3 benefits of wearing a MeditationRing

“Brew for 2 minutes”, reads the tag on my tea bag. Deep, calming breaths. How long is two minutes? About 20 deep breaths? One inhale… one exhale… two inhale… two exhale… immediately the thoughts start drifting, dispersing, scattering all over the room. All the things that are happening, and the things that I need to do. My focus is lost, and the tea is not ready. So I try to wing it. Could it possibly be two minutes already? In the end, I dump the tea bag without knowing how long exactly I’ve brewed my tea, and I head over to my desk.

If this sounds too familiar, perhaps it’s because this is a shared reality among millions of people on this Earth today. We live fast, multi-tasking, trying to squeeze the most doing out of every little moment, but barely getting any being in. The need to slow down, to savor the moment in mindfulness, is real, and is common to us all.

Enter MeditationRings…

I must admit that when I first heard about the concept of MeditationRings, I was intrigued -- what did they mean by “Spin & Wish”? And how can a ring contribute to someone’s meditation habits?

As I would quickly find out, MeditationRings are not only beautiful pieces of jewelry, but they do fulfill a role by gathering your scattered attention around one single point of focus, and keeping it there for as long as you need to until a sense of calm, serenity and peace starts to grow within. The concept originates from the ancient Tibetan Prayer Wheels, whose turning has been said to be of immeasurable benefit for oneself and others, by helping the practitioner accumulate wisdom, increase good karma, and purify negative thoughts (paraphrasing from the MeditationRings website).

Here’s 3 ways in which I find MeditationRings to be beneficial and complimentary to my yoga practice:

Calm anxiety

In my opinion, anxiety could be considered the epidemic of our time. Our hectic lives involve much running around, completely stressed out, and very little sitting in silence with the Self. There’s too much projection, and barely any reflection. With a racing mind and a body that is in a continuous fight-or-flight response, small moments of calm and focus are immensely beneficial in giving us time to reset. Concentrating on the spinning motion of the ring takes our focus out of daily life worries and gives us a much needed breather when we need one.

Bring mindfulness into your day

Many of us like to claim we’re “too busy” to meditate. However, it is precisely those of us who need meditation the most! Like the Zen proverb goes: “If you don’t have time to meditate for 1 hour every day, you should meditate for 2”, there is always time. The question is not whether there is time, the question is, are we willing to allow ourselves to make that time and use it for meditation? Some may feel like they’d rather spent that time doing something, or that the time they spend on meditation is, somehow, wasted. Spinning your ring several times throughout the day is an amazing way to bring short meditations into your day and ease yourself into the habit of making time for being.

Remind you of your intentions

On my Instagram account, I very often speak about what I've come to call the godless state, to mean that state of unawareness that can easily swallow us up when we become too engulfed in the survival ratrace of modern life. This is a state where we wake up, get ready, go to work, come back home, and go back to sleep in an almost robotic manner, with very little time to reflect on what we are doing and why we are doing it. Such a lifestyle can easily take over and make us forget our goals or higher purpose. Wearing a piece of jewelry like a MeditationRing is a simple and yet powerful reminder of mindfulness and of our spiritual intentions.

Bonus pro tip: MeditationRings are amazing for kids too. They may help improve their focus, as well as calm and soothe anxious or negative thoughts. My 5 year old recently enjoyed playing with it in the bus and plain during our recent family trip to Hokkaido :)

Have you ever used a MeditationRing? Do you use any pieces of jewelry as part of your meditation, yoga, or other spiritual practices? Share your experience in the comments below!