Part 2 from yesterday’s post: How to Start Meditation: A Beginner’s Guide for Busy and Stressed-Out Moms)
Apart from sitting down with the spine upright, you can also meditate while standing up, walking around, and yes, even while lying down in bed. There is a proper way to do lying-down or supine meditation.
The only caveat is that you can’t be a beginner at meditation. If you are, you should first learn how to meditate in the sitting position. (See yesterday’s post: How to Start Meditating: A Beginner’s Guide for Busy and Stressed-Out Moms). Once you’re confident in your ability to retain focus, you can go ahead and try it while lying down.
Meditation in Bed is Easier for Non-Beginners
Vipassana actually advises supine or lying-down meditation only for advanced students. It takes a certain amount of sharpened focus that beginners to meditation may not have already developed.
This is mainly because meditating while lying down is a good way for beginners to fall asleep instead of retain focused awareness, which is fine if the sole reason you’re meditating is to mitigate short-term insomnia.
But if you’re a chronic or long-term insomniac, you can benefit a lot from practicing meditation that doesn’t necessarily end in sleep, especially if you’re looking for a permanent cure to sleeplessness.
By practicing true meditation, you can will yourself to relax and process stress and anxiety in a healthy manner, thereby addressing some of the most common and notorious causes of insomnia. And as any sleep therapist will tell you, it’s better to address the problem by dealing with its root causes.
Unlike Sit-Down Meditation, You Can’t Do Supine Meditation Just Anywhere
Learning to meditate upright is the first step to true meditation. And by getting used to it, you can practice it literally almost anywhere you go. All you need is a space that’s quiet and isolated enough for you to retain focus, like a non-crowded public park, or even an empty conference room in the office.
Meditating in the middle of the workday for just 10 to 15 minutes is a great way of dealing with the stress of a high-pressure job. In fact, midday meditation is a popular practice in certain Fortune 500 companies. But unless you work in a place that allows employees to nap, it’s best to stick to meditating while sitting down.
Lying-Down or Supine Meditation is Best Done at Home
If you’re going to try meditating while lying down, the best and safest place to do it is on a couch or bed in the comfort of your own home. A good way to gauge whether or not you’re ready for supine or lying down meditation is by trying it and seeing if you can do it without falling asleep.
If you try your hardest to retain focus but end up falling asleep anyway, you’re probably not ready. But if your next attempt ends with you absolutely relaxed but still aware of your mental point of focus, then you might be ready to try supine meditation regularly.
In-bed meditation is a fantastic way to consistently sharpen your focus and meditating ability while also ending your day on an extremely relaxing note. But remember: before you try it, make sure you know how to meditate correctly first. Otherwise, you might be limiting yourself from reaping the full benefits of practicing true meditation.
If Peter Mutuc isn’t sculpting, writing, editing, drawing, skating, cycling, wrestling with his Labrador, or actively regulating his sleeping patterns through at least 150 minutes of weekly exercise, he’s usually just online, creating and developing web content for One Bed Mattress. [www.onebed.com.au]
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