Keeping a meditation journal
Mindfulness is about knowing where we are (being in the moment) and also about maintaining an awareness of where we have been (reflection) and where we are going (having goals). A meditation journal can help us with all of those areas of awareness, helping us to have a more unified awareness of ourselves.
We may make efforts to be in the moment while we’re meditating – to be aware of our experience as it unfolds in the eternal moment and allowing our own inner beauty to manifest. Or perhaps we become a habitually vague in our practice, and spend a lot of our time drifting in thought, making insufficient effort to bring ourselves back to our current experience.
Keeping a meditation journal helps us have a more definite sense of what is actually going on. When we sit down after meditation and take a few minutes to journal what we’ve been experiencing, it makes it pretty obvious how effective we’ve really been. If we examine our experience, honestly and with a desire to learn, then we become much more aware of what our meditation practice actually is. We can become more aware of our weaknesses and our strengths, and have a much more penetrating understanding of what we need to be working on.
A journal also allows us to look back at our experience as it has changed over a period of time. We can review several days, weeks, or months of our practice and learn about the patterns that our consciousness follows. Perhaps we’ll discover that we are lazier than we thought, or perhaps that we try too hard, or perhaps even that we fluctuate in our efforts. We may discover that there are particular distractions that are much more common that we had recalled. We commonly also discover – especially when we’re feeling a little down – that our meditation practice has been more effective and enjoyable than we had remembered.
And our journaling can help us to set goals. It’s not that we try to pin down our experience before it happens – that’s rarely if ever going to work and it’s more likely to result in frustration than in any progress in our meditation practice. Instead what we’re trying to do in setting goals is to develop a stronger sense of where we want to go in our meditation practice. Through looking back at our past experience we can see what we need to work on. Perhaps it’s forgiveness or patience that we need to develop. Perhaps it’s more persistence. Or more calmness. Whatever changes we want to make, having clear goals will help us attain them. Our goals become the magnetic north pole that allows us to navigate through our experience in order to get where we want to go.
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Comments
Comment from Sasha
Time: September 14, 2009, 6:58 am
Hi.. Let me start of by saying I really enjoy reading your website and find it to be very useful. I am very new to meditation and have a few concerns that I was hoping you may help me with. Firstly, I find that whilst my inward breath is uncontrolled and flows smoothly, my outward breath is very stilted. My exhalation comes out in spurts and feels very forced. Any suggestions on how I may over come this?
Also, I find that whilst I am meditating I am aware of certain thoughts, but that soon after my meditation is over, I forget the thoughts I was previously aware of. Is this normal or a sign of improper meditation?
Many thanks
Comment from Bodhipaksa
Time: September 16, 2009, 10:16 am
Hi Sasha,
First up, it’s very common to have thinking going on and then to forget what it was all about afterwards. It’s a sign that the thinking wasn’t very mindful (or perhaps wasn’t mindful at all) but that too is very common. That in fact is the normal state of affairs that we’re working with in meditation. Those periods of unmindful thinking often cause the arising of negative emotional states such as self-doubt, ill will, etc.
The issue of controlling the breath is a bit more tricky to answer. One approach is for you just to stick with the practice, noticing the feelings of discomfort, and letting go as best you can of any judgments that you make about what’s going on. Often what happens is that we decide that something (like tightness in the outbreath) is “wrong” and so we tense up even more. If you keep working in this way then one day you’ll simply “forget” to tighten up! Perhaps you do already, for periods of time.
Another approach (and there’s no reason you can’t use both) is to use your imagination to help you connect with a sense of letting go of controlling the breath. You can read more about that here.
Please do let me know how you get on.
Pingback from 4 Great Reasons to Track Your Meditation Efforts in a Log or Journal | No Stress Ever
Time: November 25, 2009, 1:09 am
[...] I also came across the idea of keeping a meditation journal. I realize that I am not an expert or doctor and so a lot of what I share on this blog is articles or information that I have found from real experts or doctors. “Mindfulness is about knowing where we are (being in the moment) and also about maintaining an awareness of where we have been (reflection) and where we are going (having goals). A meditation journal can help us with all of those areas of awareness, helping us to have a more unified awareness of ourselves.” -wildmind [...]
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