Transcendental Meditation

The goal of this technique is to achieve inner peace without concentration or effort. 

A person is assigned a mantra to repeat in a specific way. It is practiced 20 minutes twice each day while sitting comfortably with eyes closed.

It is also called visualization or guided imagery, where you form mental pictures or situations that you find relaxing.

It is commonly led by a guide, and practitioners are encouraged to use as many senses as possible to evoke calmness.

Buddhists have meditated for literally thousands of years. Buddhists are trying to hack their own minds, to harness them.

Only in recent times have neuroscientists discovered that meditation changes the brain physically.

• Meditation improves attention. Studies show that 20 minutes a day are sufficient to get beneficial results.
• Meditation reduces stress after eight weeks of training.
• Meditation has also been shown to increase levels of empathy.
  

The intention of calming meditation is to cultivate a quieter, more peaceful state of mind and improved concentration.

Insight meditation often sets an intention to transform the mind by developing qualities such as wisdom and compassion. 

Many meditation techniques combine elements of both.

It uses the object of your breath to focus attention and maintain awareness. If your mind starts to wander, return your attention to your breath.

Concentration meditation involves focusing on a single point. 

In this form of meditation, you simply refocus your awareness on the chosen object of attention each time you notice your mind wandering. Through this process, your ability to concentrate improves.

Mindfulness meditation encourages the practitioner to observe wandering thoughts as they drift through the mind. 

Through mindfulness meditation, you can see how your thoughts and feelings tend to move in particular patterns.

Less stress leads to less anxiety.

Regular meditation helps reduce anxiety and anxiety-related mental health issues like social anxiety, phobias and obsessive-compulsive behaviors.

Some types of meditation can improve depression and help you maintain these benefits.

• Two studies of mindfulness meditation found decreased depression in over 4,600 adults.
• One study found that participants experienced a long-term decrease in depression.

There are many different meditation styles to suit your personal approach to meditation. Beginners usually choose to start with guided meditation and then experiment with other different approaches.

The length of meditation will impact on how successful it will be.

• One study reported 5 hours' worth of meditation over a two-week period was enough for smokers to reduce their intake.
• Another study noted that regular 30 minutes meditation sessions can increase the density of brain matter in areas associated with memory, stress and empathy.

Meditation is exploring. When we meditate we venture into the workings of our minds: sensations, emotions and thoughts.

Mindfulness meditation asks us to suspend judgment and unleash our natural curiosity about the workings of the mind, approaching our experience with warmth and kindness, to ourselves and others.

“Mindfulness is awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgmentally. And then I sometimes add, in the service of self-understanding and wisdom.”

1. Arts and crafts, including but not limited to coloring, pottery and knitting.
2. All varieties of yoga.
3. Go for a walk. Notice how your breath feels. Notice your feet walking.
4. Singing, humming and whistling.
5. Free-writing before bed.
6. Cooking is filled with basic tasks that let you focus on all sorts of sights, smells, tastes and textures.

Meditation helps to counter our tendency to stop paying attention to new information in our environment. Other studies have found that mindfulness meditation can reduce mind-wandering and improve attention.

Larger randomized controlled trials are still needed to understand how meditation might work with other treatments to help people manage attention-deficit disorders.

Long-term, consistent meditation mindfulness changes our ability to handle stress in a better, more sustainable way.

• Practicing meditation reduces the inflammatory response in people exposed to psychological stressors.
  
• Mindfulness practices help us to be less reactive to stressors and to recover better from stress when we experience it. 
  

Meditative practice has no motive, except to experience the present moment. Simple as that. 

Meditation practiced for this reason transcends everything else. You can throw in the process all sorts of mantras and breathing techniques you can. But the point still stands, to meditate is to be in the now.