“Veganism gives us harmony,"
Aishling Dunne
During the lockdowns of covid many people were struggling with their mental health. Being stuck indoors, nothing to do, no one around, it becomes increasingly stressful and lonely. The use of apps like WhatsApp and Zoom, Microsoft Teams and more went through the roof as people tried to connect with each other in any way that they could. This led to people starting to focus inwards more, what could they do to better look after themselves, could they change their diet, start exercising, what about meditation?
Meditation
You can find more information about meditation our blog post Meditation - For Mental & Physical Health it talks about what meditation and different ways to do it. But, basically, meditation is a practice of getting the mind to focus on one thing and to leaves the distractions of the world and racing thoughts behind, just for a moment. Meditation is good, not just your mental health, but also your physical health. It reduces stress, lowers blood pressure and gives you a sense of calm and control that will stay with you throughout your day.
Quite often meditation is seen as something that is purely spiritual, some religious groups see it as secular, blasphemous or even sacrilegious. Meditation isn't any of those things and was previously seen as being a part of most religions. Even the bible talks about meditation, however, it is only a religious activity if practiced as part of a religion, meditation is not religious in and of itself.
The Purity of Veganism
One of this things that meditation can achieve, beyond creating a feeling of calm, is creating a bond between you and everything around you; you feel the energy of people, plants, animals, even machines. This feeling of oneness is synonymous with the feelings that that you can get from vegan living. When you eat healthy plant based food you feel the goodness and wholeness of the food going into your body, feeding you with nutrients and energy. There is a purity in this. Eating animals starts to seem like eating death and the pain and suffering that went with it. To an extent this is true, when animals experience stress their bodies release hormones and other chemicals, these hormones can remain in the animal's body even after death. Not only that, once an animal has been killed it's body begins to change, chemicals, cells, body parts, start to breakdown. This is why meat spoils quickly and has to be kept cold to slow the process down. Plants are quite different. Think of a carrot, you put it in the fridge, it gets covered up, you find it months later with leaves sprouting out of the top of it. It wasn't dead, it is still very much alive, potatoes are the same. You can plant a potato and grow a whole crop. Eating plants is eating life, it is energising and feels very pure. Meditation can also create that energy and purity along with a sense of peace and harmony.
Veganism and meditation are two separate things, they are not mutually exclusive and it is perfectly possible to get the benefits of meditation whilst still eating animal products. However, when you are vegan and you already have those feelings of connection, meditation can enhance this feeling. Meditation can give you a feeling of wholeness, of completing the circle as you start to connect what is inside of you with what is surrounding you.
If you want some more information on mediation check .our post Meditation - For Mental & Physical
and give it a try.
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