The Lazy Girl’s Guide to Meditation

In my last post I discussed why meditation is such a crucial habit to establish. Now I want to get into how to actually start making it a part of your daily routine.

Whenever I start a new habit, I usually encounter a fair amount of resistance. I come up with all kinds of excuses to avoid doing this new thing or making any sort of change. In my experience, one of the keys to overcoming this resistance is to make the new habit as easy and enjoyable as possible.

In this post I want to share with you all my tips and tricks for consistently incorporating a meditation practice into my daily life. I also want to share with you the meditations I do on a regular basis.

But before we get started with all that jazz, lets first clear up the most common misconception associated with meditation.

‘I can’t clear my head for that long.’

‘How am I supposed to go that long without thinking?’

‘My mind is just too busy to meditate, I don’t know how to stop my thoughts.’

YOU DO NOT HAVE TO CLEAR YOUR MIND IN ORDER TO MEDITATE. Let me say that again, in  another way. Meditating does not require you to stop thinking. At all. That is not the point of meditating. The whole point of meditating is to observe your thoughts with the intent of changing your relationship with them. The goal of meditation is to stop identifying with your thoughts so that they no longer run your life.

While meditating you learn to watch your thoughts. You observe them as if they are cars passing by on a busy road. You do not have to stop your thoughts or clear your mind. You learn to just allow your thoughts to be what they are.

Now with that out of the way…. let’s get into how to make meditation a daily habit.

Start small

One of the major excuses I made up as to why I couldn’t meditate was that I didn’t have enough time. Does that sound familiar to you? I can be somewhat of an all or nothing person- where if I can’t meditate sitting cross-legged in a temple for an hour every day I don’t even know what the point is. This is silliness and is a classic perfectionist excuse for not getting started.

Another excuse that comes up in this realm is that “I can’t sit still for that long”.

My advice for both of these is to start small. Start with an increment of time that feels so short its almost laughably easy. I started off with 5-10 minute meditations, but you can even do as little as 3 minutes a day to reap the benefits.

If you don’t have 3 minutes in your day you can devote to becoming a better human being, then you really don’t have a life.

Be lazy

There is nothing that says you have to meditate on a hard floor sitting up right in the 90 degree heat in an ashram in India. Sometimes when my alarm goes off and it’s time to meditate, I don’t even want to sit upright. So I don’t. I mediate lying down. It’s completely allowed, I promise.

It is much easier to convince myself to meditate when all I have to do is literally press a button. I don’t even have to sit up or really move at all. And remember, the best way to start a new habit is to make it as easy and friction-less as possible.

Grab a guide

Meditating is a very daunting prospect at first so it is helpful to have someone to walk you through it. Luckily, we live in an incredible digital age where there is an app for everything. You can access the wisdom of leading meditation gurus right at your fingertips.

My absolute favorite guided meditation app is headspace. It is the best $12 I spend every month. They have a free 10 day trial which I highly recommend if you are just getting started. Even if you never plan on doing the paid version, you should do the 10 day free trial as an introduction to meditation.

The app includes helpful animations to explain some of the more difficult concepts of meditation. These short videos gave me relatable metaphors for understanding the mindset and the purpose of meditation. Andy, the voice that guides you through each session, has a calming British accent that is perfectly suited to the whole meditation experience.

I think the best part of starting off with guided meditation is it gives your mind something to do. Like a little bone for it to chew on.  When you have someone to guide you through the process, all you really have to do is listen to them and the rest takes care of itself.

The headspace series also acknowledges many of the common struggles of meditation such as getting distracted, feeling like you aren’t doing it right, and racing thoughts. Andy normalizes these struggles and provides insightful solutions to deal with them.

Start or end your day with meditation

When I first started meditating, I wasn’t motivated enough to wake up an extra 10 minutes earlier to do it. I would hit the snooze button and miss my window of opportunity. Every morning I would try and fail. I thought that maybe I just wasn’t a meditater, maybe this just isn’t for me. I’m just too tired in the morning.

Then, I had the revolutionary idea of trying it before bed instead. It seemed like the perfect way to wind down and quiet my mind before going to sleep. All I had to do was sit there and listen to this guy talk for 10 minutes before going to bed. Almost like a mini bed time story. This worked wonderfully. Before I knew it, I was consistently meditating every single night.

Find a pocket of time that works for you. I would strongly suggest trying to start it either first thing in the morning or as part of a bedtime routine, because that is when you are most likely to make it happen. Play around with which one works best for you and allow yourself to be flexible with this.

Savor the moment afterward

Inevitably after you meditate, even if you feel like it went horribly awry, you will feel a greater sense of peace and presence. Even if you were only able to pay attention to one breath cycle, the act of closing your eyes and pausing for a moment generates feelings of calmness.

After you open your eyes and are done meditating, don’t just get up right away and rush along to your next activity. Take one moment to sit there and notice how you feel. Savor the stillness and joy and quiet confidence of your post- meditative state.

By paying attention to the goodness that you feel in that moment you are reinforcing the habit. You will associate meditation with all the positive feels. You are letting your brain know this is a pleasurable experience and you will desire to repeat it in the future. That is alot of power for just one moment.

Give yourself all the grace

Some days I really suck at meditating. It feels like my app is just running in the background and I’m not even listening to it. My brain is spastically making my to-do list for the day and I’m barely tuning into my breath or my body.

That happens. And its ok. You don’t have to “be good” at meditating. You just have to show up. So drop all of those expectations of being some professional monk, and just let your meditation experience be whatever it is. All you are trying to do is practice observing your thoughts and practice being present in your body. If you get distracted, its ok. Just do your best to come back into your breath- even if thats only for a split second. You really are just building up a muscle and it takes lots of reps. Be patient and give yourself grace as you go on this journey.

Finally, I wanted to end this post with some of my personal favorite meditation apps, resources and gurus to get you started along your journey.

• Headspace, guided meditation app. This is a perfect place to start if you are a beginner. I really don’t think I would have become ” a meditator” without the help of this little app.  Has a 10 day free trial and then costs $12/month. Worth. Every. Penny.
• Insight timer, a free meditation app. You can switch to this one after you’ve done the headspace free trial if you don’t want to spend money on your meditation habit just yet.
• Marie Forelo’s personal meditation practice. This is a youtube video where Marie walks you through a simple and effective way to meditate. She gives you hand motions and things to chant so that your busy mind has something to do while you train it to sit still.
• Soul Sync meditation by Preethaji and Krishnaji. This is my new favorite meditation that I now do every morning to start my day off in a beautiful state of consciousness.

There you have it, now you have no excuse not to meditate. Give it a try and let me know how it goes!  I’m very passionate about getting people to drink the meditation kool aid so I would love to help you with this in any way I can.

Send me an email (chelseaturgeon@theturquoisetraveler.com), drop a comment on the blog or DM me on instagram (@theturquoisetraveler).  Let me know what you are having trouble with or how I can help support you as a fellow meditator.