There are many good things that happen when you meditate. Studies have shown that people who meditate regularly are less likely to get sick, feel stressed, or need to sleep.
One of the best reasons to meditate, though, is that the act of meditating itself is beautiful. Meditation doesn't depend on the result, but the act of meditating itself is blissful. It puts you in a state of happiness and calm awareness while you're doing it, not just when you're done. In fact, the training never starts or ends because the means are the same as the goal.
All of us live in a world where stress is always coming at us. We get a lot of unwanted energy from things like the TV, noise pollution, fights, and people who are angry or jealous. To fight this huge, overwhelming force of negativity and stress, we need a more powerful force that is gathered inside of us. Meditation connects us to this source of cleansing, enlightening energy inside of us.
In the past, people lived in close contact with nature as they went about their daily lives. There were no sounds or vibrations made by phones or machines, and there were no diseases or stresses caused by the complexity of urban industry. There was the sound of water, the hum of the wind, the beauty of the stars in the sky, and the smell of the earth. There were natural rhythms in every part of life. When people planted seeds and grew them into food, they felt connected to the cycles of nature. We can live our whole lives without ever having direct contact with nature. We live in climates that are controlled by humans, and we get our food from fast food restaurants or stores where it has been packaged in a factory. By doing this, we separate ourselves completely from our natural roots and the way we used to live.
Meditation gives us a simple, easy, and portable way to get back in touch with those natural rhythms and beauty that we've lost. We can do this by shutting out the outside world, letting go of our bodies, and clearing our minds of all the artificial stress that builds up over the course of our lives, whether we're aware of it or not.
Meditation is free, doesn't hurt you, and doesn't add calories or cholesterol to your body. Nor is it like drugs or alcohol in that it makes you want more. But it does give people who do it a higher sense of well-being, which is often compared to a natural "high" that is stronger than those caused by drugs. This is a positive and healthy part of meditation that can be fully embraced.
The human body is a very complicated thing. In the brain, the body makes drugs that are hundreds of times stronger than drugs made in a lab. When you meditate, your body releases mysterious hormones and chemicals that give you a huge rush of energy and happiness. This is just one of the amazing things that happens when you meditate regularly.
Different people have different ideas about what meditation is. Some people use it instead of or along with psychotherapy. Others find it most useful as a way to improve performance at work or in sports, as well as to improve memory and other mental functions. Some people use it to help them deal with grief or the aftermath of a trauma or tragedy, and to get back to being happy and appreciating the good things in life. And some people use meditation to help them come up with ideas for their art. Meditation gives us more energy, sexual energy, and calmness that lasts longer and is stronger. It also makes us feel as relaxed as a deep, very restful sleep.
There are many reasons to meditate, and one way to make the world a better, more peaceful, and more harmonious place is for all of us to take some time out of our busy lives to stop and drink from the mental oasis of meditation practise.
