On Meditation
Who should do it? Probably almost anyone unless they have an unstable mental illness; if you’re
concerned, ask your doctor.
Why do it? It is a useful tool for prevention of and help with stress, anxiousness, depressed
mood, and difficulty concentrating, among other things.
What does it do? It focuses your mind, relaxes your mind, reminds and teaches us the
importance of letting go – we are so often fixatedly grasping to our worries or concerns. The
Buddhist philosophy would advocate that the mindfulness cultivated by meditation is an essential
key to achieving true happiness, or the alleviation of suffering, depending if you see the glass half
empty or half full.
How:
Find a comfortable (usually seated) position, somewhere without a lot of distractions. You may
want to consider creating a space in your home for activities like this. If you have family you may
want to ask them not to interrupt while you take this time for yourself, or you can have them join
you!
Start with your eyes partially or all the way closed and focus 100% of your attention on your
breathing. Experience what it feels like to be totally aware of how it feels to have air enter your
body. Breathe nice big slow breaths, leading with you puffing out your belly and then expanding
your chest for full inhalations. After relaxing your chest on the nice and slow exhalation, end the
exhalation with sucking your belly in and pushing the air out of your lungs. When you breath in,
can you feel how it changes the way your chest feels? What about your belly? Your neck? Head,
arms, legs, hands, feet? Being aware of how your body feels and what it feels like to be aware of
these very basic sensations is an essential part of increased self awareness on the path to an
improved state of personal balance, so pay attention to these things and experiences in your life.
I feel like every human experience has something to teach us – so listen!)
So we were at the stage of focusing 100% of our attention on our breathing, seeing what it feels
like to have the air enter our body and change the way our body feels. If your mind begins to
wander, don’t get frustrated or punish yourself, just focus on your breathing again.
If this is sufficiently challenging for you, do it for 5-15 minutes per day, once daily, or even three
times a day.
Once you are able to focus on your breathing without being interrupted by intrusive thoughts,
begin to only focus about 70% of your attention on your breathing and allow your mind some
space to just be calm and relaxed. If you mind begins to wander, again, remember, don’t punish
yourself, just re-focus on your breath. Imagine that your mind is a clear sky. When thoughts
come, think of them as clouds, floating through the sky…just floating by. Try not to get attached
or fixated on a thought when it comes, just watch it float on by. If you begin to excessively focus
on one thought, simply re-focus all your attention on your breath.
If this is sufficiently challenging for you, do it for 10-30 minutes per day, once daily, or even three
times a day.
On "4 7 8 Breathing"
This is a nice addition or variation to the breathing techniques I’ve described above.
Though this technique has been well described by others, I learned it from Andrew Weil at a
lecture. The person who taught it to him had some tradition in yoga, I believe, and said that you
start by placing the tip of your tongue on the roof of your mouth, where your gums meet the back
of the top teeth; in the yoga tradition it is said that this completes an energy circuit – and this
tongue position should be maintained while doing the breathing. I’ve actually heard the same
thing from the Tai Chi tradition (they use the same tongue position). Whether the tongue position
is essential to getting benefit from this breathing technique, I don’t know, but I do it anyways, it’s
not harder and I think it’s one of those things that can increase our self awareness.
So the numbers 4,7,8 refer to the time that you count for inhalation, breath holding, and
exhalation, respectively. You should inhale through your nose for a count of 4, hold it for a count
of 7, and exhale for a count of 8 through your mouth making kind of a Darth Vader noise.
It is said that if you do this only twice in the morning and twice at night, it can have a tremendous
therapeutic benefit. After 2 weeks, you can increase to a maximum of 4 breaths in the morning
and 4 breaths at night.
Maybe it will be helpful to give some structure to some people. I like the concept because it
reminds to slow down my breathing, which can be immediately therapeutic.
If you are able to do the first and second meditation techniques described above with regularity
and without difficulty, then you are ready for more advanced techniques. Contact me and I can
discuss those techniques in more detail with you.
-Shahram “Shay” Hosseinion, M.D., October 30, 2008