My life can get kind of hectic sometimes, and I'm sure yours can too. That's one of the reasons why I like taking quick 5 minute meditation breaks throughout the day. It's a great way to recharge yourself midway through the day. Let's get into the five reasons why we should all be meditating.

For starters, it increases your mental clarity. Do you ever get that midday fuzziness in your mind? Find it hard to focus? Meditation can help you put an end to that. Doctors studying the brain using Electroencephalography (say that ten times fast) have discovered that during meditation, the brain's alpha and theta waves drop, while beta waves increase. This basically means that you're consciously choosing to relax and your brain is responding by also relaxing. This relaxation helps keep the brain focused throughout the day.

Meditation helps you keep emotional balance. Slowing down your mind gives you a chance to become a little more self-aware and acknowledge some of the feelings you're having. This is a great time to sort out things that might be bothering you. When you come out of your meditation, you may feel like you can take on whatever emotional challenges you had.

Meditation kicks stress right in the ass. You know what stresses me out? Stressful stuff. Stuff like work, paying bills, and balancing my life. But meditation doesn't just reduce mental stress, it reduces physical stress and can help lower your blood pressure. This again has to do with telling our brains to slow down. When this happens, our nervous system relaxes, our blood pressure drops, tightness loosens, and breathing becomes easier.

Meditating daily improves your emotional intelligence. This is different from keeping yourself emotionally balanced. Meditation helps us be emotionally intelligent, which means that you consciously choose to move to new emotional states with the understanding that our attitude plays a massive part in how successful we are. It's important to balance your emotions.

And lastly, meditation improves ease of neuroplasticity. Wait, what the hell is that? It's the most important benefit of the five. Basically, you're rewiring your brain to react more positively to live. You're teaching yourself to pick up on cues that allow you to grow and be congruent with others. And this will help you through the challenges of life.

I definitely hope this has inspired you to sit down for a peaceful meditation today. I know I will!

Credit: higherperspective.com