Once you are set in your firm and comfortable position, it is time to tackle the next topic: your breath! Your breath is so connected to the speed and direction of your mind, that it is one of the main keys to successful meditation. If you are in a relaxed state, your breath is likely calm and slow, right? You won’t even notice you are breathing. And if you are in an agitated state, your breath will have speeded up and became more heavy. And if you are in panic, you even have to gasp for breath sometimes. This is how your mind controls your breath. Now, you can turn this around to hack your mind. See what happens when you are upset about something, and you decide to actively calm down your breath. Your agitation will slowly fade away too. In meditation, we focus on calming down your inhalation, and exhalation, so that you your mind will calm down as well. Simple, right?

In addition to slowing down the breath, we take notice of the little breaks in between the breath. You just understood how calming your breath calms the mind, now in these little breaks, the mind stops for a little bit. When the mind stops, all the covers of identification of the mind disappear for a micro second. And this is where we want to go. Tomorrow I will shortly dive deeper into this before exploring the next practical topic.