Have you ever been overwhelmed by all of the thoughts that go through your mind?

Chances are that you have, and that’s normal.

You see, lurking in the recesses of your mind, each of these thoughts turns into unopened boxes the longer you ruminate on them. Thus, that’s an awful lot of clutter. Meditation helps you to put all those thoughts back into their boxes and move forward with no preconceived ideas about life.

Life evolves, and so do you, and the only important moment in your life is now, accepting who you are, and also accepting that change is inevitable and part of life. That acceptance helps you to move through life in a very positive manner.

Chapter one: The History and Benefits of Meditation

If you go back through history, it’s pretty amazing to find out that the act of meditation goes back to before Christ was born. How do we know this? The fact is that the original Buddha, Prince Siddhartha Gautama, used it to reach enlightenment.

What he was looking for through meditation was an answer to his question as to why human beings suffer so much. What he didn’t know was that the answers would come in a crystal-clear manner, giving him the basis for setting up the philosophy of Buddhism.

You see, the prince was shocked by what he found when he wandered out into the world, having been largely protected from reality by his family. He didn’t know that suffering existed, and when he saw people getting old and infirm, he wondered why there was so much suffering in a world that he had otherwise seen as a happy and contented world.

This was two centuries before Christ, and we know that meditation was something that the Prince had been taught, so this must have been in existence before that time. It originated in India and traveled to other parts of the world. The Chinese, the Tibetans, and other travelers discovered the practice and passed it onto people within their own countries. Gradually, as travel became more popular, the trend of meditation would pass onto the western world, and today it has become of huge interest because scientists have discovered that much of what was taught actually affects the state of mind of those who practice it.

In recent years, MRI scans showed that people who meditate on a regular basis have very active minds when meditating, which is the opposite of what people thought. It’s easy to think that meditation means letting go of all thoughts, but in fact, the brain does not stop acting while you are meditating, and you are able to glean a better understanding of self and are thus more likely to make decisions based upon firmer footing than simply guesswork.

The clarity that you get from meditation is astounding, and practicing it on a regular basis, as well as introducing yourself to mindfulness, helps you to see life in a much clearer way.

Think about it. While you sleep, your body is working behind the scenes to heal you. When you are meditating, your mind is working hard, helping you to understand the complexity of life and acceptance of self. This leads to the following benefits: lowered blood pressure, the ability to relax, less depression, less stress, better posture, better digestion, slower heartbeat, and a happy, fulfilling mindset free of stress and anxiety.