This year the pandemic spurs me to try out a meditation app - similar to the impetus to finally get Zwift software for cycling in my apartment.
Each and every day for the last 6 months I have devoted 10 minutes to guided meditation and while I am reluctant to say meditation apps will work for everyone, for me it is been highly worthwhile - I benefit from being prompted and reminded throughout the ten minute sessions (even though it is basically the same every day and I’ve largely memorized the basic steps).
I checked out the 7 day free trials on several of the most highly rated apps:
The Mindfulness App - Widest variety of meditations including a good body scan session and a fine coffee drinking meditation which definitely helped me savor my morning coffee
10% Happier - My favorite basic meditation and commentary on meditation.
Calm - True to its name, Calm has lots of soothing music and relaxing visuals and tranquilizing meditations to help facilitate falling asleep
Headspace - Ultimately I subscribed to Headspace because of its several sports specific sessions, particularly:
- The ten x 10-minute “Sports Performance pack” where the idea is to let go of thinking and tap into a feeling of flow. The meditation does help me focus a bit more on the moment during sports activities and gives me a mechanism to help shift away from negative thinking during hard sessions (like how tired I am and how much distance is left).
- The “Sports Recovery pack” has me envision beams of liquid sunlight melting away muscle tension and discomfort after training, and does leave me feeling better recovered from training sessions.
I'm not anticipating any direct improvement in my race times, but acquiring the meditation apps seems to have triggered a constructive daily habit and has been another silver lining of 2020.
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