Many people I work with not only are seeking physical or emotional healing, they are also interested in increasing their level of consciousness. They want to spiritually awaken and learn to not react to their thoughts anymore.
In this article, I will share with you a meditation technique that will increase your level of consciousness and which you can do, even if you feel like you cannot still your mind.
A typical misconception about meditation is that meditation is about “not thinking”
This is the reason why most people give up on meditation quickly as they become frustrated easily as the mind just won’t stop thinking.
This is far away from the truth. Meditation is mostly about becoming aware of your thoughts but not to stop them entirely. This might happen at some point if you are an experienced meditator with decades of practice.
In the awareness meditation I am sharing with you here, it is all about becoming aware of your thoughts, to literally become the observer of your own mind.
Most people spend their entire life in a type of “trance state”.
This is a state in which you are completely identified with your mind, you follow each thought as it were real, and you are not aware of your true nature. It is literally like a trance in which you are not conscious of who you truly are, and of what is really going on around you.
For example, someone cut you off in traffic, which did upset you. You spend hours ruminating about this incident, even when you are already sitting back home on your couch. This is a trance state because now you are totally identified with the story that runs in your mind, and you have forgotten about your present moment. The moment in which you find yourself in, sitting at the couch.
Ruminating about stressful events from the past, or thinking about anxiety-provoking worst-case scenarios of the future causes real physical damage to your body. This is because every thought you have creates a chemical reaction in your body-the chemicals of emotions- like cortisol and adrenaline, which have a direct negative effect on your immune system.
This does not only make it hard for you to heal from a physical illness but it also makes it hard to change your life.
The average human has around 50,000 thoughts per day and 90% of these thoughts are the same you had yesterday.
This is the reason why it is often hard to break free from negative thinking and why change is so difficult, as change has to start on the level of the mind.
When you stop identifying with your thoughts and instead become aware of them, you now not only have the power of choice available to you, the choice to react or not to react, but you also become aware of who you truly are. You literally pull yourself out of the trance state, or in other words, you are waking up to your true nature. This is why in spiritually we talk about “waking up”.
You are not your thoughts but something much greater than your thoughts. You are a spiritual being, connected to the infinity love of God, the Universe or whatever name you want to give the power greater than yourself.
Realizing this truth is the greatest gift you can give to yourself and the awareness meditation will be of incredible value to knowing your true self. In addition, you will also get all the benefits of meditation, which over 3,000 studies have confirmed.
Benefits of Meditation
Reducing stress and anxiety, lowering blood pressure, increasing longevity and even killing cancer cells are just some of them. Most importantly, it will help you to realize who you truly are.
Instructions on How to Meditate to increase Your Level of Consciousness
When you practice this meditation, you will notice that at some point, you will “forget about yourself”, and you will be drawn into the story of your thoughts. This is the trance state I mentioned previously and this usually happens when you follow a train of thought that is emotionally charged, like the traffic incident I mentioned earlier.
When this happens, you are completely identified with the story of your mind and you are not the observer anymore, but you physically and emotionally react to the story in your mind as if it were real. You become unconscious and even forget that you are simply sitting at home trying to meditate.
At some point you will realize that the story of your mind is not real, and that you are simply sitting at home trying to meditate. This moment is the crucial moment and the whole point of this meditation.
It is not the moment when you should become frustrated with yourself, but literally the moment to celebrate. Because this is the moment in which you pull yourself out of the trance state and come back to what you truly are, the observer, the infinite soul.
When you practice the awareness meditation, you will not only be able to be the observer during the mediation much longer but in your day to day life you will also become more conscious when you are lost in your thoughts. Then you have a choice. The choice to respond rather than to react, the choice to change your thoughts, or the choice to simply let them be.
Frequently asked questions about meditation
How long should I practice the awareness meditation?
In the beginning, I suggest you practice for 10 minutes daily. It usually takes around six weeks to form a new habit, so in the beginning you want to remind yourself by setting an alarm or simply schedule it in your calendar. Later, you can increase to 20 minutes or even 30 minutes daily.
When is the best time to meditate?
The best time to meditate is usually in the morning or in the evening. This is due to the brain wave state at these times of the day. In the morning and in the evening, your brain lowers its brain waves into the alpha and theta state, which is the state that is conducive to meditation. However, if you don’t have time in the morning or evening, simply do it during the day. It does not depend so much on when you do the meditation, more importantly is consistency and making it a daily habit.
What is I fall asleep during meditation?
It is not uncommon to fall asleep during meditation. This can be due to resistance of the Ego, to become aware of itself. So if you find yourself dozing off, I suggest you don’t lean back on a chair but sit with your spine erect so that you will stay awake.
What if I can’t still my mind?
Remember, meditation is not about not thinking, but it is about becoming aware of your thoughts. So don’t worry about not being able to still the mind as this is not the goal of this meditation.
Can I use binaural beats or brainwave entrainment technology to help me relax?
As I have written in previous posts, brainwave entrainment technology, also called binaural beats technology is a great help to relax your mind and to wind down. You can use this tool if you feel highly stressed and you want to practice the awareness meditation. However, don’t use a guided meditation. A guided meditation is better suitable if you want to learn how to cleanse your energy field or even bring healing energy into your body. It Is not suitable to become more aware of your thoughts as the voice will distract you. Another option is to listen to a brainwave entrainment background music without a voice to guide you.
What do you think?
Leave your comment or question below and I will get back to you.
Much love,
Very helpful information and tools to improve our lives, Dr. Katharina! Thank you for another great podcast and blog.
Thank you, Sabrina!
I am glad you are finding the article valuable.
As ever, Dr. Katharina, you are so generous and positive in the way you Live and in your teaching style. Your healing intentions travel across the globe, literally!
Thank you so much, Anne Marie, for your kind words! I am happy to hear you are finding the article helpful.
It’s very interesting Podcast.