Meditation and Stress Management

Introduction

Meditation is a lot like martial arts. Once mastered, you notice that your mind is making a mental assault and with minimal effort, you step out of the way by returning to whatever the object of your concentration is. Little by little, you learn to build up the mental muscles of awareness and then move slowly towards letting go. This is a slow, gentle process. Just as a two year old wanders off and you bring him or her back with gentleness and patience, so it is with the mind. You must bring the same care and gentleness you would bring to that two year old to yourself, without judgment or harshness. This is often times the most challenging element to the process for many people, that of learning to treat themselves with kindness and without judgment or harshness. A meditation during which there are many thoughts and many attempts to bring the mind back to focus is not a failure, but in fact it is a great training session.

For those of you in law enforcement, emergency dispatching or in any of the other similar professions, you may feel that learning something like meditation is a little too touchy-feely for you. You're not interested in allowing yourself to have "feelings." You deal with stuff on a daily basis; you do just fine without anyone's help (thank you very much) and exactly how is meditation going to help you go out on the next call? Maybe, for you, nothing but the research is in and the statistics and personal reports show that there is most definitely something to this "mumbo-jumbo."

Although the allopathic (traditional western medicine) community is only just now starting to catch on, (alternative medicine is now starting to show up in the curriculum of a number of prominent medical schools), people have been using these methods

for thousands and thousands of years. It's only a matter of time before the research and the quantitative analytic methods catch up and the data to prove what people have known for centuries: Faith, prayer, meditation, chanting, whatever method you choose, works. Using these methods carries with it the power to transform lives, including your own. If you can open yourself up to the possibility, read on. You can pull yourself up by your bootstraps later.

Physiology

Everyone is wired differently from a physiological perspective and each of us brings with us different beliefs and experiences. Therefore, an excellent practice for one person may not at all suit another person. That is OK. Learning what "fits" for you is part of the process. Some people prefer a moving form of mediation such as mindful walking, qi gong, hatha yoga or stretching exercises. Others prefer closed eyes sitting exercises such as concentration, mindfulness meditation, centering prayer or other forms of imaginal centering.

It really doesn't matter what form you pick, as long as you pick something that feels right for you. Whatever form you feel drawn to practice, make a commitment to practicing it for a full twenty-eight days. Put it into your schedule every day at the same time and do it. This is the basis for forming a healthy habit. Most people find that waking up fifteen or twenty minutes earlier and doing the practice first thing in the morning not only works well in terms of getting it done, but also sets the tone for a more peaceful, energized, loving and productive day.

More importantly, set aside an increment of time that you can actually do, no matter how small (for example: 10 minutes). If you find when you sit down to meditate that you can do more than ten minutes, great, but if not then only do what you have committed to no matter how silly and insignificant it may seem to you at the time. Build on success. Don't commit to more than you can actually accomplish, other wise you are setting yourself up to add guilt and shame onto a plate that's already far too full. If ten minutes a day is all you can manage initially, that's ok. Ten minutes it is, because what's more important than the time is the develop of the habit of doing anything for yourself that's not related to work, or family, or whatever else occupies your time and takes you away from caring for yourself. Then gradually, once the habit is established you can increase it to 20 minutes or 30 minutes or whatever you want as a goal.

Physiological research shows that at least three 20-minute periods of meditation weekly are necessary to experience long term reduction in heart rate, blood pressure, anxiety and other stress related problems.

Diaphragmatic and Dantien Breathing

Belly (diaphragmatic) breathing is associated with lower heart rate, reduced blood pressure, increased energy and feelings of peacefulness, clarity, relaxation and clarity.

Put one hand on your abdomen and close your eyes. Take a deep breath in through your nose and expel it slowly and completely through your mouth. You will feel your belly flatten. Let the next breath (and all subsequent breaths) come in through your nose. Can you feel your abdomen expand? If you can't, just imagine that a balloon is inflating in your belly when you breathe in and deflating when you breathe out. The out breath is longer than the in breath, like a gentle sigh of relief.

A variant of this technique from Chinese medicine is called dantien breathing. Dantien means the field where the elixir of long life is planted. There are three dantien, which can be compared to storage batteries for qi, or life-force energy. The largest dantien is in the lower abdomen. As you breathe, as in belly breathing, you will also notice that your lower back and sides are also expanding and contracting with the breath.

For a fast minibreak any time during the day, take a deep breath in and release it slowly- a letting go breath. Try breathing back from ten to one, one number on each out breath. By the time you get to one, you will notice that your breath is much slower and more regular and that your body mind system is relaxing. With a little practice, you will form the habit of breathing from your diaphragm most of the time.

Concentration Meditation

Concentration meditation is what Herbert Benson, M.D., Harvard cardiologist, first called the relaxation response. All forms of meditation, in which the mind becomes quiet and focused, also elicit this innate physiological response that is the opposite of the body's stress or fight or flight response. Breathing is an important cornerstone of the relaxation response. Benson first researched the clinically standardized "relaxation" method of meditation in which the word "one" is repeated in time to each outgoing breath. Any word will produce the same results.

An ancient Sanskrit mantra, or meditation focus, is Ham Sah. This is supposed to remind the meditator of the sound of the incoming and outgoing breath. Ham as you breath in, Sah as you breathe out. Ham means I am. Sah means the inner Self, the Divine Spark. Any short phrase will work as the meditation focus, either secular or religious. Using phrases such as saying Hail Mary on the in breath, and Full of Grace on the out breath will work equally well and is an excellent focus for those used to repeating the rosary, which is also a kind of concentration meditation. Jewish Meditation by Rabbi Ari Kaplan, is an excellent primer for Jews. Bensons classic book, The Relaxation Response provides a fine review of secular and religious meditation traditions and practices.

Sitting with your eyes closed, focus on belly or dantien breathing. Repeat your focus phrase, prayer or mantra in time to either the out breath, or both the incoming or out coming breath if it is a longer phrase. When thoughts come, gently, passively disregard them and return to the repetition. Return to your breath.

Mindful Walking

Thich Nhat Hanh, a Buddhist peace worker, poet and monk, is known for his mindful walking. Most of the time we are not present to what we are doing. The mind is constantly thinking ahead and behind itself, conjuring up a million thoughts about

yesterday and tomorrow, often times perseverating on the negative and completely forgetting about the moment at hand. The only time we actually have, or have any direct control or influence over, is this moment now. John Lennon couldn't have said it

any better: Life is what's happening when we're making other plans.

Mindfulness means being present to what is, rather than losing ourselves in thoughts about what was and is no longer or what has yet to happen. Mindfulness is an awakening to life, here and now. It is opening up to a nonjudgmental awareness of the wonder of the present moment. As you walk, it's knowing that you are walking, slowly and mindfully.

As you prepare to walk, slowly and mindfully, repeating the cadence of your steps to diaphragmatic breathing or to Hail Marys or whatever you choose, try repeating a poem:

Breathing in I calm body and mind (in breath).

Breathing out I smile (out breath).

Dwelling in the present moment (in breath).

I know this is the only moment (long out breath).

Become aware of the rhythm of you body and breathing. How many steps to your in breath? How many steps to your out breath? How does it feel to move forward, shift your weight, move your feet? Keeping your breath and body awareness, begin to notice the world around you. See the trees, the grasses, the flowers in season, the sky. Smell the smells. Hear the sounds. Try to be aware without judgment or reflection. No good or bad sounds. Just sounds. Nonjudgmental awareness opens the eye of the heart. When you catch yourself thinking about something- and therefore becoming mindless- gently, kindly refocus your attention on breath and body. Do not punish yourself. Recite the poem again and once more become mindful of the world around you.

Sitting Mindfulness Meditation

Sit in you seat with great dignity, back straight and eyes closed. Become aware of your breathing. Notice how the breath is coming in and fills your belly and how breath moves out into space. Feel the coolness of the air on your skin. Keep about 25% of your attention on breathing and the other 75% on the feelings of spacious mindfulness. You may become aware of sounds, sensations and thoughts. Just let them all come and go. Be gentle with yourself. Let them pass across the spacious sky of your mind like clouds. Sogyal Rinpoche, a Tibetan Buddhist Lama, compares the thoughts that arise in mediation to waves that rise from the ocean. It is the ocean's nature to rise. We can not stop it, but as Rinpoche says, "we can leave the risings in the risings."

Holy Moment Meditation

The concepts of healing and what is holy have a common root in the old Anglo Saxon word haelen, to make whole. Holiness and healing are found in relationship- in our ability to be present in ourselves, other people, the natural world and the Divine. We have all had holy moments, natural experiences of mindfulness, when our heart opened and we were fully present to a sunrise, a sunset, the sun glinting off a snow covered mountain, lights dancing in the water of a river, the trust felt in holding a new born child to our chest or the look in the eye of someone we love dearly. These are moments of deep and profound gratitude and connection to life, and often we cry when our full heart overflows.

Sit quietly and close your eyes. Focus on belly breathing for a few minutes. Now recall a holy moment and involve all your senses. What did you see? What were the shapes and colors all around you? Can you recall any physical sensations in your body? Any fragrances that come back to you? Any sounds? Were you warm or were you cold? Touching, moving, still? What were you feeling? Where do you experience these emotions in your body? Let the memory fade and return to belly breathing, keeping the focus on the feelings that remain, watching them mindfully, flowing with them. This is the physical sensation of healing and holiness.

Centering Prayer

This form of silent, meditative prayer has been popularized by Father Thomas Keating of Snowmass Monestary in Colorado. You can read about it in his book, Open Mind, Open Heart. The intention of the prayer is to be in God's presence. The idea is to shift awareness away from the thoughts that Keating compared to "boats floating down the river of consciousness to the river itself." The river is God's presence, that loving life force in which we live and move and have our own being.

Prior to beginning the practice, choose a prayer word, a Sacred Word, which will serve as your reminder to let go of the thoughts and re-enter the river of the Divine Presence. The prayer word can be anything that reminds you of your intention to keep your appointment with God. Peace, Shalom, Hail Mary, Great Spirit, Goddess Energy, The Lord is My Shepherd, are a few examples. Before you start even your first session, center yourself any way you choose and pray for a scared word to come to you. Once you have chosen one, keep it for at least a month. Changing it in the midst of prayer is a distraction.

Center yourself in the silent intention to be present to God. There is no focus on the breath at all in this practice. When you notice your mind wandering, repeat the Sacred Word a few times until you can let go once again as gently as laying a feather on a piece of cotton. As with all forms of meditation, don't worry about how well you are doing. As Keating writes, "the feeling that we are in God's Presence is a kind of grace. The best any of us can do is to have a willing heart by intentionally entering silence and waiting there for the Divine Beloved.

The Egg of Light Healing Exercise

One of the most ancient forms of healing and concentration consists of imagining yourself in the center of an egg of Divine Light. Sit quietly with eyes closed and imagine a great star of loving light above you. Feel streams of light washing over you and invite it to enter the top of your head and wash down through your body like a river washes through the sand on its bottom, carrying away fatigue, fear, dis-ease or negativity. As all the darkness washes out of the bottoms of your feet imagining that it is taken in by Mother Earth and turned to compost. Spend a little extra time washing any part of your body where there is tension, pain or disease.

Let the light wash clean the boundaries of your heart, revealing the inner light, which is your own true essence. Let that heart light shine more and more brightly, filling your cells and tissues and extending beyond your body---three feet above and below you and on all sides until you feel as though you are sitting in an egg of healing, protective light. Affirm that all positive thoughts and prayers from others will penetrate the egg and reach you, but all negative influences will bounce back off the egg and a blessing be returned to their sender. Affirm that all your own positive thoughts will reach through to others, and all negative thoughts will bounce back off the inner shell of the egg and a blessing of compassion will return to awaken you heart to love.

Loving kindness Meditation

Meditate any way that you choose for a few minutes, or enter the egg of light. Then repeat those blessings first for yourself, then for your loved ones, then for those you are in conflict with, and then for the world. I like to imagine the star of light from the prior exercise expanding into a circle of light into which I call those to be blessed by name, imagining them as fully as possible.

Here are the blessings:

May I be at peace. May my heart remain open.

May I awaken to the light of my own true nature.

May I be healed. May I be a source of healing for all beings.

See a circle of Divine Light. Invite your loved ones into it, calling them by name. See them in as much detail as you possible.

Imagine the loving light shining down on them and washing through them, revealing the light within their own hearts. Then bless

them:

May you be at peace. May your heart remain open.

May you awaken to the light of your own true nature.

May you be healed. May you be a source of healing for all beings.

Next, think of those people who you hold in judgment, and to whom you are ready to begin extending forgiveness. Place them

in a circle of light and see the light washing away all their negativity, just as it did for you and your loved ones. Bless them:

May you be at peace. May your heart remain open.

May you awaken to the light of your own true nature.

May you be healed. May you be a source of healing for all beings.

See our beautiful planet as it appears from outer space, a delicate jewel suspended in the vastness of infinite space. Imagine the Earth surrounded by light, the green continents, the blue waters, the white polar caps. The two leggeds and the four leggeds, the fish that swim, the birds that fly, those that creep and crawl on the brown earth. Earth is a place of opposites. Day and night, good and evil, up and down, male and female. Be spacious enough to hold it all as you offer these blessings:

May there be peace on Earth. May the hearts of all people be open to themselves and to each other. May all people awaken to the light of their own true nature. May all creation be blessed and be a blessing to All That Is.

Bone Marrow Cleansing Exercise from Qigong

The entire bone marrow cleansing exercise, plus a slew of other excellent exercises are on Ken Cohen's award winning video tape, The Way of Qigong, Sounds True, PO Box 8010, Boulder, CO, 80306. In brief, there are four steps:

Step One: Cup hands and lift arms as though carrying a small ball, bring hands into prayer pose. Think of the entire universe being present within your heart. Hold this standing mediation for about a minute. Let arms drift down to your sides.

Step Two: Palms forward, raise arms to or about shoulder level, then turn palms away from body. Think of yourself as filling the universe. Hold for about a minute. Let arms drift downwards till they rest by your sides.

Step three: this is the only repetitive step, (two to five times each side). Tuck the back of one hand against the lower spine. Raise the other hand, palm forward to the sky. Gather the qi from all the sources that are meaningful to you (I call this "waving to the universe"). Energetically connect the palm of your hand to the crown of the head (Don't actually touch the top of your head) and draw down the qi, moving your hand parallel to and in front of your body. Imagine that you are drawing the qi down through the marrow of your bones, visualizing your skeleton. Imagine that any old qi as darkness being pushed out through the feet into the mother earth for recycling. When the hand that is bringing th qi down reaches the level of the hand against your lower back, change hands and repeat on the other side.

Cup hands up and raise them as if lifting a large beach ball. When hands are above the head turn them palms up and stand for a moment like a tree connecting earth to heaven. Gather the qi, make an energetic connection of both hands to the crown, and

then draw down the qi through the bones with both hands.