Peace through activity is possible
by Cindy Myska, co-founder of DailyHap.com
I like to meditate through moving my body. Moving meditation provides me the opportunity to focus my awareness on my body and free my mind to let go of any need to follow or identify with my thoughts.
Each individual mind works differently. Meditation guidelines often require a stilled body, and while a stilled body can be very beneficial to mediation for many people, everyone is different and a mediation practice has room for all of our differences.
My brain jumps around and is capable of moving from topic to topic at lightning speed; I get bored easily. Whenever I notice that I’m bored, I can return my attention to how my body is moving. This body awareness helps me let go of stress in any situation and just be with what is. From this peaceful place I can choose to focus on any one thing, which means I never have to accept impatience and boredom.
Effective meditation is that which allows each individual to open up to the beauty of momentarily holding no judgment.
This happened for me when I realized that my most awesome meditations came when I was running. I ran every morning for years, and during those runs, where my body was active and busy, my lungs were breathing in and out, and my feet pounding the pavement, my mind was freed to “be still” and watch my thoughts, to open to spirit and drop limitations and judgments.
The act of vectoring off part of my mind’s energy to focus on keeping my body moving allowed me to much more easily direct the rest of the energy as I pleased.
I used to think that if I was a good meditator, I would be able to sit still, and thereby still my active mind.
I finally realized that it wasn’t about a still mind, it was about a still (as in non-judgemental) relationship to my active mind. This let me feel free to meditate even when I’m active!