Ninety Percent Solution
“RELAX! … RELAX … relax … squared. What? … you may ask. The 90% solution. Say what …?” — Me
For you meditators out there (or for those whom aspire to) I’m doing something a little different today, and just write about some helpful meditation tidbits I’ve picked up along the way.
When I meditate I practice a specific set of techniques, usually in a fairly specific order (but not always). But I have learned, usually the hard way, that technique is only 10% of the solution.
The main thing that puts a dead stop to any progress in meditation usually is Tension, with a capital T. But isn’t that one of the main reasons we mediate? To relieve tension? And be able to relax? It is a bit of a catch-22. You meditate to relax, but you may be too tense to relax into meditation.
And then consider all the tensions in our modern world. We worry about all those little everyday things that are thrust upon us. Then we worry about what else could go wrong in our future. And then we worry about all the things that could go wrong with those close to us. And then we probably worry about some of the crazy things going on in the world that could affect … well, who knows? Maybe us, possibly others, but maybe not really. For our mind tends to find things to fret about, doesn’t it? Even when there really may not be that much to fret about.
First, I’d like to mention some of the tension-causing things in our world that if we work at it we can probably affect or have some type of control of.
Diet: Besides the obvious things we know about having a good, balanced diet, there are other considerations here. The foods we ingest can have a number of consequences. Certain foods can make you tired or lethargic, can pep you up, can cause tension, and can cause allergies and sensitivities. In addition, how often you eat them, when you eat them and how you combine them not only can affect you as well. This is an area that takes diligent monitoring on your part. Sometimes a test is how certain foods affect your meditations.
Generally speaking, there are some of the foods you should probably stay away from or only indulge in moderately. Refined sugars, caffeine, chocolate, dairy products and heavily spiced foods seem to have some adverse effects on many people. Most of these foods cause some type of tension in your system. Also, heavy foods such as beef and pork take a long period to assimilate, and thus stress your system.
In addition, for sure stay away from junk fast food and other heavily processed foods, which are hard for your body to process, causing more tension to deal with. The more natural and organic you can find, the better for you overall. As mentioned, you need to monitor your diet to see what foods affect you. If you are addicted to certain foods (foods you just can’t do without), you might have a problem and need to stop consuming them for a while.
There are a couple other dietary elements that also need monitoring to keep stable. The first is the acid-alkaline balance of your system. To prevent tension you need to be just a little on the alkaline side. Quite a number of foods we eat today cause us to be acidic, so monitor this. The second is your mucous level. If there is too much mucous, it interferes with most of your bodily systems, causing more tension.
Fasting is something you should seriously consider. As the body spends quite a bit of energy on the digestion and assimilation of needed nutrients and in the elimination of unneeded ones, it periodically needs time for healing, cleansing and maintenance. The ideal fasting routine would be to do a one-day fast one day a week, a four-day fast once a month and a ten-day fast every six months. That may not be ideal for your schedule, but it gives you a basis to work from.
Also, you need to get specific information on fasting, as they can be dangerous to do if not done right. You will be accelerating the elimination of toxins from your body, which needs to be managed properly. Fasting also helps you measure your health by signaling serious medical problems that could be on the horizon and identifying food addictions. After a successful fast, your consciousness will feel clearer and more awake, making way for more energetic, less tense meditations.
Substances: Mostly drugs, alcohol, and tobacco. These include the addictive substances sometimes used as well as other unhealthy ones. We know what the abuse of these substances can do to us physically, but they can also have serious spiritual side effects. For the most part they can cause energy drains and interrupt the energy flow within your bodily systems. Many give you the illusion of having more energy, but actually they just increase the conductivity of energy, and then cause energy depletion and tension in your whole system. All these substances produce adverse problems, and it probably would be best just to avoid them altogether.
Modern Culture: There are a number of energy situations that are unique in our 21st century world. Televisions and computers, and other electronic devices, such as cell phones, radios, microwaves and CD players, etc. all emit EMF’s (electromagnetic fields). These EMF’s are usually not harmonious with our own spiritual energy fields. Usually these devices add stress and tension to our systems. Learning how to manage these conditions has become increasing harder today, since many of these are items we use on a daily basis.
Another factor is the modern media, and the way your stress level can be raised by all the constant negative news reporting. Being inundated with media messages of an unsafe, violent and hostile world can have some very negative effects on you. It has been proven that this activity can cause sad and depressed moods, and aggravate anxiety and stress. How about taking a news break regularly to promote more harmonious mental states and less energy drain? Call it a news fast.
Music: It’s probably not news to you, but the music you listen to affects your mood, usually either up or down. Discordant and heavy music with downbeat themes can affect you in a tense, negative way. Music with beats or rhythms can drive your consciousness down, while music with melodies and harmonies can drive it up. In other words, the blues, hard rock, rap, etc. take you down, while light melodies and symphonic music take you up. This may be hard to swallow, especially in light of what is popular these days. Oddly enough, one of the higher pieces of music you can listen to is bagpipe music. If your place doesn’t feel quite right or ‘feels bad’, play some bagpipe music fairly loud for at least half an hour and it will lighten the feel of your place. Try doing that a couple times a week. It can do wonders.
Social Situations: This is another area that will take some creative engineering to pull off. As we are social creatures by nature and society certainly requires we participate, becoming a hermit is usually not a choice here. People have a tendency to play energy games with each other, and that can be stressful. There are a number of normal, day-to-day situations in which your energy may go to someone else, or to something else someone wants you to pay attention to.
Close Relationships: This is a real tricky one. It relates to the previous factor, but actually involves more serious and involved personal contacts, such as parent/child, husband/wife, siblings, other relatives, good friends, and of course, lovers. In other words, some complex exchange energy situations. Of course, people who we are close to have a tendency to get their feelings hurt if we pull ourselves away from them or don’t maintain a certain level of “energy sharing” with them. There is no easy solution here, but you still need to monitor your energy situation to make sure these relationships don’t become too stressful on a regular basis.
Second (finally), here are a couple obvious things we can do to help reduce such stress and tension in our daily lives.
Exercise: We all know the normal health benefits of regular exercise, but there are also spiritual benefits. Vigorous exercise that works the heart muscle two or three times a week, twenty to thirty minutes at a time would be good. This helps burn off stress and tension, allowing the body to relax and quiet down easier when meditating.
Also, practicing Hatha Yoga to supplement your exercise program would be a good idea. It helps prepare the body to be a container for spiritual energy, disciplines the mind and does several other positive things for the physical body. The main benefit is a body healthy enough to be able to relax properly, making it a tremendous aid to meditation and setting you up for acquiring more energy.
Another exercise element involves the lymph system staying clean, clear and flowing properly. Having a regular massage on the body’s pressure points and meridian lines and/or being manipulated by a reputable chiropractor would be a very good idea. Again, keeping the lymph system flowing and relaxed insures a tense-free, energetic meditation.
Meditation: Well, duh, that’s what we’ve been talking about here. Although we all probably know mediation originally was an ancient practice related to religious or spiritual activities, today it has grown into different health-related programs that integrate mind-body-soul. A way to tune us up, so to speak, and manage the modern stressful world. It is also used to expand our consciousness to perceive and understand reality, and to explore the inner landscape in pursuit of our true nature in relation to these higher consciousness states. An interesting tidbit; almost 20 million people now meditate regularly in the U.S. today, up 60% from just a decade ago.
Whatever the motivation or reason behind meditating, there are a number of reported benefits, as well as health problems that can be alleviated. The physical benefits include lower heart rate, decreased metabolic rate, lower oxygen consumption, increased blood circulation, decreased muscle tension, immune system enhancement, lower serotonin, cortisol and lactate levels, decreased respiratory rate, lower blood pressure, higher skin resistance, lower cholesterol levels and higher levels of DHEAS. What these benefits translate to are less stress, tension and anxiety, deeper rest, reduction of free radicals, youthfulness, better cardiovascular health, allergy relief, pain management and overall better general health. That’s quite a few benefits, but then we also have the psychological ones.
Reported psychological benefits include more harmonic brain activity, improved learning ability, better memory, decreased depression, relaxed alertness, calming the mind, elevated mood levels, better emotional stability, feelings of vitality, decreased moodiness, lessened phobias, greater creativity, all relating to heightened awareness and intuition, a sense of well-being, self-worth and self-confidence, more energy, mental clarity, inner satisfaction, increased happiness and overall better psychological health. Again, quite an impressive list of benefits.
So, who wouldn’t want to meditate? Well, how about those of us who are too busy or stressed out to go for it! Catch-22 again.
Okay, back to my original set of statements: ‘RELAX! … RELAX … relax … squared. What? … you may ask. The 90% solution. Say what …?’
Basically what I mean, and what I have been taught in the meditation system I practice (but took me a while to learn), is that no matter what meditation technique or series of techniques you apply to yourself, the real solution is very simple … your technique is only 10% of the solution. The other 90% is about relaxing properly.
Meaning, that you can work very hard and very diligently at your technique(s), but if you never relax properly or enough, it really won’t work very well. It is a bit of a catch-22, but you can get an edge up by considering those things I mentioned that you do have some control over. Balancing your techniques and giving heavy weight to reducing tension and stress will do wonders for ‘getting off’ very well in your daily meditations.
I hope these help you out!