Last Month I discussed wanting to participate in a Meditation Challenge. I wanted to do this because I wanted to clear my mind and work on calming myself down. I’m happy to report that I was able to mostly* complete the challenge and managed to meditate almost 20 mins every day for a week straight. I’m really proud of myself because I was unsuccessful when I tried to do a Yoga Challenge a few months back. I feel like I was able to calm my mind and lower my anxiety before bed. I learned quite a few things in those 7 days and I decided I should share those things for those who may consider meditating or are just curious about how it went for me. Here are three things I learned while completing my meditation challenge.
Morning Meditation is not for me (at least not for 10 mins)
Before I started the meditation challenge, my goal was to meditate 10 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes before bed. While meditating 10 minutes before bed was easy, I found meditating in the morning really difficult. I kept falling back asleep and even when I wouldn’t, it just didn’t like starting my day that way. I do think that if I had chosen 5 minutes for morning (or maybe even just a mindful minute) I would have liked it much more. However, meditating does not have to be done in the morning to be effective. There are other ways to practice mindfulness that don’t require meditating like __________. I will probably try to just sit in silence for 1 minute every morning because I did like not grabbing my phone first thing in the morning and having time to sit with myself.
Journaling before meditating reduces my thoughts being all over the place
Idk about you but my brain is always thinking of something else. However, during this challenge I realized that meditating without journaling beforehand really sets me up for a notsofocused meditation session. While learning to be focused is always a challenge regardless of what you do before meditating, a good old brain dump definitely helps me reduce the amount of times I stray off during my meditating. Even if I only journal/brain dump for 5 minutes beforehand, it helps me get a little more focused. If you struggle with staying focusing during meditation I definitely recommend this.
It’s okay to get distracted, mindfulness takes practice
Speaking of staying focused, if you’re new to meditating don’t beat yourself up about not being able to focus on your breathe or being present for the entire 5/10/20/however long minutes. Meditation is a practice and you will not be a superstar at it when you’re first starting out. We are used to the hustle & bustle of society and sitting in silence and trying not to think about anything is the polar opposite of that. It’s going to take time and HELLA PRACTICE. Be cool about it and you will slowly but surely get better at it. I barely improved between day 1 and day 7 but I did get slightly better at it. Progession is the goal, always.
I love doing challenges because they prove to me what I‘m capable of if I make it a priority. I think I want to re-attempt the Yoga Challenge but make it a week long like this one. I definitely want to keep incorporating Meditation into my daily routine. I like how it makes me feel so that’s enough of a reason. We are all trying to find things that calm us down during these times. Hopefully these lessons will help you decide if meditating is for you.
Do you practice meditation? If no, why not? Let’s chat in the comments!
The Musings of Mara 