Frequency - how often and for how long?

This is an ongoing series running through May to compliment the twice weekly meditation sessions that I will be hosting on YouTube (and are now archived on my YouTube page). If you have any questions, please contact me.

For me this is a question of quality over quantity. There are no awards in the meditation world for gritting your teeth and trying to sit for as long or as often as you can.

Build slowly and steadily.

If you sit for longer than you are truly comfortable with the danger is that in time you will develop an aversion to meditation. You look at your meditation cushion, you even just think of your meditation cushion and aversion to meditation starts to arise. Meditation starts to be associated with discomfort, mental and physical.

Scheduling & how long for:

  • Find a time or times in the day that work for you.
  • Times that fit into your wider life schedule.
  • Early morning is a good time, when the mind is settled and the world is waking up. However, if that is not a good time for you, that’s fine.
  • Better to sit for a short time everyday/every other day/etc, than grit your teeth and sit for an hour one day and never again for a week or two.
  • What do I mean by short time? In essence I mean a time that is comfortable for you. 5 minutes, 10 minutes, 30 minutes, whatever you are easily comfortable with. No rights or wrongs here. You will know what works for you. Use that. You can increase it in your own time with experience, if you want to.

In the same way that we can all have good and bad days, you will still have meditations that feel comfortable and others that feel difficult. However, by making your schedule workable for you, you will be able to handle the ups and downs.

As I said above, build slowly and steadily.