Today, I want to talk about something that is very interesting that is related to a product for meditation – the meditation balls. These days as the subject of meditation get more and more popular, you can see more meditation related products getting more available. You can very easily get some meditation balls online. Yet, availability of something often has very little to do with the effectively of it. Meditation is never an exact science so I am just going to share with you my take on whether using the meditation balls are good ways to meditate.
Long Walks & Doing Chores Can Be Your Way of Meditation
Before exploring very specifically whether the meditation balls are effective ways of meditation, let’s first revisit what meditation really are. As famously explained by the meditation master Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche, you can meditate anywhere. For example, when you are on the street, putting your focus on your breath and let yourself slow down for a couple of minutes is meditation. As he explained, what meditation does is that you are assigning a part time job to your “monkey mind” so they it is not doing full time jobs all the time and get a chance to rest and be more under control. For many people who don’t do the sit-down-and-close-eyes types of meditation, they can still achieve the same goal of clearing their mind by taking long walks and calmly doing chores.
One Common Component for All Types of Meditation is the “Focus”
No matter how you meditate, there is always some “part time job” you are assigning to your mind and that task you are assigning is sometimes referred to as the focus. For some people, they use a mantra as their focus. For some, they like to use the breath. For some probably more advanced meditators, they may like to use a single question, although I don’t really get good results myself using a single question as my focus because it is more like a “full time job” to me than a “part time job”.
Yes, You can User Meditation Balls for Meditation
Up to this point, I have explained that even taking long walks and doing chores can be meditation and the key is to have a focus which is the part time job that you can assign to your mind. So, to answer the question of “can I use the meditation balls to meditate”, the answer is obviously a “yes”. Moving the meditation balls gently in your hands is the type of part time jobs that you can assign to your mind that can hit the mind’s reset button. In my experience, I find myself most easily meditate with the mantra being the focus. I generally don’t do as well, meaning I can’t fall in the state of “half-sleeping” as easily, by focusing on my breath or on the meditation balls. There are obviously many people who like to use their breath as their focus, so it really is a situation of which tool suits you best by chance.
How to Use Meditation Balls?
There are different ways of using meditation balls to meditate. The two main ways that I will be talk about are categorized as “no training required” and “training required”. Let’s now go over the former category.
Gently Rolling the Meditation Balls on Your Palm with Your Finger
Think about meditating with the focus being a mantra or your breath. They are simply repeating pattern that can make yourself tired yet not too tired, basically a repeating, and tedious part time job to make yourself get inside the half-slept state. The key is the repeating and consistent rhythm. So, one way to use the meditation balls to meditate without much training is to basically hold the ball in your hand and gently rotating the ball with your fingers, at a consistent and relatively slow rhythm. You don’t necessarily have to close your eyes but I found it more effective when I do that with my eyes close.
With Practising, Roll the Meditation Balls Between Fingers
Although rolling the meditation balls between fingers is probably the more official ways to use the meditation balls, I found it too difficult to do and feel like it is more like playing tricks than actual meditating. I feel that the difficult that comes with smoothly move the ball between fingers way is way too high me to consider that as a part time job for my mind.
Can I replace the Meditation Balls with Tennis Balls?
Yes, you can certainly replace the meditation balls with tennis balls especially if you have big hands. I personally find the meditation balls feel better on hand. Yet, there is actually nothing magical about the meditation balls themselves. There is no reasons why you can’t use a tennis ball or a ping pong ball to meditate. As long as you can rotate them on your palm in rhythms, they can be your good tool for meditation.
Using Meditation Balls with Mantra & Breath
Can I use meditation balls along with your mantra or breath? In order words, can I have more than just one single focus? The simple answer is yes. Indeed, there are people that like to use their mantra with their breath at the same time. They find that “that part time job” has just the right intensity for the calming effect. You can actually sync the timing of you rotating your meditation balls with your mantra or your breath to make it more natural. Some people found this “two-focuses” approach more effective while I don’t myself. It’s like that some people may think that “doing chores” and “listening to music” do make them feel more relaxed. Some people think that doing both at the same time is too much to ask as a “part time job”.
In conclusion, the meditation balls do work as a meditation tool. Similar to the difference between the breath meditation and the mantra mediation, some people found one method makes them meditate better than another method. Yet, looking at the meditation balls conceptually, they do make a lot of sense for being a valid and effective meditation tool.