Current Padua Academy Junior Emily G. shares her thoughts about meditation:

This year I tried meditation for the first time. Although I’ve always been familiar with meditation, I had never really taken an interest in it until Mr. Shelton’s Physics class. After listening to his talks and participating in daily three-minute meditations I began to see a change in attitude in not just myself, but also my classmates. These three minutes set a tone for the rest of the class, and the classroom environment became clearly calmer. With a calmer environment, my classmates and I were able to maintain focus and have a better learning experience increasing our overall productivity. After noticing these changes, my curiosity grew and I realized that I wanted to find out more about what meditation is and what it does for the mind and body. I had a lot of questions, so when I saw that Mr. Shelton had a club for meditation, I decided to join. My friend Isabella E. and I told Mr. Shelton about our interests in the club and he gave us the opportunity to become co-leaders. I also brought my ideas and interests in meditation into my Junior research paper. My paper explained how meditation would be beneficial for students if implemented into classrooms nationwide. From writing this, I began to understand so much more about meditation. I learned more about its history and read about actual studies on its benefits. I soon concluded that the benefits of meditation outweigh any of the doubts, and implementing it into our lives would help our schools and society overall. (Read Emily’s research paper here) As a society, we definitely struggle with finding love within ourselves and within others, and I believe if more people meditated, society would become more peaceful and relationships would be stronger. I am excited to be involved with this club, to share my thoughts and experiences with others, and to learn even more about meditation. I hope to see the club grow, letting more people experience the benefits of meditation, and in the end, create positive changes in the community.