When I have something on my mind, whether it’s a major stress or a new brainstorm that I’m eager to flesh out, I find it almost impossible to meditate well. My mind constantly jumps all over the place. Today was one of those days. But I’m heed of the following advice from 8 Minute Meditation:
“A good meditation is the one you did. A bad meditation is the one you skipped.”
The important thing is to keep going. I know when I first started running, I would have days where my motivation simply wasn’t there – I wasn’t in the right place mentally. Eventually, the more I ran the less often I had these days. But I also got better at dealing with these days. My stamina increased and even if I was not feeling it mentally, my muscles and my body was used to doing this and would help get me through the run.
Here’s hoping there’s a parallel in meditation. That constantly putting in the time to do it will help me improve to the point where the bad days are less frequent. At this point it’s almost easy to question whether or not the process is worth it. If it will really make a difference.
But again, I can fall back on my experience with exercise. I went through the same struggle and frustration there – feeling like the effort wasn’t worth it, wondering if exercise could really make me feel that much better. But ultimately it did, and I saw just how much impact exercise made on my life. It’s nice to have that experience to fall back on.
If you’re struggling with meditation like I am, try to think if you have any other experiences to fall back on. Is there something you’ve worked at and had doubts about, but it ultimately paid off?
