Meditation for Success
by Jackie Dobrinska

We all want to thrive. To accomplish our best at any given moment and achieve exactly what we hope for.  This is true in business and at home, on the golf course as well as in our personal life. 

Meditation is a time-tested tool that helps us achieve success in all areas of life. From Twitter’s Evan Williams and Aetna’s Mark Bertolini to basketball’s Lebron James and even Oprah Winfrey, meditation changes lives, helping people dealing with physical pain, lowering stress, address chronic diseases, and even tap into intuition and change life-long habits. 

While the benefits - from lowering blood pressure, decreasing heart diseases, improved sleep problems and less anxiety and depression -- are clear, many people don’t meditate.  “I’m too busy”, “I can’t” or “My mind can’t shut off,” are common complaints.  One can meditate in the time it takes to make coffee, and can be nuanced to fit any disposition.  It also has nothing to do with “not thinking.”

The mind is meant to think. Any attempt to stop results in a whirlwind of ideas, memories and thoughts flooding into our awareness, which reinforces the idea meditation doesn’t work. Instead meditation is a practice of focus, where one drowns out all other thoughts, distractions, sounds to the exclusion of one. That has far-reaching implications for success in all areas of life – from understanding our golf swing to creating the life of our dreams.

Jack Kornfield, an American author and teacher of vipassana meditation, says that meditation is a bit like training a puppy to sit. We lead it back to the same spot over and over again and tell it to sit.  If it runs away, we return it.  If we beat it, it cowers and is no longer our friend.  When we reward it, it thrives and so do we.  Similarly, works in a very similar way – return to the same spot while making your mind your best friend.

The “sitting spot” is important.  Traditions around the world give tools -- paying attention to the breath, listening to the repetition of a sound or feeling subtle sensations.  The choices have wisdom as they help change our brain patterns, facilitating the alpha and theta waves of relaxed, clear insight.  Resting here, we generate spontaneous new ideas, creative solutions and greater understanding for issues that vex us in our normal state. 

Like any skill, meditation takes regular, daily practice, and the effects are often cumulative. It is best to get instruction initially to avoid developing bad habits. With just 5-10 minutes a day, one can adopt this simple, effective tool that assists us in thriving in all areas of life: body, mind, health and game.

 

---

Physiological benefits of Meditation:
1- It lowers oxygen consumption.
2- It decreases respiratory rate.
3- It increases blood flow and slows the heart rate.
4- Increases exercise tolerance.
5- Leads to a deeper level of physical relaxation.
6- Good for people with high blood pressure.
7- Reduces anxiety attacks by lowering the levels of blood lactate.
8- Decreases muscle tension
9- Helps in chronic diseases like allergies, arthritis etc.
10- Reduces Pre-menstrual Syndrome symptoms.
11- Helps in post-operative healing.
12- Enhances the immune system.
13- Reduces activity of viruses and emotional distress
14- Enhances energy, strength and vigour.
15- Helps with weight loss
16- Reduction of free radicals, less tissue damage
17- Higher skin resistance
18- Drop in cholesterol levels, lowers risk of cardiovascular disease.
19- Improved flow of air to the lungs resulting in easier breathing.
20- Decreases the aging process.
21- Higher levels of DHEAS (Dehydroepiandrosterone)
22- prevented, slowed or controlled pain of chronic diseases
23- Makes you sweat less
24- Cure headaches & migraines
25- Greater Orderliness of Brain Functioning
26- Reduced Need for Medical Care
27- Less energy wasted
28- More inclined to sports, activities
29- Significant relief from asthma
30- improved performance in athletic events
31- Normalizes to your ideal weight
32- harmonizes our endocrine system
33- relaxes our nervous system
34- produce lasting beneficial changes in brain electrical activity
35- Cure infertility (the stresses of infertility can interfere with the release of hormones that regulate ovulation).

Psychological benefits:
36- Builds self-confidence.
37- Increases serotonin level, influences mood and behaviour.
38- Resolve phobias & fears
39- Helps control own thoughts
40- Helps with focus & concentration
41- Increase creativity
42- Increased brain wave coherence.
43- Improved learning ability and memory.
44- Increased feelings of vitality and rejuvenation.
45- Increased emotional stability.
46- improved relationships
47- Mind ages at slower rate
48- Easier to remove bad habits
49- Develops intuition
50- Increased Productivity
51- Improved relations at home & at work
52- Able to see the larger picture in a given situation
53- Helps ignore petty issues
54- Increased ability to solve complex problems
55- Purifies your character
56- Develop will power
57- greater communication between the two brain hemispheres
58- react more quickly and more effectively to a stressful event.
59- increases one’s perceptual ability and motor performance
60- higher intelligence growth rate
61- Increased job satisfaction
62- increase in the capacity for intimate contact with loved ones
63- decrease in potential mental illness
64- Better, more sociable behaviour
65- Less aggressiveness
66- Helps in quitting smoking, alcohol addiction
67- Reduces need and dependency on drugs, pills & pharmaceuticals
68- Need less sleep to recover from sleep deprivation
69- Require less time to fall asleep, helps cure insomnia
70- Increases sense of responsibility
71- Reduces road rage
72- Decrease in restless thinking
73- Decreased tendency to worry
74- Increases listening skills and empathy
75- Helps make more accurate judgements
76- Greater tolerance
77- Gives composure to act in considered & constructive ways
78- Grows a stable, more balanced personality
79- Develops emotional maturity

Spiritual benefits:
80- Helps keep things in perspective
81- Provides peace of mind, happiness
82- Helps you discover your purpose
83- Increased self-actualization.
84- Increased compassion
85- Growing wisdom
86- Deeper understanding of yourself and others
87- Brings body, mind, spirit in harmony
88- Deeper Level of spiritual relaxation
89- Increased acceptance of oneself
90- helps learn forgiveness
91- Changes attitude toward life
92- Creates a deeper relationship with your God
93- Attain enlightenment
94- greater inner-directedness
95- Helps living in the present moment
96- Creates a widening, deepening capacity for love
97- Discovery of the power and consciousness beyond the ego
98- Experience an inner sense of “Assurance or Knowingness”
99- Experience a sense of “Oneness”
100- Increases the synchronicity in your life

Learn to Meditate

TESTIMONIALS FROM PAST STUDENTS:

Jackie is a fabulous teacher who really helps you get the foundations of practice.

 A great investment to start a practice.  

Better than an app, as you get someone who can help you troubleshoot your specific questions.

Schedule an appointment today by Skype or Zoom

Articles on Meditation

Harnessing the Power of the Mind
by Jackie published in Capital at Play

---

Meditation at Work
by Jackie
Published in Capital at Play