Types of yoga meditation techniques for beginners
The yoga meditation techniques are a healthy practice that helps to focus. It promotes inner peace and awareness. Regular practice of yoga meditation techniques creates a balance between emotions, concentration, and stress.
Meditation has different forms. Thus, we can choose any of its types which we find comfortable.
It is also known as Dhyana, one of the elements of yoga. The word Dhyana implies focus. It describes focusing your mind than stressing it with a scattering mind.
Meditation is a practice to train your brain. The mindful exercise includes forms of concentration and focuses on different spots. There is not only one way to practice it. Instead, there are numerous yoga meditation techniques to choose from.
Practicing each form of meditation technique leads to the development of new mental skills. As a beginner, you may find it painful to sit for hours and focus on nothing.
Therefore, as a beginner, you should start concentrating on your breathing. It will help you increase your focus and stills your brain from wandering thoughts.
You can also focus on a single mantra, at a candle flame, sound of nature or gong, or can count beads on mala. These improve the pulse of the mind resulting in better concentration power.
In the beginning, focusing for a few minutes can be beneficial. As you practice it, you can increase your duration of meditation practice.
At first, you may find your mind shifting. Rather than getting indulged in thoughts, let them go. This process will improve your ability to focus.
MINDFULNESS: YOGA MEDITATION TECHNIQUES
Mindful meditation makes you observe your emotions regarding the thought that drift your mind. You become more aware of your ideas, your pattern of thinking, and your sentiments.
Do not indulge yourself in the thoughts. Instead, simply observe what is going on in your mind. It is a kind of self-inspection that helps you realize the human tendency to judge experiences. You can achieve inner balance through such practices.
In some meditation schools, students learn concentration appended by mindfulness. Stillness introduces discipline in life. Therefore, they consider it an essential part of their lessons.
BENEFITS OF MEDITATION
Meditation provides us health advantages in abundance. Some of them are listed below:
- Relaxes your body and mind
- Improves blood circulation
- Maintains blood pressure
- Steadies heart rate
- Lowers blood cortisol level, which is responsible for the stress level
- Improves breath volume
- Increases concentration power
- Implements correct posture
Several researchers confirm its long-term benefits and positive effects on brain functions. They also say that one who consistently practices meditation has a healthy immune function.
MEDITATION GROUNDING
1. Find a peaceful environment.
Meditation renders peace of mind. Therefore, always practice it in a quiet place.
A tranquil environment will help you focus better on the task at hand. It avoids distraction and endorses inner peace.
The space for meditation practice should not be very high and should not be very low. It should be moderate at its place.
Yoga meditation techniques are beneficial if practiced in sunrays. Moreover, it is delightful around some natural places like parks, gardens, beside the river, etc.
For meditation, contributes to inner tranquility, choose a place away from distractions.
A place for meditation should not include any machine or equipment that scatters your attention. Instead, the site you choose should be helpful in concentration. Make sure you are at least away from the loud irritating noise of traffic and machines.
Your meditation site need not be sound-free. So, there should not be complete silence all around. Relatively there could be soothing music to increase concentration.
You can include classical music to support your meditation period. Several researchers found that classical or instrumental music or any natural sound of chirping, flowing water, etc. have profound impressions on our mind and work. It helps us complete our tasks without inconvenience.
You can also look for your favorite space where you find yourself comfortable and less dilute.
2. Wear relaxing clothes
While practicing yoga, wear comfortable clothes. Clothes should be loose and suitable for yoga practice, mostly includes breathing exercises and asanas.
If you are uncomfortable in clothes, you would not be able to focus your mind anywhere. It is helpful to remove shoes and carry a mat for yoga meditation techniques.
If you live in the chilled climate region, do not forget to wear proper clothes like a sweater and a cardigan to prevent cold. Moreover, you should reduce your distractions as much as possible.
Being comfortable with the surrounding supports you to consume your thoughts. You will find it quite helpful when you practice it consistently for some time.
3. Opt specific time for yoga meditation techniques
Before practicing yoga, you should determine a time for the practice and how long you should meditate.
If you are a beginner, you can start your meditation sessions for 5 minutes a day. However, as you gain command over it, you can increase your sessions to hours.
Though you can practice anytime, you feel reasonable. The most optimum time for meditation is early morning and evening.
You should maintain the time outline which you have decided. You may think it does not work for you. But, its regular practice shows long-lasting results.
For profitable results, stay consistent with meditation practice. Fix your schedule of the day and take 5-10 minutes from the day for meditation practice.
Track your meditation practice with simple methods without distracting yourself. For instance, you can set a soothing alarm to indicate an extension of time.
If you involve music while meditating, you can differentiate time intervals by different sounds or music records for the increased session.
This way, you could easily track your meditation time. You may look for different indications, like the ticking of a clock or a specific sun position.
4.Perform some yoga asanas to introduce flexibility throughout the body
Meditation involves a long time sitting at a place in a particular position, which may cause stiffness in your joints. Therefore, stretching and relaxing yoga help resolve the problem.
A stretching practice like cardio, yoga asanas before meditation improves blood circulation and refreshes us. This activity promotes focusing your thoughts.
It is significant to stretch your arms, shoulders, and neck as long hours of sitting in front of a computer may ruin your posture and blood flow. Besides, try stretching your legs entirely to practice meditation for elongated periods.
Learn some new and relaxing yoga asanas, which recover your blood circulation plus improves health conditions. It motivates you to give your 100% in any work and make your work more efficient.
5. Sit comfortably and in the proper position
Since it is essential to focus your mind, you need to be comfortable first. For that, you must choose a comfortable asana that you find easy to do.
The most preferred way of sitting includes padmasana, sukhasana, and kamalasana. However, as a beginner, you may find it hard to sit in such a position for long.
Therefore, you must choose some flexible exercises to improve your flexibility. However, you may sit in any position you find comfortable, like sitting straight on a chair, cushions, meditation bench.
You can sit on a mat or in any position, and ensure your posture should be straight. So, it would be active while meditating. Thus, make yourself comfortable and easy.
You can also choose a yoga meditation bench, which provides you the correct posture to meditate. If you do not feel comfortable, not a problem, you are free to sit in any comfortable position.
6. Sit straight
Once you have a seat (comfortably), straighten your spine. It is an essential part of meditation to sit straight so that your back is in perfect position. This position of vertebrae makes you relax and responsive at the same time.
When we sit straight, the weight of the neck, head, and torso are balanced. In such a way, it becomes easy to concentrate as our body parts are well balanced.
Its practice may help you improve your sitting posture. Try to relax each part of your body as this will improve blood flow through your body.
While practicing meditation, one also learns self-awareness, discipline, and self-care. By following such steps, you become self-aware and care more about your body and leads to a disciplined practice every time.
Practice the yoga meditation technique with your right hand above the left hand, on your laps. Or can also rest your wrists on your knees with the palm facing upward.
These positions of your hands, including composing posture, are considered helpful in meditation.
7. Close your eyes and focus
It is good to close your eyes while meditating to avoid visual distractions. You can also open your eyes while performing different yoga meditation techniques.
Moreover, choose simple concentrating activities as a beginner. Learn different states and forms as you practice them regularly.
TYPES OF YOGA MEDITAITON
1. Trace your breath
The most basic form of meditation includes a concentration on breathing. You do not need to change your breathing pattern. Concentrate on your normal breathing. It is normal to get distracted in the beginning.
Concentration comes through practice. Besides, you have to refocus on breathing. Make sure that you do not drown in any thought which comes to your mind while meditating.
2. Improve your focus with a mantra
You can improve your concentration by focusing your mind on chants or mantras.
It is also known as Mantra Meditation. In this form of meditation, you need to focus on the mantra that you keep chanting while meditating. So, you have to repeat the chant continuously and focus.
This practice removes distraction or useless thoughts in the mind. Try any mantra that causes relaxation. It may be any positive word or phrase.
However, if you like to use traditional mantras, then Om is a one-word mantra that you should practice.
It is practiced in most common chants because it is recognized as the sound of the universe. Hence, it is deemed to provide many health and emotional benefits.
Repeat the mantras over and over. And focus your mind on the mantra you whisper. In case you are drifted away by the thoughts, refocus on the mantra. Observe the vibrations created through the mantra.
As you reach a deeper level of consciousness, you become more aware and less distracted by unnecessary thoughts.
3. Take the help of visual creations
It is sometimes easier to focus on apparent targets than on abstract conceptions.
Therefore, this form of yoga meditation technique focuses on outer world objects. Here, you can use simple visual entities to focus your mind.
This open-eye meditation is simpler to focus on without being distracted by thoughts. The visual objects to focus on, including the flame of a candle, any structure, or point.
Make sure the concentration spot is equal to your eye level. So your neck will not strain. Now, gaze at the point till your vision faints. It consumes your vision and may appear to move.
Once you are focused, you will be going to feel a boost in your senses and emotions. It also enhances your willpower.
4. Prefer visualization
Visualization is another form of meditation. While meditating, closing our eyes, it is difficult to focus on nothing. Therefore, visualization is a type of vision in your mind, where you can easily concentrate.
You can imagine any place, riverbank, personal space, where you want to go. You can also include some images of birds, mountains, temples, etc.
It works as you are creating a personal world. So, provide it the excellent details that you can. Most importantly, feel the surroundings and space you are visualizing.
You focus the details more to indulge and enter a deeper level of meditation. You can also focus on different visuals every time or can have the same place to visit in mind.
Close your session with deep breath practice. It relaxes your mind.
5. Heal yourself
A person can easily relax his whole body while meditating. It works like body scanning.
Sit properly, and focus on your breaths, then shift your focus to body parts, one by one.
This activity helps them to relax and heal.
It is helpful to start from the bottom and then move your focus upward. For example, concentrate on your feet. Provide them proper blood flow through visualization and remove every strain.
When it feels healed, move your focus on joints and then every part by turn. Focus your mind on every body part and reach the top part of the head.
The duration of concentration on each part depends on you. You may take as much time you like to provide on each body part.
6. Meditation Walk
Nobody has time for other relaxing activities. Many barely get a little break from extended sitting hours. But do you know you can perform both the tasks at the same time simultaneously?
Yes, a person can use the time of leisure for meditation also. Walking meditation is a meditation method where you can concentrate and exercise at the same time.
Choose a quiet and least distracting place to practice walking meditation. Practice meditation barefoot as you can feel the ground while walking. If possible, choose a grassy area to walk over.
Keep your back and neck straight and walk at a slow pace. Also, since the ground and grass, you feel with your feet.
Try to focus on every natural sensation you encounter. The breezes, breath, chirping sound also relax your mind from every thought. Few minutes of the walk can reduce stress in your mind and help you connect to your consciousness.
MEDITATION IN OUR DAILY LIFE
1. Try to make yoga and meditation a part of your daily life
Schedule your daily meditation practice at the same time of day. After some consistent efforts, it will become your habit that you perform daily.
Early morning is an excellent time for practice because your mind is fresh and not obsessed. It is beneficial to practice in the early breezes of the day as they are unpolluted and refreshing.
Healthy eating habits like a balanced diet, combined with meditation, will improve your health and enhance your brainpower.
Moreover, meditation after eating is not a good idea to run. After eating, a part of your mind gets busy in digestion function.
Therefore, your mind cannot concentrate properly after eating. Thus, meditate after a few hours of gap after eating.
2. Meditation classes can polish your methods
If you think you still need some guidance, you may join meditation classes. You may find several online practice classes by experienced guides.
There are also many meditation centers available by gyms, schools, offices, etc. They find it a way to make people more productive as it is considered the best way to release stress.
You can also look for several days or weeks of meditation practices at centers. It can also help to schedule and create a regular habit.
Apart from this, you may look forward to various apps available for meditation practice. You can practice it anywhere you feel comfortable, like in the garden, beside a tree, or any favorite spot.
Such arrangements can help you achieve more results through complete meditation practice every day. You become more conscious of your works, behavior, emotions and more stress-free through
meditation.
3. Read meditation and inspirational books
You may find it beautiful and more enhancing when you will read about it and its benefits.
You can also pick some sacred texts, which reflect some essential elements of healthy living. Similarly, you may include several new components in your daily practice.
Read meditation books. Reading more about meditation is an influence that inspires several people and also aims for inner peace.
4. Practicing meditation is also practicing mindfulness
Meditation never confines to a practice interval. Instead, it can be a part of every work you do, day and night.
It is a state of consciousness. It helps us involve fully in projects we are doing at the office or work at home.
For instance, excessive work pressure may create sleep problems that affect other tasks well. Meditation surely can help you cope with the situation.
For quick relief, just take some time and empty your mind. Try to focus your mind on deep breaths. Performing such concentration activities help you focus on the task at hand.
For instance, while having a meal, elders often ask you to keep your mobile away. They ask to prevent every distraction from you. So, you focus on what you are eating.
This healthy practice is known as mindful eating. It helps to keep track of how much you are eating. Plus, this eating practice helps maintain an average intake of food.
Becoming more aware of yourself and your surrounding environment can help you be more effective in your tasks. Regular meditation will help you attain this mindfulness.
5. Try to be in the present state
Our mind runs after many thoughts every minute. It sometimes makes us so stressed that we keep wandering from past to future and forget what is going in the surrounding.
Thus, you must focus on some spots or any sensation like breathing, heartbeats, etc. You can focus on any tree, river, and sky, anything that makes you realize your presence.
You become more aware and relaxed when you focus your mind on such spots. This process makes you aware of your surroundings and is present for the work you are going to do.
It increases your efficiency and makes you sensitive towards your surroundings.
Hey! do you know why the sound of metal or gong is considered healthy. It is because the sound of metal creates a particular vibration that kills germs and negatives all around. That’s why we focus on the sound of gongs and metals.