Rebecca-Anne Withey: Tips for beginning a meditation practice!

Earlier this month it was National Meditation Day. Meditation is simply the act of practising focused awareness, whether it’s by concentrating on the breath, the body or listening to a guided meditation.

The reason most people come to meditation is that they’re seeking peace and quiet or some sense of stillness from the busyness of their lives. Mindfulness meditation, in particular has been scientifically proven to help with episodes of stress, depression, chronic pain and anxiety.

As a Mindfulness practitioner, every day is a day for meditation whether it’s through formal sitting practice or otherwise.

Being a busy mum, I don’t always have time for lengthy sitting practices so I tend to opt for mindful walks, yoga or 3 minute breathing spaces. Being deaf, I can’t follow guided videos in YouTube so over time I’ve learnt through my training to self guide.

It’s great that we have a national meditation day to raise awareness of simple steps people can take to support their health by starting a meditation practice. It also encourages companies to release free guided meditation videos, apps and podcasts and so on.

But how useful are these guided meditations for deaf people? They’re all in the form of things you need to hear to be guided by! Where are the accessible, FREE resources?!

So, sadly, meditation does tend to get written off as something only hearing people can do. But that doesn’t have to be the case. I’ve learnt to adapt my training and my work in Mindfulness so that it doesn’t rely on audio cues at all. Because when I shut my eyes I can’t hear a thing!

Browsing the internet it seems most introductory tips for Mindfulness are either written in vague English or complicated jargon which make meditation seem much more confusing than it actually is. And then you have countless free videos on YouTube with voiceovers, background music, yet no faces to lipread and awkward automated captions with typos and grammatical errors. Argh! So I decided to put together some meditation tips of my own so that YOU, dear Limping Chicken reader, can be enlightened as to what meditation really is and begin to apply the practice in your own lives.

1. Start small. When we first set aside time for meditation we may feel motivated by ambition to achieve instant inner peace, total health and happiness IMMEDIATELY! This can, however, lead to frustration and disappointment when we realise that sitting with our busy minds is actually hard work. So my advice? Start small. Sit for three minutes to begin with. Yes, just three minutes. There’s no pressure to feel anything in particular or make anything happen, you’re just giving yourself three minutes to sit and be a human being. You don’t even have to tell anyone you’re doing it. Don’t make it a big deal, don’t expect too much.

2. Recognise that meditation really is just about watching. In meditation all you’re doing is choosing to watch something. You watch the breath by feeling it from the inside. You’re not trying to change it or force it to be deeper, you’re allowing yourself to breathe in a way that feels comfortable, easy, relaxed. If you can sit and watch your breath for three minutes you’ve effectively mastered what meditation is. It may feel hard or unusual but it’s not actually complicated.

3. Remember that your mind isn’t used to being quiet. One of the main reasons people don’t continue with a meditation practice is that they think it’s too hard to control their minds. But aha! We are not trying to control anything here – we are just watching remember? But when we start to watch we may think jeez, it’s pandemonium in my head with all these thoughts and feelings and memories and daydreams and judgements, my goodness this mind does not SHUT UP! And that’s where I would congratulate you for NOTICING the busyness of your mind. Becoming aware is the first step to mastering the chattering monkey minds we all have. As a society we are so used to mental noise and the impulse to be constantly stimulated by social media, conversations, the news, books… we are not comfortable with stillness. But it is possible

4. Just get started. No more procrastination. If you have time for browsing Facebook or Ebay, you have time for a three minute breathing space. So just begin. You sit, you watch the breath. You allow your body to feel heavy and rested and supported by the chair. You don’t need to hold yourself up or hold anything in. You drop all the tension. You let go of the reigns, you surrender control of the Universe 😉 and you dedicate the next few minutes to just being. No work to do, no plans to rush off to, no people to care for. You’re just being with yourself. You breathe and if you notice your thoughts wandering, you congratulate yourself for noticing that and just return your focus to your breath. Your thoughts may wander a million times, but you can return to the breath a million times more. You absolutely can condition your mind to get used to calm and stillness, three minutes at a time. Go you!

5. You don’t have to shut your eyes. When I started my mindfulness practice I had to attend weekly group sessions as part of my training. Being the only deaf person, I was always uncomfortable about shutting my eyes. Without my eyes I wouldn’t be able to follow the guided instructions that the interpreter was relaying to me. But also – I felt a little vulnerable with my eyes closed. I soon discovered that it was possible to gaze at an object and have the same relaxed awareness. You can choose any object; a candle, a bunch of keys, a plant, absolutely anything and have it be your point of focus. Sure, you can shut your eyes if you prefer but you don’t have to. There’s no rules when it comes to adapting your practice to suit you – it’s your practice after all.

6. Your real life is your meditation practice. You don’t need to separate yourself off from the world to meditate. You can focus on your breath throughout the day while you’re doing pretty much anything. Instead of washing the dishes whilst ruminating about what you did earlier that day, try focusing on your breathing instead. Instead of driving to work and creating mental movies about what the day may hold, just let yourself breathe and drive. Take yourself for a walk and instead of going through your problems mentally, just breathe and take in your surroundings. There are so many opportunities in our day to choose to direct our focus on our breath – take your pick.

If you have any questions about Mindfulness or if you’d like to view my 3 minute breathing space in BSL – for free – just drop me an email at:
emailrebeccaawithey@gmail.com 👌