I grew up religious, and so I was constantly praying. In retrospect, prayer seems like a type of meditation that reinforces neural pathways based on the contents of the prayer.
After leaving my faith, I stopped praying, and therefore seemed to have lost access to that tool for manipulating my neural pathways in favor of my higher-order goals.
I have been struggling with motivation recently and finally concluded that perhaps losing the ritualistic aspect of religion that constantly reminded myself of what was most important has made me weaker in that way.
I have recently started meditating for ten minutes a day, mainly to ponder on my goals and why they are important to me. I have felt my motivation, focus, and willpower skyrocket since starting this ritual.
Most of my goals at this point are just stepping stone goals in learning the things I want to learn so they aren't really worth discussing.
In terms of exercise, I have to be somewhat scientific in the way I exercise because of my scoliosis. Different types of exercises have different types of effects on my spine. Last summer, under the direction of Physical Therapists, I was doing a whole array of different exercises simultaneously, so when my spinal pain started to worsen I was unable to identify which exercises were beneficial and which were harmful. Now, I do only one type of exercise for a couple of months to try to see its effects in isolation. I ruled out two exercises in the past 6 months, and have recently started running. For the last decade, I have intentionally avoided aerobic exercises in my effort to gain weight and avoid being ridiculed for being too skinny. So far running hasn't seemed overly stressful on my spine. There seems to be a chiropractic benefit in running, in that the rotation of the limbs helps rotate the spine to a more balanced state. I am cautiously hopeful that this will be a beneficial exercise for me in the long run!
METHOD
I'm not an expert at all, I'm just winging it, closing my eyes and putting my arms in a comfortable formation. I let my mind relax a bit, and try to treat my mind like its own entity, trying to prod answers out of it. I ask myself what is most important to me, and just let the neurons churn. They seem to eventually find the motivational cortex I'm looking for and activate it.
My pattern is the following -
- Look at my art/Recite core principles associated with each piece of artwork
- Meditate on self-affirmations of power and potential
- Meditate on true deep desires
- Meditate on how to improve
I have found that 20 minutes of meditation can help me go from 0% motivation to 100% motivation, and this motivation can last for multiple days.