Meditation for stressful times

I went to an excellent holiday party this weekend. There was food, there was booze, there were lights, there was much panicking about the future of the country because it was a party full of godless liberals who don't care about email servers. One friend in particular was very down, and we got to talk about ways of dealing with the next four years. My #1 way I told him I plan on dealing? A lot of working out, and a lot of meditation. Self-care for health, strength and resiliency is not something that can at all be cast aside, in my opinion -- in fact, it's going to be more important than ever to fortify ourselves mentally, emotionally, intellectually.

Why do I meditate? It keeps anxiety and depression at bay, it makes me more focused at work and in my personal life; it helps me come up with really good ideas; it clarifies the important things. I think of meditating like vacuuming for my brain. A lot of unimportant crud is going to inevitably build up day over day, week over week, month over month. This helps clear it out so you can focus on what's really important.

I think I convinced him that trying meditation would be a good idea, so I put together the below email for him this morning with tips. If you've been thinking about trying out meditation, maybe this will be helpful for you, too.

To my friend: Wanted to send you some meditation recs & tips. Remember, it's about making your mind resilient, focused and strong so we can stop nazis from taking over our country instead of just falling into a useless panic spiral! 

Here's a good primer on why meditation is so awesome and helpful: https://zenhabits.net/meditation-guide/

 

apps:

headspace (costs money, but a lot of people i know like it and count it as the first gateway for them getting into meditation)

andrew johnson guided meditations - great scottish voice guy who has meditations for everything from relaxation to ones to help you get over a fear of flying

https://www.calm.com/meditate

any app about yoga nidra - this will help you fall asleep. i use this one: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/yoga-nidra-deep-relaxation/id430531216?mt=8

simply being apps - https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/simply-being-guided-meditation/id347418999?mt=8

 

just meditating:

I personally don't use apps to help me meditate. Two to three times a week I sit on my couch before bed or in the morning and just close my eyes and breathe, counting breaths 1-10, and starting over. Inevitably thoughts come in but I just observe them and try to go back to counting my breath. I do this for anywhere from 15-45 minutes. The goal isn't to totally empty your mind, it's just to observe thoughts and breathe. 

If you have any questions about meditation at all, I'm no expert, but throw them in the comments and I'll do my best to help you out!