Do Twitter and meditation mix? Ramblings of a twittering mind.

What I am really asking is -- am I cut out for Twitter? "Do twitter and meditation mix" just sounded like a good title. Meditation mixes with anything -- meditation can be a part of any lifestyle. But for someone like me who was drawn to meditation partly because of my "twitter mind", Twitter can be a challenge. My twitter mind is a lot like the Buddhist "monkey mind" -- jumping from thought to thought like a monkey from tree to tree. Some of us are more that way than others. In Ayurveda, my mind has a lot of vata energy. For those conversant with Ayurveda, I'd say Twitter would aggravate vata, pacify kapha and be neutral for pitta. But that's a whole 'post in the making...

Noticing anything about this post -- does it seem to be jumping around? Too much time spent learning the Twitter ropes got my mind going. The energy there is incredibly frenetic for someone like me. It's also exciting. My mind tends to go off on tangents and free associates. It's great for creativity, but it has to be tamed. I'm sure that's what lead me to the style of meditation I learned and the style I teach. 

In my guided meditations, I consistently encourage letting go of thoughts -- not following the train of thought. This allows the mind to detach and settle down. Not only does this allow for deep rest, but it allows for the discovery of what lies beneath our thoughts. When we meditate, we experience the quality of awareness itself -- the silence and stability within. We call it getting centered. It is the opposite of having a scattered attention. The attention becomes one-pointed, anchored.

Twitter could easily scatter ones attention as you jump from tweet to tweet, clicking on links wandering here and there through blog posts, videos, and more. It's all a matter of balance -- finding the right mix of activities that keep us balanced and grounded. The "right mix" isn't the same for everyone. What we need to learn is what works for us.

As I said, for me Twitter is a challenge. It's a fun challenge -- I love the interconnectivity and especially the opportunity to connect with more of our podcast listeners. But because of the way I'm wired, I can't spend a lot of time on Twitter. (And that's a good thing -- I have so many projects to work on!) I have to find a way to make Twitter work for me. I need to tweet my way, and how that will look is just beginning to evolve.

For now, if you follow us on Twitter, you will receive updates of new blog posts, podcast episodes and other news. I'll try to follow you back if you look like a podcast listener. Let me know if I miss you, and suggestions are welcomed!

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Thanks to Vincent Abry for the great Twitter button.

Remembering Michael Jackson

Michael Jackson's songs have been circling continuously in my mind since hearing of his death yesterday. Everything from ABC to Black or White, Thriller... I can still see and hear him on TV singing with the Jackson Five. I see him electrifying the world at the Apollo Theater. I hear him at the Super Bowl. I hear and see Michael everywhere. He was an amazing talent. He changed music forever. He shook the world energetically, releasing energy as if splitting the atom. His talents -- singing, dancing, composing -- were enormous. How many people really understood the heart and soul of this man? It's challenging to express ones uniqueness completely, and Michael did that. It's hard to be so sensitive, creative and open in this world, especially in the limelight like Michael was.

So many thoughts and feelings floating through my mind and heart. He did want to "heal the world". I titled this post "Remembering Michael Jackson", but he could never be forgotten.

Let it Be Guided Meditation

Our latest podcast, Let it Be Guided Meditation, is a variation on a theme. It's the same theme that gave birth to the Simply Being, Effortless, and Letting Go meditations. It's a theme that can be approached from many angles and given many names, but all of the names can be misleading. All these meditations point you to experience the essence of meditation. The words -- effortless, letting go, simply being -- are all meant to invoke a state of being that can't be put into words. I also use the phrase "let yourself be" in the meditation. That's pretty easy to relate to. Being someone who tends to be hard on myself, I need to remind myself to let myself be quite a lot! But what is letting IT be?

What does it mean to "let it be"? Are there any words that can really capture what the meditative experience is like? What did those words mean to Paul Mc Cartney when he wrote Let it Be? What does it mean to you?

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Anxiety -- "What you resist persists"

I'm working on a special series of meditations, "exercises" really, for anxiety. I'm editing one right now using deep breathing. In it, the first thing I suggest is bringing attention to the anxiety. This is quite the opposite of the usual tendency to want to run away from it. Anxiety builds in a kind of vicious cycle. Anxiety is an expression of fear, and part of what creates it is the fear of the anxiety itself. We resist the anxiety, try to run away from it, and that resistance does indeed cause it to persist. Anxiety, like any other feeling state, comes and goes. Feelings come and go like the weather, but when we get involved in them either through resisting them or ruminating about them, they tend to be prolonged. Let go of the resistance, and the feelings can "pass through".

This is only one small piece of the approach I am using for anxiety, but it is an important one. I'll write more when I've finished my Anxiety Solutions project.

June 2010 Update -- It's almost exactly a year since I wrote this post and we've just finished our anxiety program. What was going to be a series of meditations evolved into a program with meditations, suggested daily exercises and journaling. You can read about it here.

Can you meditate too much?

Unfortunately I have to disagree with Mae West who said "too much of a good thing is wonderful". When it comes to meditation, as well as almost every other "good thing" in life, there can be too much. Food, water, sunshine, exercise, rest -- everything in life -- needs to be in balance. As wonderful as good as meditation may seem, too much is not wonderful at all, but may cause discomfort and interfere with our functioning. LoraC left a comment today saying that since starting meditation, she finds herself crying more easily and also has become clumsy and has been tripping and even fell. She loves the relaxation of meditation, but these things concern her. Of course, I didn't have enough information to know for sure what is happening with her, but it is certainly possible that she is meditating too much.

Too much meditation can make you "spacey" and ungrounded. It can weaken your mind-body coordination. This could be why LoraC is feeling clumsy and tripping. As for her crying more readily, it's just possible that some emotions are being released as a result of the deep relaxation in the meditation. Usually emotional releases would happen during meditation time and not create any concern. But if there starts to be a lot of release or intense emotional processing outside of meditation, it could be that too much is happening too fast. Since these things seem to have started after LoraC began "meditating in earnest", an easy way to find out if it's from meditation is to stop meditating for awhile or cut back on the meditation time or frequency. If the clumsiness and crying go away, then clearly too much meditation is the culprit and the time and frequency of meditation can be adjusted accordingly.

What is the right amount of meditation? How often and how long should you meditate? The answer is it depends. It depends on you -- your constitution, lifestyle, goals for meditation and many other factors. It also depends on the type of meditation. For most people and most meditation styles, usually once or twice a day for 15 - 30 minutes, would work well. Unless you have the personal guidance of a teacher, you will need to experiment and find out what works best for you.

If meditation is enhancing your life, you've found a good balance. If it seems to be creating problems, it may be that you are meditating too much or that you might need to be doing a different kind of meditation. LoraC might find that if she does the grounding meditation or body awareness meditation, she would feel less clumsy as these meditations can help strengthen mind-body coordination.