Learning to Meditate is Easy. So Why Does Everyone Struggle so Much?

Learning to meditate is easy. It really is. All it takes is a little patience, a little guidance, and a will to learn. So why do so many people have trouble learning? I've had so many conversations about this over the past few months. Hands down the winners are:

1. I don't have time to meditate

2. I can't stop my thoughts

3. I don't know where to start

So here are a few 'truth-bombs' to get you motivated. And a link to a really simple technique that you can use to start learning right now. The benefits are significant. They will help you. Go do it.

"I don't have time to meditate"

You do. You really do. You just need to find it.

Did you know there are numerous studies that reveal that as little as 20 minutes a day of consistent meditation practice can have significant effects on your health, wellbeing and mental performance? There are some studies that suggest just 10 minutes a day is enough to also see a benefit.

I know how it is though. Life's busy. Work. Family. Gym. Social Media. Netflix . . .

I work with really ambitious people. The types of people who regularly work 14 hour days and there are two ways that we've been able to carve out some really meaningful meditation time: Morning: Stacking a 10 minute focused attention meditation on-top of the morning gym routine. Evening: Adding a 10 minute relaxation response & interoception practice into the evening routine.

That's 10 minutes, twice a day. Less time than you spend working out a smart response to your bosses most recent LinkedIn post. Get on it.

"I can't stop my thoughts"

Well here's some great news for you. You don't have to.

It's a hugely, and frankly quite damaging myth that you need to stop your thoughts to meditate.

We can't stop the thoughts that flow into our mind. Instead of trying to silence the mind, meditation teaches us to observe our thoughts and let them go. It helps us to have better control over our thoughts, and in time, we can learn to focus our attention in a way that let's us meditate with a calm mind.

So if you're struggling to stop your thoughts, don't worry about it. In time, and with practice, you will gain more control over your mind and your thoughts. Here's some useful information to understand the basics of meditation: https://www.klarosity.com/types-of-meditation/what-is-meditation

"I don't know where to start"

I hear you. This was me. I tried so many things. YouTube, Books, Apps, Classes. There's a lot out there, and it takes a while to work through it.

My advice? Just get started. Start simple. Maybe a guided meditation. There are only a handful of meditation techniques that have been widely studied for effectiveness:

• Focused Attention

• Open Awareness

• Mindfulness

• Loving-Kindness

You can read about their benefits here: https://www.klarosity.com/types-of-meditation

Here's a really easy technique you can use if you need to relax. It's called The Relaxation Response, and it's simply designed to help you get the body into a relaxed state. I have an audio recording available, ping me an email to simon@klarosity.com if you'd like me to send it to you.

At klarosity, we've tried to make sense of all the information out there to develop a simple and robust training programme to help ambitious professionals to learn how to meditate and bring it's many benefits to their ;ives. You can read more about our approach here:

https://www.klarosity.com/performance-meditation-approach