I am a devout Christian, so I strongly believe in the power of prayer. Not just praying for things to be good in my life but for also the well-being of others. Personally, praying to me is an essential part of my day. I don’t believe that I need to be on my knees at the foot of my bed or on a bench in Church to pray.
I consider prayer a state of reflection and gratitude. During prayer, I find myself being thankful to God for my breath of life, for everything that I have and the people that cross my path through the journey of life. This time of reflection is healthy and necessary, especially after being so busy hustling and grinding to get my dreams accomplished. I have had conversations with other individuals outside of the realm of Christianity to get a better understanding of what they do in order to find their peace with God.
I have found that most other religious sects outside of Christianity often times consider meditation as another form of prayer or a peaceful state of mind. No, I’m not going in depth into any new age belief or astral projection type of mediation. I am simply speaking of the type of meditation that allows time for self-reflection. This type of meditation is being implemented in correctional facilities throughout the nation and has been proven to be an effective tool that brings peace during chaos. Certain schools are also implementing meditation tactics to at-risk youth to teach them how to find peace and become a productive members of the community.
Meditation has been demonstrated to be successful throughout the world and many organizations are starting to notice. This is not any over spiritualized mumbo jumbo, this is an essential part of living. If you don’t want to call it meditation or prayer than call it your time alone. Whatever you want to call it does not matter, just do it. A practical way that I have found to meditate is by taking a bubble bath with Epsom salt. I set the atmosphere by turning off the bathroom lights, lighting scented candles and playing classical music in the background. It places me in a very relaxed state of mind before going to sleep, so I am not so worried or anxious about events that have occurred throughout the day as I come to the end of the day.
We are all afforded the exact same 24 hours in a day, it doesn’t matter if your Oprah Winfrey, Steve Jobs, or John Doe. All successful people know that it is important to have at least 7 to 8 hours of sleep. Going to sleep late and waking up early to work will bring stress to the human body and in time the quality of work you produce will be mediocre.
Rest provides your body the opportunity to gather all the thoughts of the day and store it into an archive in your brain housing group. You wake up refreshed and ready to take on the day with fresh new ideas that can be gathered from your subconscious thoughts and possibly manifested into dreams. In short, make sure you take time off to rest and reflect.
