A Simple Meditation Preparation

Meditation is a wonderful way to calm your mind, clear your thoughts, and bring you to peace with the world. It is also a deeply personal experience, and requires your complete concentration. If you're new to meditation, or looking for a way to refresh your routine, here are a few tips for getting started.

Location, location, location

Where you meditate is almost as important as how you meditate. You should find a place that has good feelings and memories for you, and that resonates with your spirit. It should be quiet, and preferably outside, which brings your spirit closer to nature.

There are group meditations, and a group meditation can have good energy and enhance your own personal meditation. However, you should not try to meditate where other people will be a distraction. Meditation is all about connecting with your own spirit. If being around other people will make that difficult, then you should meditate alone.

Be choosy with your time

When you're meditating, especially the first time, make certain that you have no time constraints. It's very challenging to find peace and stillness the first time you do it, and that basic "I need to..." thought nagging at the back of your mind will make it nigh impossible to reach the stillness necessary for meditation. Time goes very quickly when you meditate, so give yourself that freedom.

Also, make sure other people know what you're doing, and turn off your cell phone to prevent further distractions from coming up.

Breathe in, breathe out

Once you're in a comfortable position, begin deep breathing and gently close your eyes. Breathe in through your nose, expand your lungs, slowly and count to five. As you breathe in, feel your chest and stomach expand. Feel the air coming in through your nose, down your throat, into your chest, and hold it.

As you hold your breath, feel the fullness and energy of your body completely using the oxygen. Breathe out, count to five again and feel the air push out of your body. As you breathe out, feel your chest and stomach contract and relax, getting rid of all the used air and preparing for a big, fresh new breath. Hold it and find the perfect stillness there.

Repeat the breathing as many times as necessary to get into the meditative zone. Don't hold it so long that you're gasping for air, or are rushing for the next breath. Just breathe deeply, slowly and rhythmically.

Relaxing body and spirit

The hardest part about meditating is having the patience with yourself to sit through your mind's wanderings. In the beginning a lot of strange sensations and thoughts may come to the surface. Simply let these wash over you without judgment or fear. Shocking images may pass before your eyes, you may hear sounds that frighten you, and difficult emotions may arise. Acknowledge these emotions, but to not allow them to rule your spirit. Allow these waves of sensations to pass, and float back into that clear meditative state.

At first, even your body may rebel against relaxation and stillness. You may even feel cramped and edgy at first. Simply focus on your breathing and allow the tranquility and peace to flow into your limbs and relax them slowly.

The mind isn't used to being harnessed, and that makes your first meditation very challenging. Just be patient and wait it out. Eventually your mind will settle into the stillness, like a bouncing ball slowly coming to rest. Once it's trained, your mind will crave the freedom it has found in meditation.

A few final tips

It helps to make a commitment to meditate at the same time every day and do it no matter what. Meditation must have first priority in this case, or else your mind will start to come up with all kinds of excuses. Also, that way it becomes a habit for your body, so meditation becomes easier each time you do it.

Meditating helps you de-stress, reconnects you with your spirit, and helps you to find the calm in your world. If you can be patient and truly focus on it, then you will find how truly beneficial meditation can be.

Sleeping Tiger, LLC created and produces Zen Sticks, a meditation tool. Sleeping Tiger is dedicated helping people find peace and tranquility in their personal environment. They also strive to protect the worlds natural resources. A portion of all proceeds earned by Sleeping Tiger, LLC go to My Brothers Keeper, an organization that provides habitats and healing for wild animals that are abused or abandoned. For more information about meditation and more tips and techniques, visit SleepingTiger.org

Franklin D
Believeit
Benjamin Franklin
George Washington Carver

How to Make Self-Improvement Work Every Time!

There is an inherent problem with the approach most people take to self-improvement of any kind. There is a presupposition that there is something wrong that needs fixing. Perhaps it is true that there are areas in their lives that they wish to change. However, the mindset with which they approach transformation will very often NEGATE any positive results they might have. Why? Because all of their focus is on the PROBLEM they are trying to solve, rather than their vision for what their life will be like on without the alleged problem.

There is a very basic physical natural law which ultimately determines ANY success on ANY level. This law dictates exactly what our experience will be from moment to moment. Best of all, this law is fully under our control at all times, even if we are not aware of it.

This "law" is the Law of Attraction. Most of the time, you hear about this law in terms of how it will help you to attract wealth or abundance in general. However, the Law of Attraction transcends just those basic desires. The Law of Attraction dictates that you will receive back exactly what you "vibrate"...that is, what you are FEELING. Where is your attention? Is it on the feelings associated with the problem, or with the feelings of no longer having the problem?

If you approach self-improvement material with the desire to "get rid of the problem", and if all your feelings are on how terrible or frustrating this "problem" is, Universal Law dictates that you will simply attract MORE of those feelings...more of the circumstances that brought the problem to you in the first place. The Universe isnt "out to get you". It is simply responding to the "request" that you are putting out by way of your feelings.

If, however, you approach your self-improvement solutions with high positive feelings associated with what your life WILL be...if you visualize your success with your program of choice on all sensory levels, particularly on the level of EMOTION, you will literally magnetically ATTRACT the success you are looking for! Miracles will occur!

While this may sound very "mystic" or even preposterous, I submit to you that EVERY aspect of your life right now has been brought to you in perfect response to your prevailing thoughts and beliefs which directly affect your emotional state, which in turn causes you to emit very specific and magnetic frequencies which attract like frequencies.

We must never forget that beyond simply being flesh and bone, we are, at a molecular level, ENERGY. And our personal energy obeys the same physical laws as all other Energy which we study more traditionally.

The wealthiest, most successful people in the world use the Law of Attraction (albeit often unconsciously) to effortlessly bring into their lives whatever they envision. This could be wealth, successful businesses, or satisfying relationships. Or, it could simply be wisdom, peace of mind, and a sense of purpose.

The big secret is that you truly CAN have whatever you want, regardless of how "pie-in-the-sky" this may sound. You need only learn a few key concepts about HOW to ask for what you want to begin receiving it in abundance! Despite what you may currently believe or have been taught, it is not the purpose of our lives to struggle, to work hard for years, or try to "figure things out". Our job is to do what we love to do. When we do that with full trust and knowing that doing so will naturally attract our deepest desires, we become powerful magnets, which absolutely assures our success.

Bob Doyle is the CEO and founder of Boundless Living and the developer of the Wealth Beyond Reason program, which provides a continuing education of the physics of wealth, abundance, and joyous living through the Law of Attraction. RadicalWealthFromHome.com

Anthony De Mello
We become what we think about most of the time
Phobias
Gautama Buddha

So What Exactly Is The Law Of Attraction?

The Law of Attraction - What exactly is it?We have spoken about this many times now, but I am still getting asked by friends, okay we have heard about the Law of Attraction, but what exactly is the Law of Attraction.

So we will explain again:

The Law of Attraction is the single most powerful law in the universe. So what does that mean?. Basically what that means is, what ever you think about, you attract to yourself. If you think of yourself as a magnetic force, attracting all the things, the people, the events to you. You are attracting everything that you have been thinking about.

The Law of Attraction affects all people, whether you believe it or not, everything that has happened in your life has resulted from this one law of the universe. Everything in the universe is made up of energy, our thoughts are energy, so hence you have an energy field around you at all times.

The energy attracts the what in our life. You may attract success, a financial windfall, speeding tickets, health etc. Your thoughts and feelings are the direct result in attracting the what in your life. So again what exactly is the Law of Attraction, it is your thoughts and feelings that manifest into what your were indirectly thinking about.

The Law of Attraction does take time to understand, but once you have mastered the tools of how to apply the Law of Attraction and continue to practice and use them consistantly you will then understand what exactly is the the Law of Attraction. You must challenge every thought you have.

What ever your mind can conceive it can also achieve - W. Clement Stone

Know What You Want:

In order for you to use the Law of Attraction, you focus your thoughts and your feelings on all that you want. You cannot focus on something you are unsure off, so you must clarify and identify exactly what it is you do want first. Do not jump straight in and think about wanting great sums of money instantly as this will not happen. As you will then think to yourself oh, this is not going to happen, it is not achievable. You must be specific with your requests and goals, and in order for you to believe make them a little smaller, but believe it is achievable, otherwise it will not happen.

Negative Thoughts:

You need to be aware of your negative thoughts, and start changing the way you think. Every time you have a negative thought replace it immediately with positive ones. You need to learn to change your thought patterns. Know exactly what it is that you want, what you are passion about and start creating your goals that are specific and believable for you. Then and only then will the law of attraction start working with you.

Ken Triat has a masters degree in Business Administration. Currently reviewing personal development centered around the power of the mind using the Law of Attraction. Subscribe to his list at http://www.physicsofgettingwealthy.com/rights to receive your Free Attraction Accelerator Report to learn how to make The Law of Attraction work in your life. Visit his website today at http://www.physicsofgettingwealthy.com

Ideas For Your Life
Amelia Earhart
George S Clason
Self Help And Spirtual Guide

The Story of Ooodee the Owl

I want to share with you a true story. This is the story of Ooodee the Owl.

In 1985 my daughters and I lived in a town called Mariposa, California, just south of Yosemite National Park. We moved onto 13 acres of raw Sierra Nevada land, without running water or electricity. For the first three years we lived in a Columbia, a 30-foot travel trailer built in the late 70s. My girls were stacked into the hallway on bunks I had made out of two by fours.

Electricity came two years after our move there and water six years later. Yes, in the middle of America, we lived a dichotomy - a paradoxical life if you will.

A friend ran into some people in the central valley that uncovered a Barn Owls nest in their attic and unfortunately the mother never came back. We obtained one of these small birds.

When I first saw Ooodee his head balding from the loss of his down, he reminded me of a half-blown dandelion. His temporary home was a box on our small kitchen table and every time you walked by he would lie back on his elbows, claws out and hiss at you like a dragon.

We fed him raw meat but learned quickly that he needed huge doses of calcium or the complete carcass of a mouse or a bird. An owl, being a predator, and like all birds (and snakes), swallows its food whole. A few days after having eaten the carcass and after full digestion he will regurgitate up a round ball. All of the things not consumable by the bird are there, talons, beaks, whatever. Its just under the size of a golf ball and actually very clean and somewhat dry.

This is the way a bird gets its calcium, without which would cause his wings to break during flight.

As Ooodee grew he became a loving member of the family. He would flutter inside our little trailer and live at the bottom of the wood stove in a cubby hole. This little place never got too hot or cold and served as his home, much like a hole in a tree. When it came time for him to fly, he would fly to and fro within the trailer. Because of his acute hearing and radar like capabilities, he always managed to keep within a foot of the ceiling.

I remember thinking that as I watched Ooodee perched on my daughters finger that he was a glorious animal indeed. Each ear was placed off-angle to the other and white downy-soft feathers formed a dish around his face, acting like a receiver for the sound. As I looked at him I realized why Native Americans wore headdresses.

I remember the first time we took him outdoors, realizing that we needed to train him for flying outside and for eventual release. He flew at our height level and landed in some Manzanita bushes crying shisssssst shisssst (which is a noise they make). He cried for our help in removing him. He got stuck on all the sticky berries.

At first, I never realized why he only flew at about 5 feet off the ground, he was a bird he knows how to fly.

Then I realized. Ooodee is like us. Like us he lived in a box. That box had a ceiling that was no higher than 6 feet at the most.

Like us he became conditioned by his experience. He began to believe that when he flew, there was a ceiling and like us he was a limited being.

I remember the day he first discovered there was no ceiling. His cries of utter joy as he circled higher and higher and higher will stay with me the rest of the days of my life.

I dont know how high he flew; I only heard the joy in his cry as he got further and further away.

I dont know where Ooodee is now, but Ive heard stories of him from time to time and I cant help but think how much like us he really is.

We too are raised in boxes of our own making. Our core belief structures formed in childhood from whatever traumas and circumstances we experienced served us then but serve us no longer.

Are you one of those people who fly 5 feet off the ground because youre sure the ceiling is still there?

Do something about your limitations. It's time to master yourself.

Wishing them away wont work.

2007 by Laurie Brenner
All Rights Reserved
http://www.law-of-attraction-masters.com

Publishing guidelines: You are more than welcome to publish any of my articles as long as you include my byline and provide a link back to one of my websites.

About the Author: Laurie Brenner, formerly editor of California's Oldest Continuously Published Weekly, The Mariposa Gazette and Miner, and author of The Little Book of Becoming - Understanding the Law of Attraction now writes for the sheer joy of it and her ezine The View From The Western Slope where she shares true life stories and insights into the law of attraction, the art of becoming, being happy now and stories of her own experiences living in the Sierra Nevada. Visit http://www.wildwindenterprises.com where you can read the story of how she and her husband built the house of their dreams using the law of attraction!

Sign up for her newsletter today at http://www.wildwindebooks.com

Buddha
Jesus Christ
Spiritual Thoughts
Seven Spiritual Law of Success