You’re reading Five Meditation Practices For People Who Don’t Want to Meditate, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’re enjoying this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.
If you’ve ever thought that meditation wasn’t for you for whatever reason, you may be surprised to find out that you’ve been practicing it all along. While traditional meditation in a monastery does entail sitting in the lotus position for long periods of time, it’s not the only method. Even monks practice meditation in different ways like when they’re eating or doing medial chores.
The rule of thumb is that you focus on something, breathe with intention and quiet your busy mind. Many of us do this from time to time and tend to label it “zoning out” when in reality, we were in meditation. Your favorite past times are an opportunity for you to meditate and because you’re doing what you like to do, you’re in a good headspace to let your busy mind go.
With so many articles online and health reports telling you the benefits of meditation, you are probably convinced it’s a good practice for you. The mental and physical benefits are many. You want to benefit from the elevated mood boost it can give you, an increase in productivity, get a better sleep and nurture your heart health. The perks of meditation can be yours while doing what you love to do. In keeping your meditation practice simple and personal for you, it will be easier and more identifiable for you.
Here are some practices to try if you don’t want to try if you’re not into the traditional methods.
Drumming
Multiple studies have shown that playing a hand drum, especially in group settings, gives us many of the same benefits as mindfulness meditation.
Drumming increases problem solving ability and empathy. It boosts the immune system and reduces stress. It also helps improve school grades and good behavior in children. In some settings, drumming is used to treat ADHD. Studies suggest that it may work better than Prozac or Ritalin when used for ADHD and depression.
Drumming is itself a meditation technique. The key is to become deeply absorbed in the rhythm and the sensations you feel in your hands and elsewhere. You might find it hard to sit in half-lotus and concentrate during a breathing meditation. Drumming, on the other hand, has a powerful way of holding your attention so it doesn’t feel like a chore.
Watching a sunset
You’ve probably watched sunsets before, right? Have you ever just melted in awe? You likely had no problem concentrating then. One of the feelings I’ve experienced while watching sunsets and sunrises is love. It seemed to be the magic glue that connected me with the sun. It was like a prolonged hug.
In many ways, meditation mirrors falling in love. You’re paying full attention to each other. It’s hard not to concentrate on your experience with that person. During meditation, you are merging with your chosen object and experiencing that same type of merging. Plus, research shows that awe reduces our inflammatory markers, which are associated with cardiac and autoimmune disorders.
Gazing at a campfire
If you’re in the position to have a fire pit in your yard, do it. If you’re not allowed to dig holes, you can use a feeding trough from a farming supplies store. Or if you live near the outdoors, go camping.
Like sunsets, camp fires have a powerful meditative effect. The wood crackles as the fire roars and consumes the wood. You can feel the heat on your body. All of these aspects hit your senses and has a way of pulling you in. I find fire gazing to have a very purifying effect on my mind.
Gardening
Many people find relaxation while pulling weeds and nurturing their spinach, broccoli, basil and tomatoes in their gardens. If you make the intent to really pay attention to what you’re doing, then gardening becomes a form of meditation.
You can concentrate on the feeling of your knees on the ground, the sensations in your hands and the feeling of your breath. You can also thank every single plant that you work with for providing you with healthy food. Now you’re mixing meditation with gratitude work.
Going for a Walk
If you hang out in a cubicle all day or sit in front of a computer a lot, going out for short a walk can become a meditation. The same goes for jogging, dancing and other forms of exercise.
When walking, pay attention to your breath and the sensations of your body. Be mindful of your feet hitting the ground in a rhythmic pattern.
Meera Watts is a yoga teacher, entrepreneur and mom. Her writing on yoga and holistic health has appeared in Elephant Journal, Yoganonymous, OMtimes and others. She’s also the founder and owner of Siddhi Yoga International, a yoga teacher training school based in Singapore. Siddhi Yoga runs intensive, residential trainings in India (Rishikesh, Goa and Dharamshala), Indonesia (Bali) and Malaysia (Kuala Lumpur).
You’ve read Five Meditation Practices For People Who Don’t Want to Meditate, originally posted on Pick the Brain | Motivation and Self Improvement. If you’ve enjoyed this, please visit our site for more inspirational articles.
From the architect. Seclusive Jiangnan Boutique Hotel is located in Dadou Road Historic District, Hangzhou and adjacent to Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal. Before the renovation, the existing structures are two dilapidated affordable housings. Since get the commission, within less than a year, gad tried to use design as a tool to regenerate space in the historic district and balance the “preservation” and “demolition” as well as “inheritage ” and “innovation”, which are two seemingly contractions.
The project aims to convey the idea to the public that “spatial quality is the key for living experience in residence”. The new design keeps the original form of the buildings, but reorganizes the circulation and spatial divisions. The No.188 building is in I-shape and along the canal while the No.190 is in L-shape and next to the historic neighborhood. Designers insert a glass box as hotel lobby and main entrance that connects the two separate buildings. In this way, it forms a courtyard as a 3-side enclosed space. The further design demolished the excess volume so that to keep the façades clean and straight.
The design of the façade adopts two different means. For the facades facing historical neighborhood, they are in bricks locally sourced and the old windows have been replaced with glass. The design tries to match the feeling of the vernacular architecture from materiality perspective and keep the consistence of the appearance of historic neighborhood. For the façade along the canal, architects use staggered pattern of brick wall and ceiling windows so that reflects the water at the same time responses to the context materially.
The previous basement parking space being reprogrammed and renovated into library and gallery. This action regenerates the space and bring new public space indoors. A large public space from lobby opens up to third floor that creates new communication space and increases the flexibility of the space. The roof space is redesigned into LOFT guest rooms. The previous balconies are connected and transformed into public party place.
The interior majorly uses wood material. The design pursues a more intimate and home-like environment. The first two floors are mainly flowing public space divided by bookshelves.Seclusive Jiangnan Boutique Hotel is equipped with restaurant, café, library, gallery and residence to provide an enjoyable experience. It regenerates the space within the historic neighborhood and comes up with a different modern lifestyle with the most traditional feelings of Hangzhou.
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The client came to visit in the situation when the existing Korean traditional house should be partially demolished as it become an obstacle to the planned construction of a double-track railroad from Seoul to Gangneung, which is preparing for 2018 Pyeong Chang Winter Olympics. We had to impartially consider the ideas of three generations of the client family: the grandmother and the father could not discard the love of the sixty-year-old Korean traditional house, while the young son wanted to shake off the old lifestyle that was quite bothersome so far. Taking into account their ideas, we began to enjoy imagination by sitting together with the family on the side wooden floor.
Preservation / Link / Topography
In Bongyangjae House, three words are used as architectural terms: first, preservation, to relocate and refabricate the Korean traditional house at a crisis of demolition, thus protecting and cherishing its bygone memories; second, link, as a house that connects and mediates the three generations, completed by wooden assemblies of linkage between the Korean traditional and the Western-style parts; and finally, topography, of the rising landscape that can be seen in the Korean tradition of real landscape painting, to project its image that can reflect its locational background, Daegwallyeong, and pursue harmony with pine trees.
The Plan that Combines Three Generations
We made the existing Korean traditional house disintegrated and relocated to preserve the space for the grandmother and the father as well as creating a new space for the son. The Buildings are laid out in a way of unfolding its floor plan southward within the site and the almost 100-year-old Geumgang pine tree was preserved fortunately despite the new construction works of a double-track fast train nearby. In order to avoid the noise from the right side which the fast train would pass, we relocated the existing Korean traditional house to the left side while designing the western-style house as a reinforced concrete structure and putting a loft above as a buffer space.
Amongst the four space in the main body of the existing structure, one is assigned to the grandmother; another to the father; yet another to the common space; and the right one is used only to provide its component because it could hardly reassemble its loft above the kitchen. Designing the common space, which connects between the new western-style and the Korean traditional wings, as a wooden structure which can be fabricated, we made the flow naturally lead through the vestibule to the Korean-style wing, whose left space was topped with a hipped-and-gable roof while its vestibule and the right space were topped with a gable roof. In son’s place, children room was put in connection with the toilet corridor so that the son would have his own family there in future; and the living room and the kitchen were located to the south. We also made a roof balcony that would serve as a family lounge to which one could go through the loft.
Product Description.
The main materials of BongYangJae are pine tree and concrete. The structure of Korean Traditional building “Han-ok” is consistent with timber wood made by local pine trees. Therefore relocated part of BonYangJae is mostly made of local pine trees.
While we refabricate previous house, existing timber is reused after process and damaged part is replaced by newly processed timber of pine tree.-
Urban planning exhibition halls in China should be public buildings for citizens, but in reality, these buildings are largely used for government to attract investments. Therefore, a grand square built in the front helps to highlight the elevation of the box-like building. It is common in Chinese that public buildings only show the power of the authority, instead of serving the public. The project is located at the edge of a mountain park. If we take the common practice, the building has to step aside to make sure there is enough space for a grand square, which means we need to excavate the mountain and build a 10-meter-high wall. In this way, we occupy the park where people could have taken a walk, create an unnecessary square and a huge building filled with negative space. In order to preserve the park, we build part of the exhibition hall on stilts as public space, not just empty ones. The space in the shade allows not only for outdoors exhibitions but also people to take a stroll. So citizens will get closer to the hall and exhibitions. The roof transformed into an artificial hill with ups and downs integrates the hall into the mountain of the park, making the prominent feature of the design. The roof helps the preserved mountain become the landscape feature of the design, meanwhile, expands the area of the park. All in all, the architects intend to provide people with a public building as well as a larger and more interesting garden.
A free-form surface has been introduced in the design to blur the shape of the hall, rather than the symbolic facade. When you walk on the roof, you can find different levels of beauty of the hall from various perspectives, which encourages people to wander the hall and enjoy it.
The roof is made of dozens of trumpet-like steel structures. They are both suitable for the topography and perfect supporting structures of the hall, creating a large span space of 33 meters inside and an overhanging space of 15 meters outside the hall. In addition, these structures serve as not only accesses to bring in light and collect water, but also interior staircases and equipment rooms.
An urban planning exhibition hall always sounds like its city, hence we should show the city image through a hall basing on local people’s needs, the respect for nature and human-oriented values. We should merge halls and environment so that citizens can see the integration of architecture, landscape, future city and daily life. Here we try to make the best use of the city space by means of architecture design to gain a win-win result between the government and citizens.
The hall has been put into operation while its garden on the roof has been blocked to the mountain park by a fence, which explains local authority wouldn’t easily accept the spirit of openness and publicity. Nevertheless, Nanning Urban Planning Exhibition Hall has made clear its open attitude that it is ready to embrace the future.
From the architect. The owners of this house were not identified with the layout of their old apartment. Small consecutive spaces, arranged longitudinally along a corridor that provided access to multiple rooms and uses. A simple and inefficient distribution for a contemporary dwelling.
From the beginning, multifunctional spaces were created allowing future possibilities. It was necessary to move away from the restrictive layout that was preventing new habits, hobbies, activities or new ways of thinking.
Kitchen, dining room, living room or work area were connected in a open plan layout keeping this uses away from the most private areas of the house.
A simple, clean and unconventional designed space acts as a proper living room and it hosts different activities. This main space can be adapted to meet the requirements of the clients.
Furthermore, the layout generates a meander through the space that leads the guest from the most public to the most private part of the flat relating the different uses of the dwelling.
The proposal retrieves the dwelling’s values and efficiency, providing space and light, a rare luxury in an urban context.
Sig Nordal 