It might be a myth that we only use 10-20% of our brain capacity. However, reading about that myth/fact and mindfulness in an article exactly five years ago was what made me want to meditate. The article included a picture of an iceberg above and below water to illustrate how much more there is to tap into. Reading the article and seeing the picture – I was sold!
What happens when you practice mindfulness meditation is that you train your awareness. You train to be present, to be in the now. I have mentioned this before – reading about it won’t do it. Imagine you want bigger muscles in your arms. You can find books telling you what to do to get stronger arms, and get a lot of good knowledge about it, but your arm muscles won’t change before you start exercising them regularly. It is the exact same thing with your mind and awareness. You have to train your “awareness muscle” regularly in order to become more mindful and act less on automatic pilot throughout your day.
For me, one aspect of practicing mindfulness meditation so far is that I feel much more human. It is as though I have created space for myself for how I experience life, and at the same time I feel closer to people. I now find that I am in life instead of racing towards the future, only brushing the surface of what life has to offer.
Here are some other benefits of mindfulness meditation when you keep on practising:
First of all, less stress in whatever situation you are in. A calmer mind and less of the non-stop inner chatter. In addition, you become more creative and see things in a clearer way. You will find that you have more time on your hands than before, even though you take time off to meditate 10-30 minutes a day. You will get to know yourself better as you will become more aware of your thoughts and emotions. You may start acting in a wiser way, as you will know where you are, in a deeper way. You will become kinder towards yourself, have more compassion for others, and thus feel happier.
Also, you will get more in tune with your body and your breathing. Many of us walk through life with a head sort of separate from the rest of our body, thinking, thinking, thinking, and not realising there is so much helpful information we can get from simply listening to our body and breath. You will perhaps go back to relying more on your gut feeling (you may already have noticed how often your gut feeling is right?).
If you are curious about mindfulness meditation and what it can do for you, why not try it? Look out for further information regarding this on my website in the near future.
