Worklife Solutions · 2016-10-19 · molecular geneticist Matthieu Ricard. ”It completely changes...

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© Worklife Solutions Ltd 2015 Meditation Worksheet 1

Meditation and mindfulness: strategies to quiet the mind and rejuvenate the soul

"Our brains never get a break and the results can be increased stress, anxiety, insomnia and, if left unchecked, even depression. But there is something you can do - nothing.”

~ Mathew Johnstone

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Worklife Solutions Coaching System All Rights Reserved Copyright 2015 www.worklifesolutions.co.nz No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted or distributed in any form or by any means, electrical mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system without permission in writing from worklifesolutions.co.nz. Permission is given for a single copy to be downloaded and used by an individual for the purposes of their own coaching programme only. No change may be made to the content and the workbook may not be reproduced or distributed elsewhere without permission in writing from worklifesolutions.co.nz. Not to be used for commercial purposes, other than by Worklife Solutions approved coaches who have permission to distribute one copy for use with their clients. Not to be hosted electronically outside of the Worklife Solutions website. Updated April 2015

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Meditation – inner power “Meditation is not just blissing out under a mango tree,” says French Buddhist monk and molecular geneticist Matthieu Ricard. ”It completely changes your brain and therefore changes what you are.” Perceptions of meditation have radically changed during the last two decades. It’s increasingly seen as a miracle cure that helps people manage increasingly busy lives and competing demands. Rather than see meditating as a waste of time as some people do, by taking 20 to 40 minutes out of each day to meditate growing numbers of people are realizing that they’re keeping not only their sanity and health, but also increasing their productivity and success. Science has proven that when people meditate they alter their brains in a good way – lowering stress levels and increasing energy and positivity amongst many other important things. People who meditate these days come from all walks of life and aren't necessarily ‘weird’ New Agers. Students, children, lawyers, athletes, actors, prisoners, artists, writers and government officials – basically people from all walks of life meditate. “Meditation gathers me up for the day and makes me feel organised and happy and capable of facing the challenges of the world, both internal and external.” ~ Lena Dunham, creator and star of Girls

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Quiet the mind Quietening your overactive mind through mindfulness training techniques like meditation helps you to take control of your mental chatterbox and create some quiet space so you can hear the voice within. This changes how you respond to what’s happening in your life and, amongst other benefits, increases your ability to tap into higher levels of wisdom when making decisions. Meditation is not just about distracting yourself from stress and pain; it literally changes you at the genetic level, writes Arianna Huffington in her best-selling book, Thrive.

“It’s the Swiss army knife of medical tools, for conditions both small and large.” Ridding yourself of self-limiting thoughts, controlling your reactions, discovering an inner contact with a creative source, and having more creative insights are just a few of the benefits that can flow from meditation. The whole experience is primarily an experience of wholeness, rightness, and power.

Benefits of meditation Because practicing meditation helps you to slow your breath, quiet your mind, and find peace, it can be beneficial physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. Meditation is now commonly used to treat mental health disorders, addiction and everyday stress, as well as to heal physical ailments and promote better sleep. Mental benefits

§ Reduces anxiety and depression by enabling your body to balance its own neurochemical system

§ Make better decisions, improve alertness and critical thinking

§ Breaks unhealthy habits by helping you detach emotions associated with an action from the action itself

§ Improves communication with yourself. When you better understand your thought processes, you have more control over what you think

§ Helps you stay in the present moment. When you let go of the past and the future, you’re living 100 per cent in the now, which affects all aspects of your life, including relationships.

§ See things more clearly

§ Improve self-control – and thus, your ability to choose your thoughts

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Emotional Benefits

§ Improved relationships at home and work and socially

§ Become more emotionally stable and balanced

§ Increased perspective

§ Become more affectionate and kind to yourself and others

§ Increased acceptance, forgiveness, tolerance and patience

§ Helps overcome loss and grief

§ Reduced aggression and become more compassionate to others needs

§ Increased activity in the left prefrontal lobes of the brain - the area linked to positive emotions, self-control and temperament

§ Increases positive endorphins – boosting happiness, bliss and well-being

§ Smile and laugh more, and always carry your happy place within you

§ Improve self-control – and thus, your ability to choose your emotions

§ Become your authentic Self

§ Boost self-esteem and confidence

§ Reduced depression and anxiety § Taming the amygdala, an area of the brain that is the hub of fear memory

§ Increased activity in areas of the brain related to positive emotion

Physical benefits

§ Stimulates your parasympathetic nervous system, or the branch of your peripheral nervous system that helps your body return to a calm, relaxed state after the threat of danger, or even daily stress, has passed. Enabling your body to naturally rejuvenate, repair, and rebuild itself

§ Clears your mind for better quality sleep

§ Improves athletic performance by refining your ability to focus on a goal or situation (another term for meditation used in this way is visualization)

§ Slows your respiration for longer, deeper breaths

§ Boosts your immune system by slowing the production of the stress hormone cortisol

§ Reduces headaches

§ Improve self-control – and thus, your ability to choose your actions

§ Significantly reduces blood pressure

§ Greater pain control

§ Increases longevity and quality of life

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Spiritual benefits

§ Heighten your connection to your higher Self

§ Increased Self understanding

§ Stronger intuition

§ Unified body, mind and spirit

§ Enhanced ability to live in the ‘here and now’

§ Inner peace, courage and strength

§ Increased self-love

§ Enhanced ability to find your true life purpose

§ Better ability to connect with your God (angels or spirit guides)

§ Be at one with the Universe

§ Enables you to be the best version of yourself

§ Relax and rejuvenate your spirit

§ Heighten your connection to your higher Self

§ Improved energy and creativity

§ Increased ability to reach self-actualisation

§ Finding you true identity

§ Tap into an unlimited source of wisdom and faith

§ Trust your instincts

“We meditate to discover our own identity, our right place in the scheme of the universe. Through meditation, we acquire and eventually acknowledge our connection to an inner power source that has the ability to transform our outer world.” ~ Julia Cameron, author of The Artist’s Way

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Find time to clear the mind Many people claim they just don’t have time to meditate. But when you consider all the benefits that flow from meditation prioritising time makes sense. Finding time to clear the mind will help you work and live smarter, not harder. Do less and you will achieve more. J

Meditation has been proven to boost creativity – which helps us look at things in new ways, and improve our ability to resolve issues that may keep us stuck. Steve Jobs, a lifelong practitioner of meditation, confirmed the connection between meditation and creativity, but also the need to develop a regular practice: “If you just sit and observe, you will see how restless your mind is. If you try to calm it, it only makes it worse, but over time it does calm, and when it does, there’s room to hear more subtle things – that’s when your intuition starts to blossom and you start to see things more clearly and be in the present more. Your mind just slows down, and you see a tremendous expanse in the moment. You see so much more than you could see before. It's a discipline. You have to practice it."

Tap into your intuition – unleash your higher Self Tune out all the mental chatter and static that interferes with your psychic radio and tap into an unlimited source of wisdom. Many people are tapping into the power of mindfulness, and boosting their intuition and higher Self in to the process. When we slow down for even a few moments, we cultivate inner peace.

18 years ago after a particularly upsetting life event I turned to meditation to help me not just survive, but thrive in the wake of a tsunami of stress. At the time I learned Transcendental Meditation. The catalyst to learning this style of meditation, rather than any other, was encountering a woman who looked so serene, so happy, so at peace with herself and was extremely successful in a highly competitive and stressful career too.

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I thought, ‘I want what she has,’ and asked her to share her secret! Incidentally she told me my mind was too busy and predicted I would never master meditation. Well, that only made me more determined! I also studied Buddhism and learned how to simply quiet and calm my mind by focusing on my breathing. I like the Buddhist approach to meditation and to life as well. It's non dogmatic, highly philosophical, and encourages questioning - something my own Catholic upbringing never did. There are many other meditation techniques out there – it’s important to find the one that is right for you. But whichever one you choose be aware, like learning any skill, it does take discipline – that’s why it’s called a practice. The wandering, chaotic mind can be wilfully obstinate if left to its own devices.

Which meditation technique is right for you? There are many forms of meditation, including breathing meditations, walking meditations, Buddhist meditations, Transcendental Meditation. Some people even find activities such as watercolour painting, photography, gardening and other creative pursuits highly meditative. You may find repeating a word or phrase that makes you feel relaxed such as “one,” “peace,” “calm,” “It’s all good,” or “om.” Buddhists call this mindfulness. Whichever form you choose, the main thing to remember is that its benefits are only a few breaths away, and the only thing you need is your attention. Meditation can be done in short bursts of time, even while on the bus, or train. To really be of benefit many people recommend meditating first thing in the morning, and towards the end of the day, for 20 or 30 minutes each time. You may already feel pressed for time but the benefits of creating some space in your diary will pay dividends. Meditation gives us not only the light of insight but also the power and courage for expansive, inspired change. “Our breath also has a sacredness about it. Sometimes when I’m giving a talk, I’ll first ask everyone in the room to focus on the rising and falling of their breath for ten seconds. It amazing how the room, which moments before hummed with chaotic energy, will suddenly be filled with a stillness, an attentiveness, a sacredness. It’s something quite palpable.” ~ Arianna Huffington, business women, editor and author of Thrive

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The two types of meditation: passive and active

When we meditate several important things happen physically and mentally. First, we are "focusing internally" and letting go of the outside world (similar to going to sleep, but without losing consciousness). This allows our brain to shift into the more stable, stronger brain frequencies (called alpha and theta by scientists) normally reached during sleep. When we can reduce our brain frequencies to these levels while staying awake we are able to bring the unconscious mind to the conscious level. This allows us to control and harness the power of the unconscious mind.

Passive Meditation

Passive meditation involves withdrawing within ourselves in calm, sitting postures, and performing a meditation practice, such as rhythmic breathing, or repeating a mantra for example, to achieve a meditative state – one that can help us in our active life. By "passively" letting go and going within, we "deactivate" our survival mechanisms and allow our body’s natural health and rejuvenation abilities to be activated.

Active meditation

Active, or dynamic meditation, as it implies, includes movement. If you’re more extroverted by nature or find sitting still stifling, active meditation may be for you. You can jump, shout and even dance! It was created and used by Indian guru Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, later known as Osho, who believed that a meditation style that involved physical activity was more practical for the modern world. Active meditation is practiced in stages and said to help calm the mind and create greater awareness of the world. Follow this link http://www.wikihow.com/Do-Active-Meditation for a few guidelines you may wish to follow and base your future meditation routines on.

“How can one sustain the inner peace in the pressured lifestyle of the West?” Ask The Buddha’s of Suburbia. Advocates of a more active style of meditation their website is worth checking out. Other tasty treats include Spiritual Aerobics. The concept alone is intriguing. http://www.activemeditation.com.

Watch this video here or Google for some of your own http://www.search.ask.com/videos?o=APN10371&gct=sb&q=active+meditation&tpr=10

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All meditation techniques, such as Yoga, Zen, Transcendental Meditation (TM), Laughing Yoga, and others have similar benefits. Each method has its own way of reaching the inner state of mind, and each has its own goals.

To find out more about laughing yoga check out this link http://laughteryoga.org.nz/the-story-of-laughter-yoga/

Awareness and insight “The wisdom that arises from awareness is an ever-deepening insight into the conditioning, habits and biases of our own minds. The heart quality that arises from this insight is a profound freedom from judgment and harshness, that begins with our very own sense of self. These two expressions of inherent awareness are the foundations of the spiritual path.” ~ Peter Fernando, former Buddhist monk and mindfulness tutor.

Awareness of what is most intimate to us, and being fully present in the here and now is overlooked by so many. It is also that quality ‘within’ experience our minds most easily overlook. When we focus on maintaining awareness and sense it directly it’s incredibly grounding and fortifying. It is both the doorway to wisdom and the key to compassion and kindness for ourselves and for all those around us. Acquainting ourselves with their presence in ourselves gives rise to a humility, clarity and simplicity that opens us out of suffering and reveals the treasures hidden within our human nature. “As soon as you honor the present moment, all unhappiness and struggle dissolve, and life begins to flow with joy and ease. When you act out the present-moment awareness, whatever you do becomes imbued with a sense of quality, care, and love - even the most simple action.” ~ Eckhart Tolle, author

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Article: Buddhists really are happier Buddhists 'really are happier' Scientists say they have evidence to show that Buddhists really are happier and calmer than other people.

Tests carried out in the United States reveal that areas of their brain associated with good mood and positive feelings are more active.

The findings come as another study suggests that Buddhist meditation can help to calm people.

Researchers at University of California San Francisco Medical Centre have found the practise can tame the amygdala, an area of the brain that is the hub of fear memory.

They found that experienced Buddhists, who meditate regularly, were less likely to be shocked, flustered, surprised or as angry compared to other people.

Paul Ekman, who carried out the study, said: "The most reasonable hypothesis is that there is something about conscientious Buddhist practice that results in the kind of happiness we all seek."

Brain activity

In a separate study, scientists at the University of Wisconsin at Madison used new scanning techniques to examine brain activity in a group of Buddhists.

Their tests revealed activity in the left prefrontal lobes of experienced Buddhist practitioners.

This area is linked to positive emotions, self-control and temperament.

Their tests showed this area of the Buddhists’ brains is constantly lit up and not just when they are meditating.

This, the scientists said, suggests they are more likely to experience positive emotions and be in good mood.

"We can now hypothesise with some confidence that those apparently happy, calm Buddhist souls one regularly comes across in places such as Dharamsala, India, really are happy," said Professor Owen Flanagan, of Duke University in North Carolina.

Dharamsala is the home base of exiled Tibetan leader the Dalai Lama.

The studies are published in New Scientist magazine. (Source: BBC article, date unknown)

Buddhism may be good for your mental health

There is something about conscientious Buddhist practice that results in the kind of happiness we all seek Paul Ekman, University of California San Francisco Medical Centre

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Helpful resources There are literally thousands and thousands of great resources out there. These are just a few of my favourites:

Watch this How meditation can shape our brains for the better - take a look at this video on YouTube - incredible results verified by science http://youtu.be/m8rRzTtP7Tc Feeling good - I've been meditating for over 18 years now and love it. And while it can be challenging to find time during busy or stressful periods, it really is the key to boosting creativity, harnessing intuition building resilience, and creating a calm and happier outlook in general. Here’s a wee clip of me singing its praises just after I’d meditated. Is it just me, or do you agree that I’m glowing?! Not bad, after an uber stressful week https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nsirAQVNMzI&feature=youtu.be

Go to this http://www.originalnature.co.nz/ Offers meditation and mindfulness training, workshops and retreats, online courses and inspiration

Read this Books Quiet the Mind: An Illustrated Guide on How to Meditate Mathew Johnstone Incredibly inspiring book with images that convey key messages, techniques and benefits simply Capturing Mindfulness Mathew Johnstone A fabulous book on how to create mindfulness through photography

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Thrive: The Third Metric to Redefining Success and Creating a Happier Life Arianna Huffington

This book has great content, throughout and some excellent resources listed in the back.

The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment Eckhart Tolle

Web http://www.monthofmindfulness.info Wellington based Peter Fernando offers an introductory guided meditation which you can take further. He also meets with individuals and groups in Wellington for philosophical talks on mindfulness and Buddhism. Very enjoyable and great for the soul

www.calm.com free app with guided meditations

http://eocinstitute.org/meditation/emotional-benefits-of-meditation/ Comprehensive lists of the benefits of meditation

www.matthewjohnstone.com.au Wide range of books and resources on mental wellness, and mindfulness

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Try this Begin with ‘why’ - intensify the desire to learn a new skill by listing all the benefits you’d like to gain from meditation ! _____________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ What steps can you take to learn more about meditation? ! _____________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ How can you make more time to meditate daily? If sitting down for 2O minutes at a time seems overwhelming, try building your meditation muscles in baby steps. A daily habit of two, three, or five minutes or more will soon lead to mastery ! _____________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________ ________________________________________________________________________

Worklife Solutions · 2016-10-19 · molecular geneticist Matthieu Ricard. ”It completely changes...

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