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Both meditation and the ability to focus on something despite distraction are skills that improve with practice. (We can call the ability to focus on something - eg music - despite distraction, 'focussed relaxation'. I'll stick with that term for this post, okay?)
So if you have shots/blood draws coming up, or if you just want the health benefits of meditation/focussed relaxation, or if you just want to be able to do it on demand: practice.
Start in a quiet, 'safe' place. Like your bedroom - for most people, that's the quietest, emotionally safest place they have. Meditate with or without a mantra, concentrate on your breathing, whatever form of meditation suits you. Or listen to a piece of music (ideally one with no lyrics), and whenever your focus drifts away from the music, calmly bring it back.
Forgive yourself any failures: you're *learning*.
Once you can do this in the bedroom to a 10-minute piece of music (or if you're doing it in silence, until a pleasant alert informs you it's been ten minutes); try in a living space in your house, with distractions around.
I can power-meditate: I've done it in a nightclub (as in, an active one), and in a bowling alley on Saturday night. In both cases, I did it with friends around to guard me against genuine need for me to be alert: I don't recommend going into low-power standby like this alone, if you're not in a safe place.
But once you can do it in your home with your family around making noise and distractions, you'll find you can develop the skill to do a slightly lesser form of this on public transport or in other situations of annoyance: one where you maintain enough awareness to respond to situations which need response, but are otherwise consciously-unaware.
And you'll be able to sink into the deeper level despite situations like blood draws. I go into low-power standby when I'm getting a muscle manipulation done: it's painful, but I have a great deal of trust in my myotherapist (she's aces!), so I just use the pattern on the ceiling fan as a mandala and drift my conscious mind elsewhere.
Be aware that a small percentage of the population may not be able to meditate/focused relax at all, and that different people need different techniques. A - my best friend - has given meditation a damn good try, using a wide variety of techniques. Her brain is screwed up (schizoaffective is her diagnosis), so we've figured that she just has a brain that doesn't do it; and trying to meditate is like a one-armed man trying to hang wallpaper.
I, on the other hand, can do focussed relaxation, and can meditate to a mandala, a mantra, my breathing, a concept, a meditation tape... just about every technique that I've been introduced to. The one type I can't do is moving meditation, it hurts too f-ing much. (Moving meditation is - well, when walkers, joggers and runners get 'into the zone', where you're focussed entirely on your activity and all other thoughts drift away? You're meditating. You can get into that zone gardening, or cleaning, or in most physical activities, too. This does your mind the same sort of good that relaxed meditation does, but it doesn't give your muscles the down-time. OTOH, your muscles get a fine old workout.
)
So if you have shots/blood draws coming up, or if you just want the health benefits of meditation/focussed relaxation, or if you just want to be able to do it on demand: practice.
Start in a quiet, 'safe' place. Like your bedroom - for most people, that's the quietest, emotionally safest place they have. Meditate with or without a mantra, concentrate on your breathing, whatever form of meditation suits you. Or listen to a piece of music (ideally one with no lyrics), and whenever your focus drifts away from the music, calmly bring it back.
Forgive yourself any failures: you're *learning*.
Once you can do this in the bedroom to a 10-minute piece of music (or if you're doing it in silence, until a pleasant alert informs you it's been ten minutes); try in a living space in your house, with distractions around.
I can power-meditate: I've done it in a nightclub (as in, an active one), and in a bowling alley on Saturday night. In both cases, I did it with friends around to guard me against genuine need for me to be alert: I don't recommend going into low-power standby like this alone, if you're not in a safe place.
But once you can do it in your home with your family around making noise and distractions, you'll find you can develop the skill to do a slightly lesser form of this on public transport or in other situations of annoyance: one where you maintain enough awareness to respond to situations which need response, but are otherwise consciously-unaware.
And you'll be able to sink into the deeper level despite situations like blood draws. I go into low-power standby when I'm getting a muscle manipulation done: it's painful, but I have a great deal of trust in my myotherapist (she's aces!), so I just use the pattern on the ceiling fan as a mandala and drift my conscious mind elsewhere.
Be aware that a small percentage of the population may not be able to meditate/focused relax at all, and that different people need different techniques. A - my best friend - has given meditation a damn good try, using a wide variety of techniques. Her brain is screwed up (schizoaffective is her diagnosis), so we've figured that she just has a brain that doesn't do it; and trying to meditate is like a one-armed man trying to hang wallpaper.
I, on the other hand, can do focussed relaxation, and can meditate to a mandala, a mantra, my breathing, a concept, a meditation tape... just about every technique that I've been introduced to. The one type I can't do is moving meditation, it hurts too f-ing much. (Moving meditation is - well, when walkers, joggers and runners get 'into the zone', where you're focussed entirely on your activity and all other thoughts drift away? You're meditating. You can get into that zone gardening, or cleaning, or in most physical activities, too. This does your mind the same sort of good that relaxed meditation does, but it doesn't give your muscles the down-time. OTOH, your muscles get a fine old workout.
)
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