Here I'll present an easy form of meditation - it has nothing to do with the popular perception that meditation is "just sitting there, not thinking about anything". If you've tried that, I'm sure you found that the more you tried to "not think about anything", the more you thought about something, generally about how hard it is to not think. Instead, this meditation uses your awareness (which is something different from your thoughts), and the flow of energy through your body.

Ready to give it a try? I've broken it down into five lessons -practice each lesson, til you feel you've mastered it, then move on to the next. The lessons build on each other, til you are in a fully meditative state.

Lesson One - Grounding

Get comfortable, close your eyes, and relax.

Now, bring your attention to you body, notice how it feels. Any tightness, or agitation anywhere? Are you carrying any energy left over from your day?

Take a deep breath, notice the base of your spine, your 1^st chakra. The 1^st chakra is where we will ground from. When you make a connection to the planet, it stabilizes your body, and allows you to release energy back to the planet.

Mentally see a bright spot of energy at your 1^st chakra. Notice what happens to your body when you say hello to your 1^st chakra.

Now, notice the planet, and send a hello deep down into the center of the planet. Notice how it makes your body feel to notice the center of the planet.

Next, we will create a grounding cord - consider an image you'd like to use; a beam of light, a waterfall, a tree, an umbilical cord. Feel the bright spot of energy at the base of your spine, and send another hello to the center of the planet. Now, step back and connect the two points with your image, sending your grounding cord deep down into the center of the planet. Notice what happens to your body when you connect the two points - does your body release energy? Do you feel yourself coming back deeper into yourself? Do you feel more solid?

Take a deep breath, and consciously decide to release energy - just let go of your day, your job, your responsibilities, at least for now, and allow yourself to connect with your body. How does it feel to release energy? Notice your body, and use your grounding cord to release and relax. Notice if you're tight or tense anywhere- these are points where you may be carrying foreign energy. Say hello to them, and let go- don't force or push the energy out, just let it drop out. Release all the foreign energy point by point, letting it fall through your body and down your grounding cord, back to the center of the planet.

Now, you'll need to replenish the energy you let go of, but you don't want to replace it with the same energy. Instead, imagine a golden sun above your head, and call back your own energy from where ever you left it. Make your sun big and bright, and let it flow through the top of your head and into all the places you released. Let it flow through your entire body, filling up your feet, your hands, your fingers. If you want, make another sun.

When you are all full, take a deep breath, open your eyes, stretch, and enjoy the feeling of being grounded.

Lesson Two - Creating Space

Get comfortable in your chair, take a deep breath, and say hello to your body. How do you feel? Settle in, close your eyes, and notice your entire body, especially the outer parts, your skin. Notice your size, how does it feel?

Notice your 1^st chakra and the center of the planet, and send a hello to the two points. Now, create a grounding cord and connect. How does your body feel to connect and release energy?

Bring your awareness to your body again. Now notice your "space"-your space is your aura. Become aware of this energy around you, feel its size, imagine a bubble under your feet, over your head, behind you, in front of you. What happens to your body when you notice this space? How do you feel?

Continue to stay aware of your grounding. You can carry foreign energy in your aura, too. Release any foreign energy from your aura, you don't need to identify it, just release it, let it go.

Take a deep breathe. Now, notice your room- take your aura, and extend it to fill up the room. How does that feel? Sometimes your aura is big, sometimes small- do you feel you lose a sense of yourself, of your space, if you extend it big? Now, extend it to encompass the building- how does that feel? Are you comfortable doing this? If it feels uncomfortable, try it anyway, just for the experience of what it feels like.

Now bring it back to the room, then back to your body, about two feet around your body. Now pull it in another foot, pull it to six inches. How does that feel? Do you feel like you don't have enough space? Now bring it back to about two feet. Find a comfortable place. Sometimes just moving your aura around shakes out the alien energy.

Notice your grounding cord, and continue to release energy. Now get the idea of "owning" your space- in the owning and creating of space for yourself, you set the stage to heal yourself as a spirit. Once you feel the ownership, create a gold sun, and bring your energy back from where you left it. Make the sun at least as big as your space, even bigger. Bring the sun in, fill up your body and your aura. When you are ready, open your eyes, stretch, and enjoy the feeling of owning your space.

Lesson Three - The center of your head

Get comfortable, take a deep breath, and notice your surroundings, notice your body, and relax. Notice the base of your spine and send a hello to the center of the planet. Connect the two with a line of energy, creating a grounding cord.

Once you are grounded, take a deep breath, and notice where your attention is. Is it on your body, on your job, on your kids? As you get an idea of where your attention is, get the idea of bringing it back to yourself, back to your body.

As an experiment, become aware of your right hand. Put your attention in the palm of your hand. Notice what it feels like to have your attention in the palm of your hand. Now notice your left foot, be in your left foot. Now notice your nose -let yourself be right at the tip of your nose. Then notice your eyes- move back til your attention is right behind your eyes. Notice what you find there, how does it feel to be in the center of your head? Is it noisy? Are there thoughts there, or other people? Notice what is there, then notice that you are not any of these things, - you are the awareness in the center of your head.

Now, take a deep breathe, and release whatever it is you've found in the center of your head. Release it down your grounding cord, just let go of those thoughts, images and sensations. What happens when you let go? Notice how much room there is in the center of your head- as you let go, does that give you more room?

Now decide how you can create the center of your head as a sanctuary for yourself. You can create a beautiful room, or a landscape, a color, feeling of warmth. Create it just for yourself. Is it big enough? Notice what happens to your body when you settle into the center of your head. Acknowledge your body, and yourself in the center of your head.

Now, create a gold sun, let it flow through the center of your head. Make another sun, and let it flow through and fill up the rest of your body. When you are all full, open your eyes, stretch, and enjoy the new perspective from the center of your head.

Lesson Four - Separation

Relax, take a deep breath, and say hello to your 1st chakra. Send a hello into the center of the planet, and create a grounding cord.

Put your awareness into the center of your head. Imagine a big, gold sun, and call back all your energy into that gold sun. Once you've collected up all your energy, allow the gold sun to flow through the top of your head, through the center of your head, and fill up your body. Do you feel a change once you're grounded and filled up with your own energy?

Now, about eight inches from your forehead, get an image of your favorite flower, or maybe a bubble, or a miniature sun. Can you sense it? Can you feel It? Now release this image, and create another one- it could be another flower, or bubble or sun, or you could experiment with something different. Now release this image, just let it go.

Notice the center of your head, notice the space around you, find the edge of your space. Notice you can also use your grounding cord to ground your space.

Now, in front of you, get another image of a flower, or bubble or sun, but this time, with the idea that this image represents you on an energy level. What does this image look like? Is it vibrant or dull? Solid or wilted? If you don't like it, release it and make another- just do this til you get something you like.

Now set your image on the edge of your aura. Allow it to be between you and all the energies around you. Allow it to provide some separation between the demands and expectations of you. Get a sense of your job- let it be between you and your job. Get a sense of a person you work with- let your image be between you and this person, giving you space. You can even use it to give yourself space from your family.

As you find your separation from the things around you, you create more space for yourself. This space gives you the freedom to be you, to enjoy your own energy and ideas. Think of something you are supposed to be doing, a task, and allow yourself some space from it. How does that feel?

Allow your image to remain at the edge of your aura. Once you've found a sense of separation, create a gold sun, and fill yourself up. As you fill up, get a sense of owning your space, and owning your ability to be separate from the energies, people and things around you.

Lesson Five - Running Energy

Settle in, take a deep breath, and relax into your body. Notice the base of your spine, and send a hello to your 1st chakra. Notice the center of the planet, and send a hello to it. Then create a grounding cord, and connect these two points with a grounding cord.

Now bring your attention behind your eyes, into the center of your head. Notice your space, notice your body, notice your grounding.

Create your favorite separation image, and set it out in front of you, right at the edge of your aura. This allows you to separate from the energy around you, and go within.

Take a deep breath, and be aware of yourself in the center of your head. Now, notice your feet. Right in the arch of each foot is your feet chakras. Say hello to your feet chakras, and allow them to open up.

Now, send a hello into the center of the planet, and look deep within the planet for some Earth energy. It might be a color, an image, it might be a vast underground lake, or a great, glowing underground pool of lava.

Bring that Earth energy up, like a line of energy coming up through the planet. Allow your feet chakras to draw this energy up, let it flow through your leg channels, imagine the Earth energy flowing up through your legs to the 1^st chakra. When the energy reaches the 1^st chakra, allow it to fall back down your grounding. Notice what happens to your body when you run Earth energy.

Take a deep breath, notice yourself in the center of your head, and notice that the Earth energy keeps on flowing once it starts, it automatically keeps flowing.

Now notice the top of your head, your crown chakra. Say hello to your crown chakra, and imagine opening it up. Send a hello out to the Universe, go way out, past the atmosphere, past the planet, beyond the Solar System, way out into space. Now, find an energy you'd like to bring in and run. Start to call that energy down to the top of your head, right into the back part of your crown chakra,. Allow that energy to flow down your back channels, on either side of your spine, into the 1^st chakra at the base of your spine.

Allow the Earth energy and the Cosmic energy to mix, and then let it flow back up through the front channels. As it flows through your body, it cleans out and energizes all your chakras.

When it reaches your 5^th chakra at your throat, allow some energy to flow down your arms, and out through your fingers.

The rest of the energy will flow up through your crown chakra, and fountain out of your head, into your aura.

Take a deep breath, be aware of yourself in the center of your head, and notice what it feels like to run energy.

Allow the energy to flow as long as you like. When you are ready, create a gold sun of your own energy above your head. Call back all your energy, and collect it up into a bright, hot golden sun. Then let it flow through your head, filling up your entire body.

So that's it. See, meditation isn't that hard, and with just a little practice and a few minutes a day, it can make all the difference in how you feel, and more importantly, how you feel about life.