Om~Monday: setting intention with meditation

When I was thinking about what I wanted to share with this post, I immediately thought of prayer. Which then led me to the search for the difference between prayer and meditation. In my search I found words from Deepak Chopra.

AHH! I see! I had figured they were pretty much the same thing. During prayer I am always setting an intention.  I am asking for blessings as well as being grateful for all that I have been blessed with. So then I thought how can I set intention with meditation and it occurred to me that I could easily do this. 
I know a lot of people don't pray because of it's huge tie to religion. If we just REMOVED religion from this and thought of prayer as intention then I think we would find a lot more people sending out strong vibrations of beautiful intentions. Avery close loved one makes it very clear that they do not pray because they do not believe in God, which is TOTALLY fine but I feel that the world is missing those massive vibrations of love sitting stagnant in their heart. You don't have to worship a "god" to pray. Pray to the earth, the moon... pray in behalf of your heart. Replace prayer with intention. 

It is during meditation that we are found in such in a beautiful state of mind and this is when we are closest to our divine spirit wouldn't now be the best time to have a prayer? 
There is so much hatred and ugliness going on in the world right now that I just couldn't help but want to set an intention of peace out into the universe and I wanted to know how to do it in the best way that I could. 
I found another great article by Deepak Chopra. He is the KING of meditation I swear. I always find great advice when reading his quotes ( I have yet to read one of his books but IT WILL HAPPEN)
His article is a great and you can go here to read it. 
I'm just going to cover the basics but you can get more detail out of that article. 
Know your intention. First of all I think it's really important that you know what intention you are wanting to set so that you can go into your meditation knowing what you are desiring to send out into the universe. Maybe even have a little statement or prayer you can say. "I ask for Peace and Love to surround those that are suffering at this time". Your intention can be anything.
Center yourself. This is so important in meditation! Take a few deep breaths, you could actually do the exercise I posted two mondays ago. (read here) Let this last for as long or as little as you would like.
Release into the Universe. While in this beautiful and rested state of mind release your prayer out into the universe. Focus on what you want to manifest and let it go. 
Detach yourself from any desired outcome.  I know that I cannot go and hug every single person out there who is hurting and I understand that some may not feel any comfort during these hard times but just my little intention that I brought with me into my meditation will have an affect on many. There is nothing more powerful than the vibration of love. And this is exactly what we want to be sending out into the universe. 
Let the Universe do her job. When we can detach ourselves from what WE THINK needs to happen we can accept what truly needs to be done. We don't always know the reasons for things but we have to believe and have faith that there is a reason for all of this. There is something greater waiting for us and we need to allow for the universe to do this part for us. Everything is of Love. We need to rest our spirits in the divine love. Allowing for things to happen with divine timing. 

Namaste and Peace be with you! 

Om~Monday: Feeling Stressed? Time to get silent.

Life can get crazy... am I right?  Feeling stressed and over-worked is just a regular part of the day, some days this stress is frequent and on other days its a breeze. Then there are the days that you just can't escape stress and it isn't just one day.. it continues onto the next and then the next and so on. Before you know it, you are spiraling down a big black hole and you just can't seem to see the light at the end of the tunnel. 
I've been here, on multiple occasions, I understand the power that stress can have over you. 
BUT I also know how to get OUT. 
It is time for you to get SILENT. 
Meditation is your answer.
I promise that if you take at least 20 minutes of your day and practice meditation, your life will change immensely. The light at the end of that dark black hole will start to shine brighter. You will be able to work through your schedule of chaos. You will breathe a lighter breath. You will be able to stand a little taller. You will begin to know how to solve all those problems that keep on coming up for you. You will find joy in the mundane that life often brings. 
I understand that we are all at different places in our lives. For me, I am a stay/work at home mother and wife, we have three children (one being 3 weeks old) and life can definitely get crazy. Maybe for you, there are no children or husband, but you have a tiring work schedule or maybe asshole co-workers. Maybe you are attending school and you have tests and projects. There is a mix of us doing a ton of different things but one thing we have in common is that stress often prevails. Also it's often that our life becomes dull, tedious, and all we have is worry and STRESS. 
Let's figure this shit out.
I can hear you saying... "I'm so busy, I don't have 20 minutes to set aside for meditation." I call bullshit we can always find a little extra time. If you are reading this then you definitely have a few minutes to spare. (Although, I'm super stoked you are spending your time with me...) 
For this next week I challenge you to 10-20 minutes of sitting quietly by yourself... MEDITATING. 
Not sure HOW to meditate. In the next few weeks I'm going to share with you some tips and different ways of meditation but for now I'm going to give you a few basics so that you don't feel entirely lost.
First of all. YOUR MIND IS GOING TO WANDER. This is okay, when you notice that you've moved away from focusing on your breath just say to your self "back to breath" and then inhale deep and continue on. You'll probably find yourself saying this MULTIPLE times for the first while. TOTALLY NORMAL. Meditation, like anything, takes practice. I still wander off into the crazies (thoughts that lead to thoughts that lead to thoughts) but I've learned to pull myself back.
Here are some basic breathing tips--

• inhale deep through your nose
• relax your tongue on the roof of your mouth right behind your front teeth
• exhale deep while pushing down and out through your stomach

Counting your breaths is an EASY and well-known way to meditate. If you only have 5 minutes to spare then start with only 5 minutes but each day try to add a little more time and get yourself to at least 20 minutes.

I've found that early in the morning, during nap time, or late evenings before bed are the best times for me. Look into your schedule and figure out a good time to set aside, a time without any interruptions. 

This is just the beginning. I don't want this post to go ON and ON and ON... and I don't want to give all you beginners too much to worry about. This exercise isn't supposed to cause MORE STRESS... it's supposed to free you from all of that yuckiness. 

I'd love to know how you did. Was this hard for you? How did you feel afterwards? Were you able to get to 20 minutes?