Meditation continues to show itself to be important in knowing and living comfortably with one's own life, body, companions and other. I have been keeping a Google Alert on the subject of "children meditation". I chose this particular subject because it is quite American to try to get into something valuable like meditation earlier rather than later, even if doing so may not be such a good idea. I don't really know whether it is or not but many people think it is. That number seems to be growing. Sitting still for 10 minutes or so, concentrating on one's breathing and return to that focus when the mind strays is a simple and inexpensive practice. Disease, disability, spiritual confusion, political oppression, emotional distress such as depression have all been shown to be more endurable when one practices meditation.
If a family has a practice or one of regular prayer, especially silent prayer, with or without spoken prayer, too, that practice will probably help both the adults and the children in the family if they are old enough. What sufficient age is, I don't know. That is just one of several questions that remains open. Like anything else, it almost certainly depends somewhat on whic individuals we are talking about.
Here is a link to my web page of the Google Alerts on the subject of "children [and] meditation". The 4th set of results just came in today and has been added to the bottom of the page.
