have the added bonus of relaxing you more. You want to be taking long, deep breaths. For a guide you should aim for five seconds breathing in, three seconds pause then five seconds breathing out, then another 3 seconds pause.
And that is it! Sounds simple doesn't it... The first time you try this you will realise how undisciplined your brain is! The trick is not to get annoyed when your mind inevitably wanders. Just notice that you aren't thinking of your breathing any more and focus your attention to your breathing once more.
You will get better and better over time at noticing that your mind has wandered. The first time you could go for a few minutes without noticing! The trick is to notice sooner and sooner, so eventually as soon as a thought arises you can notice that it has arisen, and get back to your breathing. Once you notice the nature of the mind to create distractions you can take control over it much better.
Your body will also try to get into the act of distracting you. You will probably develop itches in the most unlikely parts of your body! Resist the urge to scratch these itches. All they are is the body calling for attention. I have found that once I notice an itch, if I focus all of my attention on it, then it will go away!
Practice this as much as possible. If you say to yourself "But I don't have time" then just think about that for a second... is it really true that you don't have 10 minutes a day to sit down? How much time would you be willing to sacrifice for peace of mind? Just take a second, and imagine a you, but a you without any negative self talk or un-necessary worry going through your mind...
Now, isn't that worth ten minutes?
Can we focus on a turn-off TV? :-P
ReplyDeleteI tried to meditate 15 mins. It's actually easier than I thought but I reckon it's because I did this first thing in the morning so my mind has already been quite still.
Walking mediation is another option but I think it's harder for a beginner but it's good for the people who don't like to sit still LOL
Good article! I like it :-)
For people who want to try walking meditation, you no longer focus on your breathing but focus on your steps instead.
ReplyDeletePrimary level: You focus on stepping forward of your right & left foot.
Intermediate level: In each step, you focus on lifting (the heel), pushing, dropping, and touching (the ground). Keep focusing on each process of a step continuously and keep walking.
Advanced level: Similar to Intermediate level but you focus more on the details of your movement. You require a self-awareness on raising (the heel), lifting (the leg), pushing, dropping, touching the floor, placing, and pressing.
However, you may need a quiet park or a fairly spacious living room which is big enough to walk around :-)