Tips for Meditating:

Meditation has many benefits that make it worth the effort, but if you’re an overthinker, it can be hard to settle down your thoughts and just focus on your breathing. It’s not impossible though!

With these 9 tips for meditating when you’re an overthinker, you can learn to use meditation to calm your racing mind and achieve more peace in life than ever before.

1) Create A Routine

Tips for Meditating: If you’re looking to start meditating, creating a routine is a great place to start. Meditation doesn’t have to be complicated; if you work out every day at 5 pm, make meditation part of that routine.

Sit down in a comfortable position and concentrate on your breathing. To deepen your practice, try meditating before bed.

Use apps like Insight Timer or Headspace if you need help creating and sticking to a meditation routine. Another benefit of starting a meditation routine? It will help train your brain not to overanalyze everything!

2) Get out of your head by journaling

As in Tips for Meditating Maybe you’re a journaler by nature and always have been. Maybe you want to get into it but don’t really know where to start.

Maybe, if you’re like most people, you haven’t thought about keeping a journal since high school and are completely confused about how to go about doing it.

The first thing to realize is that a diary does not have to be some fancy notebook filled with leather and gilt; it can be as simple as keeping track of your schedule in your smartphone or writing down three things you accomplished each day in a spiral-bound notebook that costs $2 at Target. Find what works for you—and then do it!

3) Focus on Your Breath

It may sound counterintuitive, but focusing on your breath can help keep your mind from wandering too far. As you concentrate on each inhale and exhale, thoughts will inevitably pop into your head—and that’s OK.

What’s important is to acknowledge those thoughts and then refocus on your breathing. A few minutes of concentration will calm your nerves and clear up any potential roadblocks in your thinking process.

Keep it short: Meditation is no sprint; it’s a marathon. It takes time to develop a consistent practice—so don’t expect to perfect it overnight.

4) Clear Out The Clutter

Taking some time each day to meditate can make all of your other efforts at self-improvement more fruitful. But if you’re like me, and you are easily distracted, it may be difficult to stick with your meditation habit.

Here are some tips for how to keep up a meditation practice when you’re an over thinker who tends to struggle with focus.

Take five: One solution I’ve found is simply to take five minutes at a time; after five minutes of silence and focus, I feel much better equipped to stay on task during my daily meditation sessions.

5) Use background noise

Meditation involves quieting your mind and focusing solely on your breathing. But what do you do if your brain won’t stop thinking? Some people suggest putting on background noise, such as soothing music or a podcast, to make it easier to focus.

Other people recommend setting a specific time limit—say 15 minutes—for when you sit down to meditate so that you force yourself to have a concrete goal.

Whatever method you choose, one of the most important things is realizing that meditation is not a competition against time or other people; it’s about clearing your mind in whatever way works best for you.

6) Invest in Good Equipment

If you’re struggling to find time to meditate regularly, investing in a high-quality cushion can help. It will improve your posture during practice and prevent you from being sore.

If you have tried meditation and have been unable to remain still, a high-quality cushion can make all of the difference.

Many people purchase expensive cushions but do not know how to take care of them; they wind up sitting on plastic bags or old blankets because they don’t know how to clean it or what size or style is best suited for their body type.

7) Take Breaks

Many people believe that meditation should be practiced daily. Some think it’s something you can just read about and then do.

But even though meditation is simple, it’s not always easy. As with anything else worth doing in life, there are some important rules to keep in mind if you want to start meditating regularly:

Stick to It: Choose a specific time of day and make sure you practice your meditation at that time every day, whether it’s first thing in the morning or last thing at night. The key is sticking to a routine so your body knows when it’s supposed to practice being still.

8) Try Different Types Of Meditation

Everyone’s different, so it’s important to find what works best for you. That said, there are many types of meditation you can try out—and it’s worth experimenting before committing to anything in particular.

For example, you could start by trying out a guided meditation and then gradually move on to more advanced techniques (like Transcendental Meditation). At that point, it’s just a matter of figuring out which type of meditation is right for you and your needs.

9) Start Small

Meditation isn’t like a light switch—you can’t just turn it on and off. Instead, think of it as training your brain to be more mindful throughout your day.

This might mean starting small: meditate when you wake up in the morning, or when you get home from work. Or try setting a timer to focus on what you’re doing in 15-minute blocks.

Those 15 minutes will quickly turn into half-hour sessions—and then hour-long ones! It might take some practice, but eventually you’ll be able to bring that mindfulness to any activity or situation.