Hello!
I wanted to take a few minutes to explain why mindful breathing,
Mindfulness,
Meditation is relevant to Latter-day Saints.
So what is mindfulness?
What is meditation?
And why is it something I should be interested in as a disciple of Jesus Christ?
So mindfulness is the practice of being present,
Being in the present moment.
Our thoughts often go to the future,
To the past.
If we're prone to anxiety,
That can be sometimes worrying about the future.
If we're prone to depression,
That can be ruminating about the past.
And so it's really powerful and healthy to focus on the present moment.
And one of the simplest ways of doing that is simply focusing on our breathing.
So this is where it begins to be relevant to our doctrine already.
I mean,
We could talk all day about the benefits of mindfulness.
There's a lot of research about it,
How it helps your nervous system,
Helps your physical health.
But speaking about breathing,
Our prophet,
President Nelson,
Has talked about the true meaning of the word repentance,
And that the Greek word metanoeo refers to change.
That's the meta part.
And the noeo is related to words that mean mind,
Knowledge,
Spirit,
And breath.
And so President Nelson goes on and says,
Thus,
When Jesus asks you and me to repent,
He is inviting us to change our mind,
Our knowledge,
Our spirit,
Even the way we breathe.
So for anyone who meditates,
That is just like,
Wow,
Our prophet is basically telling us to meditate.
So the practice of meditation often invites you to focus on your breath.
And the breath is literally our connection to the present moment.
It's our connection to life.
And interestingly,
It is also the connection between your conscious and subconscious mind,
Because breathing is something that happens automatically.
But it is also something we can control.
So that is a really good place for us to practice making deep changes that we want to make in our lives.
So I think we need to get away from the idea that righteousness is all in our actions.
If you read the scriptures,
Especially the Book of Mormon,
There's many times it mentions thoughts,
The thoughts and intents of our hearts,
Our desires.
This is where spirituality occurs.
Focusing on just our actions,
That's just the surface level of who we are.
So getting deeper and going into our thoughts is a worthwhile practice.
So when we slow down and get still,
We learn what the contents of our heart is,
We are able to separate what happens to us versus what we are.
And that's another theme of the Book of Mormon.
We are agents to act not simply to be acted upon.
Now things do happen to us and they do affect us.
But getting still allows us to sort through that and figure out at the core who we are,
We get to choose who we are,
We have agency.
So here I want to talk a little bit about yin and yang.
Because discipleship is a combination of giving and receiving,
A combination of doing and being.
And yin and yang are simply the opposing forces in life and in the universe that are complementary that make a whole that are dynamic and moving.
So yin is what is called the more feminine energy,
Referring to receiving,
Being.
Yang is the more active energy,
Energy,
More masculine,
More about actions,
Accomplishments,
Doing.
Both are important,
Both are part of life,
Both are a part of every person on this earth.
It's not about gender or sexuality.
It's,
It's everything.
So we live in a fast paced world full of distractions.
And of course,
This has implications for our spirituality.
But not only that,
We live in a sort of patriarchal culture.
And by patriarchy,
I don't mean men are in charge,
Because that could be argued,
But women do have a lot of power.
But this is not about gender.
This is about our society rewarding behavior and action and accomplishment.
And even sometimes our church culture,
There is this other half of the picture that is about being about healing about listening to your intuition.
These are also essential parts of spirituality that we sometimes neglect.
Meditation and some of these Eastern ways of thinking can help us bring those two sides together and find more wholeness in Christ.
The word yoga,
For example,
Means to yoke.
And when I hear that word,
I think of Christ saying,
Take my yoke upon you.
So as we take the time to meditate and to breathe,
We can align our minds and our hearts,
Our bodies and our spirits,
Our masculine and feminine qualities,
We can become more in harmony in our souls.
Sometimes we do need to do the work of healing in our lives.
We can believe intellectually that God loves us unconditionally.
But we may be operating on a belief that our worth is based on our actions.
And meditation is inspired by Buddhism.
And there's a principle inherent to that tradition that is self-compassion.
And I think this is a divine law that we sometimes forget.
We are to love our neighbors as we love ourselves.
We are to love ourselves.
And so,
Like I said,
Sometimes we are operating in a way that is not giving ourselves compassion or love.
And we may need to practice.
So spending the time to do some meditations,
Whether guided or independently,
Can help us to practice loving ourselves and to come to a better place.
So to go back to President Nelson's definition of repentance,
In my mind,
Repentance is very connected to healing,
Because the things we do are often because of how we feel because of what we've been through.
And so if we spend time healing ourselves,
Giving ourselves love,
Becoming more aware of what drives our actions,
We are healing and repenting at the same time,
Because we are changing the way we breathe,
We're changing the way we think,
The way we feel.
And so it's really a great gift that we have because of Jesus Christ and his atoning sacrifice that we get to change,
That we are not forever damned by our actions,
We get to have time and space to repent,
To change.
And so it's a truly beautiful gift.
And I think meditating is one way we can harness that gift that we've been given from our Heavenly Parents and from Jesus Christ.
