If you are new to meditation and you are looking to begin a practice, the following three tips should be very helpful.  I started meditating back in 1993 and I wish I would have come across an article like this at that time, as it took me at least two years to feel like I was experiencing any noticeable quality of transformation from meditation practice.

I believe that, if practiced with the right intention and attitude, meditation can create an instant shift in your life.  It does not have to take years.  So, let’s dive in and cover 3 important tips that will help you approach meditation in a way that can lead to immediate change in your life.

1.  Let go of the need for anything to happen aside from what is here right now ~

The best advice I can give you as a beginner is to go into meditation practice without expecting anything to happen.  Now, this does not mean that you expect nothing to happen.  Instead, it means that you allow yourself to have a completely open and accepting attitude toward the practice without clinging to a certain outcome.

In this sense, you are not meditating to be more relaxed, calm, peaceful, enlightened, or
awakened.  From a meditative perspective, these qualities are already with you; there is no need to search for them or to ‘work’ to develop them.  It is more a matter of letting go of that which prevents you from contacting them in this moment.

When we approach meditation with the attitude that we are using the practice to be something other than we are right now, we are missing the point.  Meditation IS who we are right now:  the good, the bad, and the ugly.  If we feel depressed and awful in this moment, these feelings are the meditation.  The idea is that we allow them to be there without putting an agenda over our feelings so that we can feel better.

In meditation, if we can just be with direct experience of what we call depression, we come to realize that it actually does not exist; it is just a label we give to feelings and sensations of discomfort.  When we drop the labels and just rest in the direct experience of our emotions, it becomes evident that there are no problems.  Every problem we have is generated from a mind that is steeped in resistance to present moment reality.

It is normal to approach meditation with a certain desire for change.  Otherwise, we would have no motivation to sit there and watch our minds.  But, we only allow this motivation to get us to the cushion–then we drop it.  We surrender to what is happening now, as that is the only gateway to peace in this life.

2.  Sit for at least 10 minutes every day for 3 months ~

Especially when you are first starting off, it’s important to sit at least a few minutes every single day.  Ideally practice first thing in the morning.  If you have time, a few minutes before bed is also a great window of time to practice.  Daily meditation creates a much deeper foundation for continued growth and awareness.

You will likely notice that if you feel a little off if you miss days of practice.  This is because meditation is a form of spiritual hygiene; it cleanses the mind of impurities, worry, stress, and impatience.  Just as you wouldn’t want to miss a day of brushing your teeth due to the plaque that would accumulate, you wouldn’t miss a day of meditation because of the mental clutter that would likely ensue.

3.  Get in your body ~

Many forms of meditation are focused on the chin up, meaning that your focal reference point in the brain itself.  While this can certainly be a powerful way to practice, it’s also very important to use meditation as a vehicle for becoming an embodied person.  This means that you are actually fully inhabiting your body; you’re not just living in your head.

You can inhabit your body more fully during meditation by bringing the breath more deeply into the abdomen and by paying attention to the sensations coursing through each specific bodily region.

By living in your body, you will notice that you have a heightened sense of intuition.  Life becomes a much more fluid and effortless experience.  You don’t second guess yourself so much, nor do you try to assume control over things that are inherently out of your control.  Meditation can be a very powerful method of realizing these important qualities.

I hope these 3 tips have given you a practical and helpful framework to build your meditation practice around.  You can learn more about meditation for beginners by clicking this link.