What is mindfulness meditation?

Photo by Simon Rae on Unsplash

I have meditated using a few different techniques over the past 7 years, and would like to share what has worked for me.

A brief introduction

Meditation is a very broad label and can be applied to many different practices. These practices include mindfulness meditation, compassion meditation (metta), various forms of mantra meditation, tai chi, yoga, pranayama, contemplative religious practices and many more. There are also many ways to practice each of these forms of meditation. For example, with mindfulness, you can perform a sitting meditation or a walking meditation. The meditation can be guided, where someone or a recording guides you through it, or you can meditate without listening to anyone. I don’t think there is any right way to meditate, it’s something that can become very personal, but there are a few frameworks we can start off with depending on what we want or our spiritual journey.

Mindfulness Meditation

What is it?

With mindfulness meditation you pick something to place your attention on. Whenever you notice your mind has wandered you bring it back to the object of your meditation. This is the key part, this noticing that your mind has wandered. There’s a popular misconception that meditation is about “clearing your mind”. Whilst I…