Meditation is both very easy and very complicated to explain.  Any form of mental exercise could be classified as meditation; whatever you are thinking of you are meditating on.  However, at the other end of the spectrum, it can get quite confusing (see Transcendental Meditation if you don’t believe me!)  But the reason I introduce it here is because meditation can help you to manage pain, or at least help you to relax and let go when you are stressed.  I’ve found it very useful to combine this with traditional painkillers.

There are some great descriptions of meditation in books such as “The Power of Now”, but this is what I do when I meditate (and it works for me):

I focus on a place, a beach in Malibu (where I went to a couple of years after the operation).  I breathe in through my nose and out through my mouth.  I remember the wonderful feeling of being in the sea and looking up at the mountains and the beautiful coastline, I remember feeling awed by the beauty of the place.  I remember feeling free and at one with the world.  Sometimes I imagine walking along the beach, or lying there, listening to the waves coming in and going out.

I let go of any thoughts that spring into my mind, pushing each one away, letting them go, until I feel that I have created a clear space.  I feel for the energy that runs between me and all living things.  I let the feeling of blissful interconnectedness run through me.  I send out love to the world and then I allow myself to accept all the love coming to me from the world.  If I then choose, I allow single thoughts to pop into my head and examine each one individually.  But they rarely occur at this point, or, if they do, they seem much smaller and less problematic, very easy to solve. 

I wish that I could always remember to meditate when I am in pain but I often forget, which is a shame because I am sure it would be good, and I am sure that it would have a been a wonderful help when I was stressed in hospital.

With regard to meditation there are some that say you should meditate several times a day, one person even said you should give the same priority to meditation as you would to diarrhoea.  What can I say?

I would highly recommend meditation to anyone and everyone, if you can do it on a busy bus or train you can do it anywhere and it really can make seemingly stressful situations much easier to handle.  I can really feel when I have let it slide, because then when I approach my next meditation I feel that I really need it – and it has definitely improved my life, pretty much every single day.

Check out the Meditation section if you are looking for more exercises or more information.