10 Steps To Improve Your Meditation

Often I’m asked, “What’s the best way to meditate?” or “How can I meditate better” or “How can I concentrate when I meditate?” These are common concerns that crop up. Consequently, they often cause well intentioned people to abandon their efforts to start a meditation practice. Today, I’m going to give you some practical steps on how you can improve your meditation practice. 

Be Consistent 

We often push aside their meditation in favor of trying to complete things we feel “should” be done. Other times we just lose the urge to meditate or feel it’s not something we want to do. That’s normal since we’re all human. The first thing to understand, however, is that for your meditation to improve, you need to do it consistently. Consistency is far more important than the length of the time spent meditating. 

The more consistent you are with your meditation practice, the better results you’ll experience. Ideally, you should meditate daily, even if it’s only for 5 or 10 minutes. Meditation has numerous benefits, so the more you meditate, the better the effect. 

Consistency also means you should meditate at the same time each day, whether that’s in the morning or the evening, whatever suits you best. Personally, I find morning meditation is the easiest, since my day is just starting, plus it really gets my day off on the right foot. Since meditation can be so enjoyable and relaxing, you should look forward to it and that will help your consistency.

Avoid Expectations

Don’t expect miracles overnight. Understand that for the first few weeks or months, you may feel that your thoughts keep interfering with your practice and get frustrated. Thoughts are OK and are just a symptom of your mind releasing stress (exactly what you want). Take it as it comes and don’t worry about your thoughts. Just come back to your breathing. 

Also, you may think that nothing’s happening. However, you’ll find that over time, you’ll become more relaxed, centered, grounded, peaceful and content. You’ll find that meditation becomes easier for you and more enjoyable. Like all things, meditation provides an evolution, not a revolution. Progress will be slow and methodical. This is not a race, it’s more like a marathon.

Don’t Meditate When You’re Tired

Many people complain they can’t meditate because they fall asleep. This is one reason I meditate in the morning after I wake-up (even before my morning coffee–HEAVENS!). I do a “morning meditation.” You want to try meditating when you feel refreshed, full of energy and can focus. 

While it seems counterintuitive, to be full of energy, this allows you to focus better and become more centered. Your mind will wander less and you can bring yourself to the present more easily..

This Is A Mindfulness Practice

As I just explained above, meditation is a practice that uses the mind to focus on the here and now, to become centered and to visualize. Thus meditation is a mindfulness practice above all else. This too seems counterintuitive, since you’d think, “Don’t I want to take my mind out of the equation?” 

Mindfulness is simply another term for awareness and centeredness. Therefore, make your meditation a mindfulness practice. You’ll find you’ll enjoy meditation even more.

Find A Comfortable Place Without Distractions

While you certainly want to be comfortable during your meditation, you don’t want to be so comfortable that you fall asleep. Therefore I always recommend finding a comfortable armchair in a quiet room. Keep the dog out, keep the spouse, significant other or children out. You finally get some alone time–YAY! Don’t forget to turn off any appliances (otherwise there might be some unfortunate consequences).

Consider this place your own Nirvana for a short time, and it’s all yours. Turn off your phone (yes, unplug), turn off any alarms, and just allow yourself to be alone in the quiet of your own being. If you want, set a timer on your phone to play soft music as an alert that your meditation time is complete. I love the app “Insight Timer” for this.

Focus On Your Breathing

One of the best methods to bring you back to center is by focusing on your breathing. When you begin your meditation, focus on your inhalation and your exhalation. Feel your chest rise and fall with each breath. Feel the air fill your belly and leave your belly the way a bellows would. Do this for several minutes. 

Allow your breathing to find its own natural rhythm. Relax into each breath. With each breath, become even more relaxed. You can even do an entire meditation focusing only on your breathing. This is called a “breathing meditation” (what a shock, right?). This is also a great method to bring you back to center if thoughts interfere.

Use Visualization Meditations

Visualization meditations are very powerful. Begin to visualize in your mind’s eye a scene that you find comforting, calming, relaxing and pleasurable. This might be a beautiful green meadow with a soft breeze, or a glade of trees with the wind rustling in the leaves, or a beautiful sunset on a warm beach with waves lapping at your feet, or gently floating into space without a care in the world. Allow yourself to dream up whatever feels good to you. 

This is basically a wonderful daydream. Allow yourself to go someplace else and just escape. Some people have difficulty visualizing, and that’s ok. Instead, just focus on the feelings of what it might feel like to experience any of these scenes or situations. With any experience, whether it's breathing or visualizing, just focus on the feelings.

Repeat Mantras

You can also repeat words or phrases silently in your mind or out loud to help you stay centered. You could repeat the phrase, “I love myself,” or “I am love,” or I am light.” You can also repeat sounds like “Ohm.” You could repeat the Buddhist phrase “Om Mani Padme Om,” which essentially is the fundamental concept of compassion. 

Since the mind can only hold one thought at a time, your mind is focused on the mantras as you’re repeating them. Here is a list of 21 Mantras you can try during your meditation.

Use Mala Beads

What are Mala Beads? A mala is a strand of beads (traditionally 108, or a fraction thereof) used for keeping count during meditation. It is often worn on the wrist or as a necklace. It is very similar to the rosary in concept and practice. It is a tool focusing your awareness and concentration during your spiritual practice, meditation, prayer or reflection. choose your intention or affirmation. 

Hang the first mala bead gently on the middle or ring finger of your hand. Place your thumb on the guru bead, and use it to count each smaller bead, pulling it with the thumb towards you as you count, or repeat your mantra. Reciting a mantra takes your mind away from your daily life and establishes positive thought patterns. Repeating a single sound, word, or phrase focuses your attention and is scientifically proven to calm the mind.

Consider Chakra Meditations

You can open each chakra and your overall energy channel with a chakra meditation. This will help you to unblock the energy in each chakra point. You can choose to focus only on one chakra at a time or work on all 7 chakras. You can choose to focus on the color with each individual chakra or the energy and number associated with it. Whether you choose a root chakra meditation, or heart chakra meditation or a crown chakra meditation, for example, the effects can be different. 

I have a chakra meditation that helps you unblock each chakra and allow the energy to flow in your chakra system. By the end of a chakra meditation, you feel more open, allowing, centered, grounded and at peace. This is only one of the numerous meditations available. Others include loving kindness meditation, transcendental meditation, mindfulness meditation and movement meditation to name a few.

I hope this article has helped you find ways to improve your meditation practice and get you one step closer to improving your spirituality and spiritual awareness. If you’re interested in exploring different meditations, I have several available for free here. If you’d like to further explore ways to improve your meditation and have a guided meditation to practice along with, then I have a video you can watch here. 

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Tags: meditation, visualization meditation, mindfulness, chakra meditation, guided meditation, mala beads, benefits of meditation, body mind soul, transcendental meditation, how to meditate, morning meditation, living spiritually, loving kindness meditation.