The First Month or So
Meditation has been shown to have important health benefits. It can also lead one to experience profound altered states of consciousness, without drugs, for a fuller spiritual experience. Getting started in meditation is simple.
Find a comfortable place and sit or lie down. The most important thing is to be comfortable. Let your entire body relax. Feel like you are sinking into your bed, couch, mat, or chair. Now take a deep cleansing breath. You may close your eyes or leave them open as you wish, but if you leave them open pick an object in the room to focus on. Begin taking slow, even breaths, and take a few to establish a rhythm. Now begin counting breaths. Inhale, exhale, one. Inhale, exhale, two. Inhale, exhale, three. Inhale, exhale, four. Now begin at one again: Inhale, exhale, one, and begin the cycle anew. Try to clear your mind of all thoughts except for the breath count.
Your mind is almost certainly going to wander. That's okay. When you find your mind wandering gently return your focus to counting breaths. Don't be bothered when your mind wanders. Don't berate yourself when your mind wanders. Just try to keep that gentle focus on counting breaths. It is this work that is good for you.
You may fall asleep. This is a good thing; it means you are achieving a profound level of relaxation. When you wake up you can continue meditating, or you can wait until your next session. Do whatever feels right.
Try to do this for twenty minutes a day, four or five times a week. Keep it simple at first, the simpler the better.
The Second Month or So
Hopefully you have been able to establish a meditation routine, and incorporate it into your life. If you enter the second month of your routine you are doing extraordinarily well. The benefits may or may not have become apparent by now. If the benefits seem minimal or nonexistent, I would urge you not to give up. If you make it into your second month your body may have found benefits your mind isn't fully aware of yet. Or is it the other way around?
At this point you may want to consider extending your sessions to thirty minutes a day. Alternately, you may want to add a second twenty minute session each day. Do what works best for you.
The Third Month or So
Congratulations! You are well on the way in your spiritual journey. At this point you may want to mix it up a little. There are a number of focuses for meditation besides counting breaths, and you may want to experiment. Other potential focuses are bodily movements, such as Tai Chi or Yoga, visualizations, music, and even sexual feelings. There are a few meditation traditions based on sexual feelings, I practice one I developed myself, and these are known to create especially powerful altered states of consciousness. The possibilities for mental visualizations are virtually endless, and some have their own traditions. Music is the most spiritual and mystical of all art forms, and any genre can be used in meditation.
I know your days are busy, even hectic, but you may want to consider two thirty minute sessions per day. An hour of "me" time doesn't seem like too much to ask of the universe. Perhaps meditation has helped you realize some of the "important" things in your life are trivial and can be abandoned.
The Rest of Your Life
Unfortunately, many meditation traditions have acquired a thick veneer of ritual and dogma. I've eschewed that here and tried to give you a simple, extensible system you can adapt to your own needs throughout your life. Remember to always relax your body, maintain even breathing, and gently, GENTLY, focus on whatever the center of your meditation is. Feel free to pursue what works for YOU, and don't let anyone tell you you are doing it wrong. Meditation is, and should be, intensely personal. The ritual and dogma of others has no place here.