The Original Superpower: How and Why to Start Meditating Today.

If you know how to worry, you know how to meditate. It means to think of something over and over. — Joyce Meyer

Meditation, in recent times, is gaining popularity — despite having been around for thousands of years. Science, and particularly neuroscience, can now begin to explain the reported benefits of meditation.

I first learnt of the power of meditation whilst studying neuroscience as an undergraduate. Since then, I have been practically screaming at people to start meditating.

The list of benefits associated with meditation is so extensive it almost sounds like I made it up to sell you something. There are more and more studies demonstrating new and exciting ways it can benefit you, some of which are unexpected.

Meditation has been shown to reduce symptoms of many disorders such as depression (4), anxiety (5), substance abuse (6), eating disorders (7) and chronic pain (8). It can also improve general feelings of well-being and quality of life (9).

I could sit here all day and list the benefits meditation brings to obscure and seemingly unrelated conditions — at this point, the benefits of meditation are clear. It is, in my opinion, something that everyone should be doing. Just like everyone should be doing cardio for heart health, they should meditate for the neurophysiological benefits.

Trying to figure out who is the observer of my thoughts.

The current surge of interest in meditation can, in some part, be attributed to a 2010 paper by researchers from the Massachusetts General Hospital that demonstrated the effects of meditation on brain structure.

Hölzel (2010) showed that meditation increases gray matter concentration in brain regions involved in learning and memory processes, emotion regulation, self-referential processing and perspective taking (3).

This study made quite an impact because the time it took to see these changes was just eight weeks — in just two months, participants tangibly changed the structure of their brains for the better.

Subsequent research into meditation has confirmed this many times in many parts of the brain. Clearly, it’s evident that meditation is changing the brain. But what is causing these changes?

The concept of neuroplasticity can help us understand.

Neuroplasticity: The Final Frontier of Self-improvement

It was the view for a long time that your brain remained unchanged once it was fully developed in your early 20s. In recent years the concept of neuroplasticity has come to the forefront of modern neuroscience and can help explain the changes we see as a result of meditation.

Neuroplasticity is the brain’s ability to modify, change and adapt structure and function throughout life and in response to experience. Explaining the various mechanisms involved in neuroplasticity is beyond the scope of this article, but the crux is that the brain can grow and reorganise itself to function in some way that differs from previously (10).

It’s probably no surprise that meditation can be a catalyst for these changes (1)(2).

There are a number of things that can cause neuroplasticity, and also it’s not always a good thing: the brain can change in negative ways in response to certain stimuli.

Regardless, if meditation is one of the things that can cause neuroplasticity and all the benefits are positive, then clearly it’s a powerful thing.

But to be able to enjoy the results it provides, you have to know how to do it. In the next section, I will explain exactly how to get started.

The cause of, and solution to, all of life’s problems.

How to begin building your meditation habit

Undertaking meditation isn’t hard at all, but it might seem confusing. There are a lot of different styles of meditation, but they all boil down to the same thing: repetitive and persistent redirection of attention towards the same mental object. This counters a common reason people use to justify not meditating: That they have a poor attention span, and the frequent lapses in concentration cause them to get frustrated with themselves.

Meditating is not a herculean feat of attentional endurance. It’s the repeated redirection of attention — completely analogous to doing repetitions with a dumbbell in the gym to train your muscles, the repetitions that engender growth are returning your attention from those intrusive thoughts to your original point of focus.

To keep it simple, I will separate meditation into just two groups: guided and unguided.

Guided meditation is where someone directs your point of focus using their voice, essentially talking you through the meditation. Unguided is just directing your attention to whatever point of focus you choose of your own volition.

Let’s start with unguided meditation.

Unguided Meditation

First, find somewhere relatively quiet and free of stimulation where you can sit or lay down — the posture doesn’t matter. To keep the difficulty low, we will set the timer for five minutes. Once the timer starts, take a few deep breaths.

When you’re ready, return your breathing to whatever natural rhythm your body desires and try to notice how it feels. It could be the coldness of the air passing through your nostrils, or the sound or even the physical sensation of your chest rising and falling. Any way in which you can experience the sensation of breathing is something you can focus on, and you can shift from one to the other at any time.

Without fail, there will be a point where your attention will drift to something other than your breath — don’t worry, it’s expected.

What happens here is important — don’t get frustrated with yourself for letting your attention have drifted — simply notice that you’re thinking of something else, and return your attention to your breath. That’s it. There is nothing else to do; no judgment or self-censure is needed.

Keep doing this for your allotted time and you’re done.

Once you can comfortably complete the five minutes, you can increase the time. Only increase the time if you can maintain the daily habit of meditating with that new session length. Doing an extra-long meditation sporadically is the equivalent of flossing your teeth for an hour because you haven’t done it in a while.

It is much better to have a small habit you can maintain than a large one you can’t.

Guided Meditation

The other option is a guided meditation, where someone’s voice is guiding you through the meditation. A quick internet search will give you more than 45 million results for the term ‘guided meditation’.

There are more than enough free ones to get you started on popular streaming apps, with or without video. There are also paid apps, such as Insight Timer, Calm and Headspace, which give extra functionality but are not essential.

The key is to find a speaker that you like. Some people will just have some quality about their voice or manner of speaking that makes it difficult to meditate. If you’re listening to one like that, move on to another speaker and eventually, you’ll find one you like.

There is not much standing between you and a better functioning brain, the plethora of other health benefits besides.

All it takes is to stay in one spot for a bit and try to think of the same thing. Pretty easy if you ask me.

I argued the case that meditation is worth trying and I have given you a way to start doing it, today. Keep in mind that these aren’t the only ways — just two ways I find to be an easy introduction to meditation for most people.

Consider this article as yet another attempt of mine to get you to start meditating. I’m sharing meditation with people because I understand from my own experience what they stand to gain from creating a meditation habit.

Once you start to feel the benefits that come from repeated practice, you’ll understand too.

Good luck.

My name is Nikki Thomas and I make free health and fitness content for everyone, everywhere. I am on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter and Facebook. If you enjoyed the article follow me here and elsewhere for content in all formats. If you’d like to support what I’m doing, you can do so through my Patreon or BuyMeACoffee or simply like, comment and follow me on whatever platforms you like!