Why Meditate

There are many studies that explain the emotional, mental and physical benefits of meditation. Look them up. The benefits are many and wonderful.

I’m not going to tell you about those.

For me, the greatest benefit of meditation is the way it led me to connect with both my spiritual self and my human self. I expected to find the spiritual with meditation. I did not expect to connect with the human. How does that work anyway? How do I connect with both? And why? I wanted to escape from the physical world - isn’t that what meditation is for?

First, let me tell you what meditation means to me. There are times when I do what most people think of as meditation - being still and quiet. Sometimes I do guided meditations of my own creation. But most of the time my meditations are dialogues with Spirit. I ask questions and often get immediate answers. The answers for me are usually visual - I’m a very visual person - but I also hear, feel, and/or know things.

For instance, one day I was meditating and saw that I had fallen into the “hole” of depression AGAIN. I saw myself in a deep well. Looking up, I saw Spirit looking down at me. I yelled, “I did it again! Can you help me out of this hole?” Spirit said, “What hole?” and I immediately found myself face-down on the ground at Spirit’s feet. The hole was gone, and Spirit was laughing.

When I began having success with meditation, it was very spiritually centered, as one would expect. I seemed to be in touch with a Higher Power (and later, additional spirit guides) which showed me truths about myself, about the bigger and better parts of me. At first the experiences were about events (past and present) in my life and how to see those in a different way. The experiences changed with time and practice, and all kinds of interesting things came up.

The more I meditated and communicated with Spirit, the more aware I became of the Oneness of everything. The connection of everything to everything. Eventually, I started to see the Divine in me. My spiritual self is all the best of me - of all of us - because it’s made of the same qualities as Spirit. What are those qualities? Love. Light. Peace. Joy. Compassion. Wisdom. Vision. Connection. Abundance. Wholeness. Oneness…. Meditation helps me experience these qualities in me. They ARE me - they are what I am created from and of. Meditation helps me feel my connection to Spirit, and that changes everything.

One day while meditating I heard, “Make peace with your energy self…Forgive yourself for your humanness and be happy that you are who you are.” About a month later (sometimes the message takes time to integrate - LOL), I was taking a walk and it hit me so hard I stopped in my tracks and tears sprang to my eyes - I am both spiritual AND human. I need both and I can enjoy both. I suddenly felt love for my body (and that doesn’t happen often). I realized how important my physical self is. It is the vessel for my spirit. It is the expression of my spirit. How can I not love it?

Once I had this realization about my human self, I started to experience my life differently. (We of the shamanic tradition call this healing.) I felt like I was “in my body” more. I felt more respect for my body. I felt happy to be here in this physical world - maybe for the first time ever. This awareness helped me to become more fully present in my life. I am less an observer of my life and more a participant, a creator of my life.

When I started this journey, I wanted my life to be perfect. It turns out perfect is not the goal; Peace and Joy are the goals. More and more I feel these in my life, and it has made all the difference.