Yoga to Improve Concentration
Have you ever mulled over the fact that how many autopilot thoughts are processed in your mind a day? Or let’s get it down to an hour? Are you aware of how subconsciously you let your mind into space where you will never be into? For instance: – You catch a glance at a huge bungalow while walking down the street. Meanwhile, you resume your walk you are no more conscious about how many people pass by you or the dust of traffic that has choked your throat. You are subconscious about the screams and horns that buzz the air around you.
Although you don’t seem to be one, now you are more or less like a robot whose body has been keyed by its mind. You think about the cost of the bungalow, at what age you might be able to afford it, how will you then enhance it further and all those stuff. The ‘my-bungalow’ things then pile up until you catch another attractive glimpse of art and get involved in another world.
In this interval of time, did you skip something? Yes, you skipped an entire hour of your life. Such not-needed thoughts dominate your days and years and the funniest part is that you seem to be less worried about it.
This is where meditation comes into the picture. It has become the need-of-the-hour. Great personalities who have contemplated for years on their thoughts, on how minds function, have sadly found a cage where the entire world is willingly trapped into. The sole reason for such a sad discovery is that you have let your mind be the big boss.
The mind plays in a sarcastically dual way when you flip its role from master to slave and vice versa. Keeping the mind under your control is an art that can be nurtured by being meditative.
Meditation
The word ‘meditation’ has not been aptly interpreted by most people. They disregard its simple act of sitting still and pondering over a single thought. You can never ‘do meditation’ you can only ‘be meditative’. There is a difference. Meditation isn’t a task it’s an innate act. An act of focusing on a thought while shoving all the garbage that you have dumped in your memory-bag (mind) to date.
We have been given many non-mandatory ways to meditate like focusing on the blue flame of the burning candle, concentrating on a single thought for a certain period of time. Experts say all this is to be done keeping your body still. This is where its essence lies. When a person who is a newbie sits still keeping an erect body posture his mind tends to resist this state of the body since this master-mind is not used to maintaining peace
Going back to the ages where saints and people have stressed more on yoga and have taught us to maintain a still body posture in various positions is another kind of meditation. Concentrating your entire physical and mental power in maintaining a pose might seem like a task for a while. But with months and years, you will realize what its sum and substance basically are.
Meditation can also be defined as training your mind to be your slave which is basically not inbred within you. Neither does it surrender itself that easily. You need to work on the rust that has taken its color and shape with time. You have been given some really spoon-feeding ways to converge all your power to a single thought.
It is usually preferred to sit straight with your spine erect, head slightly tilted towards the sky and palms of both hands opening upwards. This position is recommended by most experts because if we reflect on this posture from a scientific viewpoint, you will find that due to the palms facing towards your head, shoulders and chest concurrently tend to open keeping your eyes focused on the forward direction encouraging an open state of your mind and body.
Now when you maintain this state, try to centralize all your thoughts to a single positive image or thought like visualizing idols of the God you believe, or any positive thought. Taking deep breaths during this act helps you to release the stress that you may have burdened yourself with.
The best form of exercising on your thoughts is done by taking long deep breaths. With each inhalation, you need to manifest this reality that you are not this mind and with each exhalation, you should refrain from being this body. You should allow this truth to be absorbed by each cell of your mind and body.
This is when the entire chaos of this flesh and blood experiences a torque. Every movement of your body including your internal systems tend to come to a state of rest, and tranquillity prevails. Many people find this way a bit bemusing.
Those few can keep their eyes open. They can direct them towards the burning blue flame of a candle for some prolonged period of time. Likewise, we find various ways in which we can practice the art of ruminating. Inculcating this routine in your daily chores will slowly and surely bore its fruits.
With each passing day with your eyes wide open and hands-on on a particular task. You will find you start dictating thoughts to your mind. It then no more acts as a master. Yes, this is possible. Concentrating on external situations soon will turn out to be a cakewalk.
Moreover, your internal states of being like anger, happiness, and pain will be handled in a way unlike before. Act without expectations. It can lead you to heights you may have never imagined and will help to reveal your higher self.
I was having problems meditating due to many work related distractions. But taking into account the points described in the blog helped me concentrate. Thanks for this wonderful writing.