It's always good to know why you're doing anything. When a therapist or teacher recommends meditation, it's important to know what the intention is- why is it "good" for you.
I often teach yoga and meditation practices when conducting a retreat. One of my concerns about the yoga and meditation world is that sometimes students are guided to do practices without a good grounding in why. Similarly, certain practices are presented without a context to understand them in.
Yoga students, for instance, are frequently taught about the chakras, without the important information that chakras are a very elusive thing, perhaps more of an idea than a thing, and might even be more of a unicorn than a chocolate lab. Chakras are best thought of as a conceptual framework that one's life energy can tend to concentrate in certain parts of the body. Our wants and needs may be felt “concentrated” in the lower belly or pelvic area, for example. Some of us may have a felt sense of strong drives being rooted in the pelvis, just as we may feel a warmth in the heart area when we feel strong affection. But it's important not to teach people that there is in fact a thing in your pelvis or heart area, called a chakra, and it even has a certain color or may take on the spirit qualities of certain animals or other natural phenomena. Please. That's leading a student toward delusion, in my humble opinion. Yoga teachers, please stop!
It's important to keep some healthy skepticism about teachings on yoga and meditation. Keep your BS detector within reach.
Perhaps a more subtle form of this issue is teaching folks to meditate without a plainspoken explanation of why. This can lead to distorted or unrealistic expectations about meditation. One of the primary misconceptions about meditation is that it's supposed to make you become peaceful and calm. So if you're not blissed out, you are doing something wrong. This creates much discouragement, and in my experience, leads a lot of willing meditators to throw in the towel, concluding “I can't meditate”.
It's important to understand this nuance: Yes, meditation can lead to moments of calm, peace and feeling “centered”. Pretty reliable research does indeed show a correlation between a bit of meditation practice and a less agitated nervous system. But it's just as likely that the calm moments will be slow in coming, and one may have to slog through lots of restlessness, boredom, confusion and frustration first.
Consider your average vending machine: You put in your dollar and press “E3”, and the peanut M&Ms will come out pretty much every time. Meditation is not a vending machine. Put in your dollar on any particular day, and keep in mind, you may get peace, or you may just experience a mind currently unable to settle itself. No problem! Keep in mind that in the long run, you're training your mind to become more settled, less reactive, more content in a given moment. But that's often a glacial pace, a slow-cooker, not a microwave. If you get immediate relief, consider that a bonus.
Understanding the purpose, or intention, of meditation arms you with reasonable expectations and a basic context of what the goal is. It's important to ask a teacher why they're suggesting something if you don't understand it. Be careful not to give away your power to a teacher just because they're in the teacher role. Asking questions empowers you.
Check out this video on this page to listen to a simple overview, from the perspective of the Insight or Vipassana tradition, of the primary goals or intentions of meditation.
