Can Meditation Help You With Blogging?

Restored from the Empower Network archive (2011–2017), lightly edited to meet our current advertising standards. Views are the original author’s.

Meditation for Blogging

Is meditation really an option?

What do you do when the words just won’t come out? Writing is already hard enough, but many times, especially when writing for a deadline, it’s darn near impossible. Like today, for example, I’m participating in a blog challenge and I had no idea what to write.

Hmmm. I checked out Google Trends (sometimes there are timely ideas there), nope. Don’t want to include Joe Paterno in my post today!

Thanks to my engineering brain, I tend to be skeptical of anything that isn’t structured, logical and analytical. It’s hard for me to “go with the flow”… if there’s no obvious outline, I tend to blank on writing.

Today I decided to learn a new technique recommended by Farnoosh Brock at ProlificLiving.com….meditation.

How Meditation Can Benefit Your Writing

Meditation isn’t the only element needed to become a better writer, but leaving it out is losing out on much of your potential.

Without meditation, you’re not tapping into your full creative juices and you’re robbing yourself of becoming the best writer you can be on many levels.

Reading is a wonderful stimulant for your brain; it expands your horizons and increases your knowledge of the world, but what matters with your writing is how well you can access that information and express it on paper or keyboard.

You need to get into the right state of mind to achieve that, and meditation is the shortest path to that state.

• Meditation can unlock your best writing ideas.
• Meditation calms your nerves and allows the brain to process the information it has soaked up from reading and listening.
• Meditation allows your mind to have a genuine conversation with itself, and to make honest discoveries about what untainted and original content it can create.
• Meditation fills the gaps and connects the dots.
• Meditation tames fatigue, purifies ideas, discards old ones and gives birth to new ones.

1. Meditate on your own

The most practical and effective type of meditation is done on your own and in the privacy of your own home. Use guided meditation, listening to CDs or podcasts of experts who lead you through the meditation. Or you can meditate on your own.

• Decide to do it. Nothing happens without a mental commitment.
• Find a time and a space in your home that is comfortable, inviting, and quiet.
• Sit on the floor or on a cushion. Sit crossed legged but be sure that you are comfortable and if need be, have your back supported by a wall for a tall spine.
• Put your hands on your lap Be relaxed and receptive.
• Choose a mantra This is a phrase that you keep repeating to yourself during meditation. It can be a question you ask, a problem you want to solve, or a mental block you wish to release.
• Close your eyes and begin breathing. Let the meditation start. Let your thoughts come, neither rejecting or acknowledging them. Repeat your mantra over and over. When finished, open your eyes and rise slowly, preserving the relaxed feeling.

2. Forgive yourself if you miss a day

Meditation is a practice and you need to develop a habit around it. Habits are built over time, and with consistency. When you sit still for 5 minutes or 10 minutes per day for weeks or months, you have developed a stable habit. When you naturally choose to meditate and to tune into the solitude before you write, then you have a strong habit.

3. Write after meditation

Protect the post-meditation state of mind for as long as you can. Write soon after meditation, even returning to your writing while still sitting in your meditation posture. You will find that you are in a new reflective mode, feeling creative and productive and calm.

The idea of meditating before writing is new to me….and perhaps to you. What do you think about this idea? I have resolved to give it a try and would love to hear your comments.