Meditation is a stress-buster, a path to calmness and solace. A regular session of meditation and mindfulness exercise works wonders on the mind and soul. Which is why a woman needs it more! Mindful meditation and exercise would cure a stressful day for the woman. Meditation is calming the mind and training it to get a single focal point and achieve a calm and stable state through that. It has many benefits, like promoting self-awareness to the person who practices it, reducing stress and anxiety, increasing mental focus and triggering the relaxation response of the brain. Various studies have shown that just an eight-week meditation can bring significant changes in the attention and emotional state of the mind. For women, these are important to keep away from the regular monotonous routine and just focus.
There are two crucial forms of meditation practiced- concentrative meditation and mindfulness meditation. In concentrative meditation, the person focuses the attention on a specific object and blanks out the mind from everything else. Here the prime focus is to experience the focal point, be it the breathing rhythm or a mantra. In mindfulness meditation, the person targets different issues of his/her life and focuses on it. Meditation is practiced by many women. Leading and powerful women across the world credit it as a stress-buster and for improving their concentration. Meditation has helped them tackle many challenges in life and public situations easily, like leading TV presenter Oprah Winfrey, who claims that meditation has made her 1000% better. Soledad O’ Brien, CNN anchor states that meditation is life-changing and popular Hollywood actress Jennifer Aniston who said that meditation has changed her life and everything.
Meditation can also be a support for individuals to get past their difficult times in life. The issues of emotional upheavals and downsides can be calmed with meditation, so also the depression that comes in a relation. It also proactively affects a woman’s mind. By removing the layers of mental state, it enhances the mind to work at an optimal state. Women are at the maximum end of receiving emotional distress. Blame it on the hormones or menstrual cycles or the functioning, a woman goes through an enormous myriad of emotions on a daily level. As such, to ease the fluctuating moods and bringing comfort to the soul, meditation is crucial for the woman. A recent study on mindfulness meditation revealed that it has different effects on men and women.
While it significantly helped women to overcome a depressing mood, it made men feel worse than before. It is believed that the surprising result is because of the traditional ways in which men and women react to emotional distress. While women tend to ruminate into the distress and indulge in it, men tend to distract and divert. As meditation brings attention to a focal point, for the people who ruminate into the distress and expose themselves to it, mindfulness meditation helps in improving the mood. And for those who look into distracting themselves, meditation worsens their mood as it brings back their attention to the same thing. The study, conducted by Brown University studied 41 male and 36 female students in a course of 12-week class on mindfulness meditation. This course included three one hour meditation labs every week where an average student had to engage in 41+ hours of meditation in class as well as outside.
Women and meditationPractice Mindfulness Meditation- Step-wise
- A good seat: Get a good place to sit in a calm and composed environment. A quiet place is a great way to start mindfulness.
- Time Limit: It is good to set a definite time limit. If you are a beginner, then a short span of time, say 5-10 minutes is best to train the mind to focus.
- Observe the body: You can sit with your feet on the floor or can also sit on the chair. You can sit loosely cross-legged, in lotus posture or can also kneel- as long as you are comfortable with your body and the position you are sitting in. Just make sure you are comfortable and stable in the position you will be staying in for some time.
- Feel the breath: Observe the breath and focus on it. Follow the vibrations of the breath as you breathe in and breathe out.
- Observe the wandering mind: Your mind is destined to wander places leaving the vibrations of your breath. Observe the wanderings and the places it is going to. When you notice the wandering mind for a few minutes, train and focus it back to the breath and the sensations of the breath.
- Be kind to the wandering mind: It is perfectly fine for the mind to wander about. Instead of judging the mind for getting diverted or judging the contents of the wandering mind, just focus and come back to the present.
So ladies, train your mind into meditation and get the solace from hassles and worries of your everyday life!
Also Read: Meditation Apps For Achieving Mindfulness
