5 Things Everyone Should Know Before Meditating
By Cory A. Mitchell

Here are 5 things that you be aware of before meditating, and during.

1. Remove Your Everyday Worries

-This is actually kind of what meditation is - a quietening of the mind. But I add it in here because this process is required for further steps in meditation. If you never quiet the mind you will never reach deep peace.

-This is a "cleansing" process where we allow our daily worries, fears and anxieties to float away.

-We can do this by visualizing ourselves vividly standing in a warm rain shower, under a waterfall in a calm river, etc. Anything that is peaceful gives us a feeling of peace and can take our worries away. Image your worries flowing away with the water. Alternatively, you can image your anxieties and persistent thoughts as a physical form in any shape you imagine. Then dissolve it in any way you feel. This could again be through calm flowing water, burning or watching it dissolve. Do not make this process violent. It is a free flowing release in a serene mental environment.

2. Breathe

-Meditation is about breathing. While going through these mental exercises, and when in deeper states, always breathe. Feel your lungs filling air. Feel a connection to the air and its life giving force. Always breathe.

-Proper breath is when air is taken to the lower part of the lungs. Often we breath taking shallow breaths and have a sensation we are just filling the top part of our lungs. When breathing in a meditation, and at all times when we remember, visualize the air coming in and filling the bottom of the lungs. The stomach should rise or push out, and as we exhale it will fall back in. Watch a baby. They normally do this well - the belly rises and falls as they sleep. This is how we should breathe, taking relaxing long inhales into the abdomen area.

3. Don't Meditate While Stuffed

-If you are full of food your body will be focused on digestion and not so much on allowing you to enter deep states of peace. Wait til your food has fully settled before meditating.

4. Cleanse

-This is an optional step and is an addition to the cleansing above. The above cleansing removed our unwanted thoughts. A further cleansing would be to imagine ourselves bathed in a white light. This light protects in our meditation and restores us. We could also imagine our self being bathed in gold. This creates a mental protective barrier around us and prevents any energies which are not good for us to move on.

-Imagine for a few moments this light. It is cleansing your body, your mind and creating a shield around you.

-If you are a positive person, you don't really need to do this. Your positive energy has already created a barrier around you. If you are negative or feeling a little off that day, then include this technique. That said, it doesn't hurt and a little rejuvenating cleansing light can do anyone good.

5. Come out of Mediation Slowly

-This meditation was our time to renew our self. If we get up and start running around immediately we may feel a little disjointed. Relax. Get up slowly. Wait a little bit before doing anything strenuous. It is not that anything bad will happen if we start running around, but meditation is there to slow us down. So don't rush out of it.

-As we learn more techniques and meditation for different things, our answers or additional information we were seeking may come through after we have started to wrap up the meditation. If we start rushing off this information may be missed.

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