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Go Back   Spiritual Forums > Spirituality & Beliefs > Meditation

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  #1  
Old 03-08-2018, 08:34 PM
ember23 ember23 is offline
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Question How to motivate yourself to meditate when dealing with depression?

Hi all. So I am dealing with a pretty bad bought of depression at the moment.
I've been trying to use meditation as a way to raise my vibration and help bring me out of it, but I struggle with executive dysfunction which makes it difficult to motivate myself to actually do things.
How do you all keep yourselves motivated to keep meditating and stay on your path to spiritual enlightenment? Do you meditate everyday? Do you do it on a schedule? Any helpful tips would be very much appreciated. Namaste
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  #2  
Old 04-08-2018, 12:14 AM
Gem Gem is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ember23
Hi all. So I am dealing with a pretty bad bought of depression at the moment.
I've been trying to use meditation as a way to raise my vibration and help bring me out of it, but I struggle with executive dysfunction which makes it difficult to motivate myself to actually do things.
How do you all keep yourselves motivated to keep meditating and stay on your path to spiritual enlightenment? Do you meditate everyday? Do you do it on a schedule? Any helpful tips would be very much appreciated. Namaste




I'm not so strict as I used to be, but ideally, I have a schedule to ensure meditation fits in with the rest of the routine. If I feel like it, or I don't feel like it, I still do it because there is work to accomplish. Lately I haven't been as strict about serious meditation practice, but I would like to get back to having a proper routine so I know there will be some small progress every day.
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  #3  
Old 04-08-2018, 07:47 AM
Starman Starman is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ember23
Hi all. So I am dealing with a pretty bad bought of depression at the moment.
I've been trying to use meditation as a way to raise my vibration and help bring me out of it, but I struggle with executive dysfunction which makes it difficult to motivate myself to actually do things.
How do you all keep yourselves motivated to keep meditating and stay on your path to spiritual enlightenment? Do you meditate everyday? Do you do it on a schedule? Any helpful tips would be very much appreciated. Namaste

I have been doing formal sitting meditation for more than 40-years, one to two times daily, ten to thirty minutes each time. Occasionally I will go a day or three without doing any meditation, and it usually gives me an uneasy feeling.

Besides my formal sitting meditation, I also meditate while standing in the grocery checkout line, or waiting in line at the bank, etc., it helps me to build patience while standing in a slow moving line. When I was working, I am now retired; I would also meditate on my lunch break. Go outside to a park bench, or sit on the grass, and meditate.

Meditation gives me a sort of umbrella that helps me with whatever rains of depression that may pour. I am more vulnerable to depression when I don’t meditate, and the best time for me to meditate is when I am not depressed. That builds a momentum, which can carry me through all sorts of moods and situations, although quieting my mind when I am depressed has also been helpful.

Depression usually comes to me when I am holding on to something, most often something that I am not conscious of, and taking a relaxing bath, listening to soothing music, and doing quiet meditation, usually helps snap me out of it. But also watching very funny comedy movies, reading certain fiction type stories, and doing volunteer work, has also been beneficial for alleviating depression for me. Basically, getting my mind absorbed in something else other than my depression.
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Old 08-08-2018, 09:37 PM
Miss Hepburn Miss Hepburn is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ember23
Hi all. So I am dealing with a pretty bad bought of depression at the moment.
I've been trying to use meditation as a way to raise my vibration and help bring me out of it, but I struggle ...
Well, this is my input..
depression or anything else that gets in the way, anger, stress, worry...
instead of trying to raise your vibration from 'that' point.
Get to 'zero'.
Inside wipe your mental slate to blank...feels like a black curtain has come down and or an empty screen...be nothing...no
memories of 5 minutes ago..be completely blank.

There.
Start from there to do your 'techniques of focus'...on your breath, in your Third Eye..whatever you learned.
Hope you try it...it's great.


If you must think...try thinking of all your cells, containing all these atoms...what's inside the atom...it's called getting to the atom point.
Now if you do that ...where did your depression go for that 45 seconds?
Gone. Don't invite it back...
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Prepare yourself for the coming astral journey of death by daily riding in the balloon of God-perception.
Through delusion you are perceiving yourself as a bundle of flesh and bones, which at best is a nest of troubles.
Meditate unceasingly, that you may quickly behold yourself as the Infinite Essence, free from every form of misery. ~Paramahansa's Guru's Guru
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  #5  
Old 16-08-2018, 07:20 AM
blueheart blueheart is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ember23
Hi all. So I am dealing with a pretty bad bought of depression at the moment.
I've been trying to use meditation as a way to raise my vibration and help bring me out of it, but I struggle with executive dysfunction which makes it difficult to motivate myself to actually do things.
How do you all keep yourselves motivated to keep meditating and stay on your path to spiritual enlightenment? Do you meditate everyday? Do you do it on a schedule? Any helpful tips would be very much appreciated. Namaste

Hello !
From my 16 to 21 I was in a depression. Besides spiritual work, have you have advised with a psychiatrist ?

I will assume , that your mood is low, you don't feel joy. His leads to demotivation and apathy. Some medicines, like seropram constists of serotonine, which boosts the mood. Others, like lamictal can stabalize you. Sometimes depression might occure if we have weak will power. Analyze yourself.

How is your sleep? Do you eat normally? Do you drinj alcohole? It is very difficult to engage in activity, when not motivated. Can you focus on your will, to force yourself to meditate, even though you are not motivated. Try focusing on logic, not on on how you feel. At first seems nonproductive but in time you will get a result. Use your will. Force yourself. I know it is difficult, if you feel desperation, know that it is not reality, it is a lying feeling.It is not real!

Try to force a few days to eat large quantities of chocolate, it has endorfin, which might help boost your mood. In the morning, 30 min. before eating, drink hot water with lemon juice in it. It stabalises the whole mood and organisn. But it takes days to start working.

Depression, might come from a trauma in the past. An obstacle you couldn't overcome.How are yoour relations with your parents?. Realizing the reason for depression, will help healing. It actually very easy to force yourself on mindful breathing for 7-8 minutes , twice a day.

5 minutes a day, vizualize yourself. Watching yourself from aside, in third person; imagine a situation in which you are completele healthy and joyful. When these thoughts became more and more the subcounsious stars satisfying your thoughts, which means it will drive you to that situation...

If depressed, then definately your brain doesn't produce enough serotonin. Have you abused drugs or opiates?

Consult with a psychiatrist. Good luck !
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  #6  
Old 16-08-2018, 09:11 AM
iamthat iamthat is offline
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David Hawkins recommended niacin (vitamin B3) for depression.

In the brain, low levels of the neurotransmitter serotonin are associated with depression. One of the building blocks of serotonin is the amino acid tryptophan, and one of the building blocks of tryptophan is niacin. Tryptophan also helps the body supply itself with niacin. If tryptophan is divided between serotonin production and niacin production, serotonin production is likely to be inadequate. Supplemental niacin and tryptophan can improve symptoms of depression.

Be aware that large doses of niacin can produce a "niacin rush", an increased flow of blood to the face making it temporarily red and tingly. It is not comfortable but it passes.

Meditation when depressed is difficult because there is just you sitting with whatever you are feeling, no distractions, no escape. It is difficult to raise your vibrations when you feel that bad.

So one option is to meditate on your depression, completely opening up to whatever feelings are present. We tend to resist this because we are afraid it might be painful. But sometimes the pain of resisting our feelings causes us more problems than the pain we are trying to avoid. So dive into those feelings and see what happens.

Peace.
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  #7  
Old 16-08-2018, 09:57 AM
luke86 luke86 is offline
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You don't have to meditate. Understand that there are many paths leading to enlightenment, and meditation isn't necessary to "experience it".
Maybe you get depressed because you wanted spiritual enlightenment?
Try to change the goal - for example - I want to be happy or... try something simpler - hand gestures (mudras). You can do them even while lying in bed. I especially like Hridaya mudra - it heals the heart.
Good luck!
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  #8  
Old 21-08-2018, 11:23 AM
Uma Uma is offline
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Fish

Along with what Miss Hepburn wrote, to become a zero, and the idea of psychotherapy there is something called ACT Acceptance and Commitment Therapy - which derives from mindfulness meditation as used by mainstream doctors to treat victims of trauma, to desensitize war vets from their horrific flashbacks.

Any kind of mindfulness sharpens the observer part of us that depression tends to fog. You can train yourself to watch the thoughts, observe the pain - as you would the rain falling. When the rain falls it is cleansing, it is healing work.Just observe without getting caught up in it, without identifying with it. "I am not the rain. I am not the pain." Try to stay in the present moment. Accept it for what it is without labelling it or judging it.

That's a nice basic meditation to bring yourself into a more neutral space, a space of equinamity.

And you know the thing with rain is that the sun is shining behind the cloud. And eventually that cloud will move. And the sky will be clear and bright again.
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  #9  
Old 22-08-2018, 12:25 PM
Miss Hepburn Miss Hepburn is offline
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Angel1

Ok, I'm going to add a bit more...but, I know this may not be for everyone.


Once I woke up and was not feeling my usual...I was actually 'down'. LOL
I said to myself, ''Well, what's this feeling all about ...what the heck?"
Felt it for a minute (ick) and said, " I have no idea why You, (the Lord, God) are having me feel this,
but...ok, :)...it's for a reason."
It went away and in it's place my usual practicing of the Presence (His Presence,
the Divine Presence) filled that space.


---I say this for not just meditators, but for lovers or devotees of God ❤️ ...by
whatever name, Shiva, Krishna, Father, Divine Mother, the All That Is, manifest and unmanifest...we must
understand...feelings, thoughts, moods, anything we see with open eyes, these bodies are nothing...
our focus on the One is 'the thing'.

If and when our focus has been practiced daily enough...we know that
that is more important than any upset during the day or any mood that sometimes can be like a leaf in the wind - up and down
all over the place....but our heart's attention can be steady and strong...always on our soul's Lover.


Practice makes perfect...these new pathways in the brain become our norm.
(This has been researched and proven by neuro-science...ref Dr. Caroline Leaf or Dr. Candace Pert.)
Then, these 'upsets' pass away easily and we settle in to our normal state...peace and feeling the Presence.



Hi, Uma :)

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*I'll text in Navy Blue when I'm speaking as a Mod. :)


Prepare yourself for the coming astral journey of death by daily riding in the balloon of God-perception.
Through delusion you are perceiving yourself as a bundle of flesh and bones, which at best is a nest of troubles.
Meditate unceasingly, that you may quickly behold yourself as the Infinite Essence, free from every form of misery. ~Paramahansa's Guru's Guru
.


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  #10  
Old 13-09-2018, 01:59 AM
Uma Uma is offline
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one of the things about depression - one tends to isolate
so try to meditate with like-minded others - it really helps!
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