Meditation has become fairly commonplace these days. We often come across a multitude of posts on social media where people showcase their meditative practices in quick videos.
Kimberly Snyder, a meditation teacher, highlights the benefits of this mindfulness exercise in a conversation with PsychCentral. “When you meditate, you focus on moving beyond the senses and thoughts and tapping into the peace and equilibrium that lie beneath them,” she explains.
Committing to this exercise every day can reduce stress, enhance concentration, and aid in letting go. It can also help to improve the quality of sleep.
However, for some, the simple act of sitting on a chair, breathing, and putting a pause on the cascade of thoughts coursing through their brain proves too demanding. If you’re tired of failing to achieve tranquility through meditation, here are three other methods to help you decompress.
Try these three stress-reducing methods to improve your meditation practice:
First, try keeping a journal. This allows you to live in the moment and let your thoughts come and go without holding onto them. For this exercise to prove effective, clear your mind for a few minutes, grab a pen and write down whatever comes to your mind.
“Through writing, you get rid of repetitive thoughts from your mind, reducing the emotional burden when you meditate,” Shawna McGrath, a meditation teacher, explains to HuffPost.
You might also want to create a list of positive mantras to refer to whenever you find yourself in a stressful situation. Reading out encouraging phrases can help you to let go and concentrate on the words that you’re projecting. This anchoring in the present helps lower stress levels, as your brain is primarily focused on the piece of paper before you.
Another effective way to relieve anxiety is through cyclic breathing exercises. A study published in Cell Reports Medicine suggests this technique to be highly efficient. How does it work?
- Expel the air from your lungs
- Inhale through your nose for 4 seconds
- Hold breath for 4 seconds
- Exhale for 4 seconds
- Again, hold breath for 4 seconds
- Repeat steps for 3 or 4 times
The study demonstrates that “controlling your breathing allows an immediate relaxing physiological and psychological response by stimulating the vagus nerve (a nerve enabling message transmission between neurons and communicating with all organs).”
