Site contents:Meditation for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome
There are many methods and types of meditation. I'll describe a basic form which you can adapt however you like, and then follow with a yogic breathing exercise and a simple exercise where you simply lie motionless. All can help with both the physical and mental/emotional sides of ME/CFS.
Basic Meditation for M.E/Chronic Fatigue
There are many different forms of meditation which come variously from Tai-Chi, Yoga and Buddhism. It's interesting how different these techniques are, with very different emphasis in the many schools of Buddhism. For example in Tibetan Buddhism they sometimes use complicated visualisations. In Japanese Zen Buddhism by contrast the aim is just pure and perfect concentration on the present moment - which leads to the understandable accusation that Zen is really more a discipline than a real religion. Some people are wary of meditation, feeling it is akin to praying and would therefore conflict with their own religion or for atheists that it is involving them in organised religion by the back door. That is for you to decide, but I know of at least one devout Christian who's a keen practicioner of Zen meditation and does not believe such practice conflicts with her belief in any way.
Meditation is just an exercise for the mind. It does not involve converting to anything, and neither am I advocating that you should live in a Thai forest monastery for the next 20 years. I practice meditation in different forms because it helps me to stay in control of what would otherwise be a restless mind. Because our thoughts control our bodies this gives many benefits, both mentally and physically. Of course there are so many different types of meditation I would hesitate ever to say that there is one correct method - rather there are a number of common principles to follow, and that is how I will approach this desription.
Meditation with Chronic Fatigue is a balancing act
Meditation is a curious balancing act between trying to do something and stepping back and observing it happen. Your intention should be to concentrate fully on what you are doing at that moment, ie sitting in a relaxed posture and breathing, without forcing yourself to concentrate which will introduce frustration, tension and physical and mental strain.
Posture and Meditation
Meditate in a quiet room with the lights fairly low, but not in total darkness, or you'll probably just feel sleepy, especially with Chronic Fatigue.
If using a chair use one without arms, and sit with your knees no higher than the hip level, (as for seated Qi-Qong exercises) as this will help to keep your back straight, which in turn will help keep you relaxed but alert. You can either rest your palms face down on your upper legs, or cup one hand inside the other, fingers resting on top of each other forming a bowl shape with the thumbs lightly resting against each other. Rest your wrists on the upper legs a few inches in front of the waist. For men the left hand is on top, for women the right - this is considered important in Tai Chi.
If sitting on the floor, use a folded pillow or other cushions so that you can get your knees stable on the ground and your back straight without straining, either just crossing your legs, or doing a full or a half lotus. It will take some practice and experimentation to work out what is most comfortable. With the hands either cup them in front of the waist or joining the thumbs and index fingers of either hand, place the backs of the hands on the knees. Adjust any of these instructions as you see fit to get comfortable.
Your eyes should look slightly down and in front, and check there is nothing distracting in front of you (a tv for example!). A plain wall is ideal. You'll probably want a clock or watch within sight so you can check the time without changing your posture, although don't put it directly in front of you or you'll just be clock watching.
What to meditate on
The most simple form of meditation is just to concentrate on where you are at that place and moment in time - the 'here and now'. Whenever you catch your mind wandering off, just return to noticing the sounds in and outside of the room, the feel of the cushion or the chair, the wall in front of you, the air passing around you and in and out of your lungs. This may sound easy but the more meditation you do the more you realise how much is going on in your mind when you think you're completely inactive.
The mind is full of words, pictures, music, feelings, memories, half thoughts starting to form, whole thoughts and other places where your body is climbing a mountain, driving a car or running for a bus. None of this is particularly helpful, but it is the way the human mind works, so there's no point getting annoyed about it. Just observe it, but equally you don't want to encourage it. Just go back to relaxing the body, noticing your surroundings and your slow steady breathing.
The practice of meditation can also be re-assuring if you find your mind full of negative thoughts about yourself or your place in the world. Gradually they lessen and you can see they don't represent reality, they don't even represent the view the world has of you - they are just a habitual dialogue that goes on in your head, making you feel worse about yourself. So let them go. If you are worried about what life without such negative thoughts is like - don't worry. Sure as eggs is eggs negative thoughts will come back! So see Meditation as a short holiday that helps you put it in perspective and realise that you don't have to be ruled by such thoughts. Although not about meditation I greatly reccomend Susan Jeffer's excellent book about positive thinking, 'Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway' if you can't stop harranguing yourself.
As a student I used to get annoyed with my lack of concentration and when I told my tutor I found my attention drifting off she said, 'but that's good isn't it? Most of the time people don't notice!.' The mind can be like a stuck record. So in a way if you are constantly having to re-focus your mind, don't get annoyed and frustrated - it shows you are concentrating!
Look, listen or feel your meditation?
According to NLP (Neuro Linguistic programming) people respond differently to a visual, an auditory or a sensory stimulus depending on their personality type. It all depends on which sense dominates your thoughts. So do you think using pictures, words and sounds, or feelings? I am fairly hopeless at drawing because I can't hold a picture in my mind for long, but find language and music comes relatively easy, so when I meditate I avoid visualisations, as I would only be giving my mind unnecessary work.
So for you visually oriented people you can picture clean white light, or blue or green (good healthy colours) entering your lungs and filling up the whole body as you breathe in. Then as you breathe out, think of gray or brown light being carried out of the body disposing of the toxins as you expel the air. Or maintain a picture of the body as full of white blue or green light throughout. Or you could see white light collecting in the Dan Tien (accupoint just below the navel).
Auditory people can listen to the rush of the air going in and out of the lungs. Use a word or two to occupy the mind as you observe your in and out breath - 'rising' as you breathe in, 'falling' as you breathe out. Yogis use the word 'OM' which may sound silly but there's good reason for it. As you breathe out that syllable generates resonance and massages the lungs, from their base with the deep 'OOO', to the chest as you begin the 'MMM' to the top of the lungs and throat and mouth as you finish the 'mmm'. You can do this all the way through a meditation, out loud, whispered or in your head.
Sensory oriented people can concentrate on the feeling of the air passing through the nose, the sinuses, down the windpipe and into the lungs. Or on the feeling of the body subtly expanding and contracting with the breath, and the points of contact with the floor or cushion. Also notice any spots of tension in the body and relax these muscles while maintaining a good posture.
For all types of people a good way to start can be to simply count the breath. Each time you breathe in add one to the count, and either say the number to yourself mentally, or visualise it. Aim to count to ten breaths and then start again, (or go from 10 to 1 if you prefer), but reset the count to one again if you mind wanders off the here and now. If you're honest with yourself it is suprisingly difficult to get to 10, and I may only manage it once or twice in a twenty minute meditation. Don't get annoyed if you don't make it. It's not really about counting to ten - that would be a pointless exercise. It is just a way of directing your mind to what you are doing at that moment in time.
You will probably find a combination of methods works best for you. I usually count for around the first five minutes of a meditation, while noticing my posture and trying to keep the muscles relaxed. Then I'll switch to just placing my concentration in Dan Tien and letting the energy gather there for the remainder.
You'll notice I haven't given any particular directions about how to breathe. Aside from getting into a comfortable and relaxed posture so that you breathe slowly and down into your abdomen, there isn't much more to say about breathing. It is something you're body is doing naturally anyway and so too much concentration on controlling the breath conciously can be counter-productive. The main point is remembering to relax the belly area so the diaphragm can sink. The belly will go out during inhalation, and be pulled in as your diaphragm compresses the lungs during exhalation. To further encourage relaxation around the diaphragm, you can pause for a second or two at the end of each exhalation and let the belly relax and go outwards before breathing in again.
How long and how often to meditate
As for duration, little and often tends to be the rule. Five minutes is fine to begin with and I would think anything beyond about 40 minutes is unecessary, especially with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome where long periods of concentration will be difficult. However, be aware of what you're subconcious is telling you as it is easy to over do it. When I first started meditating I would sit for 50 minutes at a time, three or four days running, thinking I was achieving great things. But then I just wouldn't practice for a couple of weeks. My meditation teacher pointed out I was trying to do too much and my subconcious was intervening by finding other things for me to do instead. By cutting the duration down to 15 minutes I soon got into a daily habit which lasted for months.
Now I tend to meditate on an 'as needed' basis, probably once or twice a week only, 20 minutes each time. Once you've got into the habit it is nice to know you have some degree of control over the anxiety in ME/CFS. However it is unlikely to fully deal with anxiety, which has a profound physical cause - an exhausted nervous system. For the first six months of my ME/CFS I refused my doctor's offer of Cipramil (an SSRI anti-depressant for anxiety) and tried to use meditation to control my anxiety. This worked partialy, but it was quite a relief when I started the Cipramil and was able to use the meditation at the same time.
On the next page I describe some breathing exercises which go well with meditation.
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