The Fantastic Life

More on Meditation

“You should sit in meditation for 20 minutes every day—unless you’re too busy; then you should sit for an hour.”  – Sukhraj Dhillon

That quote grabbed my attention in the article below.  Wow.  As I read on, the author, Patricia Williams called me out—If we say we are too busy we are simply making excuses and self-sabotaging ourselves.  I will add, it also means we have not prioritized finding inner peace.

Williams goes on to say that growth and comfort do not coexist.  You can only grow when you are expanding your comfort zone and (this is where she got me again) embracing the parts of you that you never got in touch with.  Meditation gets you in touch with yourself.

I am still committed to meditating daily…I am still committed to meditating daily.  (repeat 100 times Craig).

Are you?  The complete article is awesome and a worthy read.

Rule # 11 from my book The Fantastic Life: The Growth Paradigm

Meditation is just one of the ways we can grow, but it requires work. You can control the speed of your growth, if you put in the work.


What No One Else Tells You About Meditation

By Patricia S. Williams

October 21, 2020

We’ve all heard about the benefits of meditation. From reducing stress and anxiety, to improving sleep and promoting emotional health, there’s a lot we can benefit from when it comes to any mindfulness activity.

I have been practicing meditation on-and-off for the past few years. When I started, I was expecting to see long-term results but, to my surprise, the results were almost immediate.

I gradually started feeling a huge sense of inner peace. I could notice my own thoughts without being judgemental towards myself, and I was able to see everything with so much clarity.

However, I eventually came across a few obstacles and started leaving my practice behind. Life gets in the way, you get busy and realize you have no time to sit still and just breath.

Now I know that it’s precisely during turbulent times that we need mindfulness the most.

As Sukhraj Dhillon says,

You should sit in meditation for 20 minutes everyday — unless you’re too busy; then you should sit for an hour.

Over the past few months, I’ve started incorporating meditation into my daily life again, and even though I’ve been going through some emotional and psychological challenges, it’s been the first time I’ve been meditating consistently. And I intend to keep it that way.

I’ve learned a few lessons that I would love to share with you.

You Can Feel Peace And Discomfort At The Same Time

Meditation is associated with finding inner peace — and it really helps you get in touch with the purest, calmest part of yourself.

What no one else tells you is how emotionally uncomfortable it can be sometimes.

Sitting still and being present is not easy. When you turn down the volume of your mind, you can hear the inner voices that you’ve been ignoring for years, and you’re left with the pain you had tried so hard to bury.

And suddenly, you have a choice to make: are you going to keep avoiding it and live your life pretending you have it all figured out, or are you actually going to face it and heal yourself?

This is the stage where most people choose to walk away from their practice. They start thinking “I don’t have the time” or “I’m so busy today, I’ll do it tomorrow” just like I did.

In reality, what we’re actually doing is making up excuses and self-sabotaging ourselves. Our subconscious mind knows it will be painful and it convinces us that we’d be better off without it.

We’d rather stay with our comfortable old self, filled with sadness, anger and confusion than to let it go and venture into the unknown.

If You Move Past The Discomfort, Meditation Becomes One of The Best Tools for Personal Growth

Meditation teaches you self-control and self-acceptance in the best way possible.

It teaches you how to sit still with your own thoughts and simply accept them instead of trying to control them — which, ironically, is how you end up controlling them.

Is there a better way to grow and improve yourself than developing the ability to face your shadow and learning to embrace it? Is there a better way to become the best version of yourself than to continually accept your weaknesses and turn them into strengths?

When you’ve been meditating consistently, and when you’re already prepared for the possibility that some uncomfortable feelings and emotions may arise, you realize that you’re slowly becoming a different person.

You no longer feel the urge to engage in some bad habits you once had.

You no longer react with anger to things and people that used to piss you off. Instead, you’re able to acknowledge negative feelings that are starting to come up to the surface, and let them go.

And you don’t stay in relationships that don’t match the new person you’re becoming. You accept that you’re on different paths, and you recognize that you want to surround yourself with people who truly love you and who bring out the best in you.

It Boosts Your Self-Awareness, Even If That Was Not Your Goal

All this transformation happens because mindfulness practices increase your self-awareness exponentially.

They increase your ability to spot your emotional triggers, understand your feelings and acknowledge the real roots of your emotions.

In order to become more self-aware, you need to stop thinking and stop doing. Meditation is the perfect solution for this. Don’t worry. If you’re not the type of person who enjoys sitting cross-legged on the floor, while burning incense and chanting “Om,” that’s fine. Traditional meditation doesn’t resonate with everyone. There are many other ways to quiet your mind for a few minutes, such as taking a walk through a park, caring for your garden, listening to soothing music or even just taking a few deep breaths while you concentrate on your inhale and exhale.

Debbie Gisonni, Self-awareness Increases With Meditation

When I started meditation, I was able to identify certain subconscious beliefs that were holding me back — and I used meditation and other mindfulness practices to let them go and rewire my brain.

Beliefs like:

I don’t deserve to be loved.

I’m not good enough.

I’m broken and I can’t be fixed.

A few weeks after I started, I realized I no longer felt the need to smoke as much as I used to. And bear in mind I used to smoke, at least, one pack of cigarettes per day. I was addicted to it, and quitting was not in my plans.

I suddenly also stopped enjoying alcohol as I did before. It felt good to drink occasionally, but not everyday as I used to.

A few months went by and it became clear to me that the reason I no longer needed to smoke or drink was because I was gradually healing the root cause of my addiction.

Alcohol and cigarettes were my coping mechanisms and they stopped serving their purpose when I became aware of the fears and beliefs that led me to them. I stopped needing them because I was able to fill the void inside of me with my own love.

True, deep transformations always stem from discomfort.

Growth and comfort do not coexist. The only time when you’re actually growing is when you’re expanding your comfort zone and embracing the parts of you that you never got in touch with.

Meditation helps you do just that. It teaches you how to love the uncomfortable, unpleasant emotions, fears and beliefs that you’ve been avoiding for years.

And that is how you grow.

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