meditation for beginners

For T and anyone else who's interested in trying meditation:

Set aside about ten or fifteen minutes and find a comfortable place to sit.

How to sit -
You can sit indian style, lotus or in a chair. Whatever is most comfortable for you. You want to be relaxed but have pretty good posture so your breathing isn't impaired by slumping shoulders. If you're sitting on the floor, try to make sure that you are grounded with you butt on a cushion and both knees touching the floor.
Another thing to note when you're preparing to meditate is the position of your head. Try to keep your chin level. If you nod too much forward, you might become drowsy. Too far back (besides being kinda uncomfortable) your mind will be more inclined to race around.

The goal -
As a beginner, you really just want to practice calming your mind. There is a tendency to believe that we are our mind and if we stop thinking we will cease to 'be' in a way. When we take a few minutes to calm the mind down, we can pull back a little and see what it's doing. See where our thoughts take us. Instead of being 'in' our mind, we can pull back a little and observe it.
When we try to NOT think, we become aware of how busy our minds are and how little control we have over them. We can choose for the most part what we want it to focus on, but when we ask it to stop for a few minutes and be still, we can see how active it is without our choice.
The important thing to remember is not to get hung up on clearing your mind completely. That will happen after a while of practice (so I've heard :) For now, you want to see what your mind is doing, accept the thoughts that come up but don't follow them. Don't investigate or let them bloom in your mind. Just acknowledge them and let them pass.

Tips-
If you have a super busy mind, giving it something to focus on can allow the rest of you and it to relax. Focusing on your breath is a great one. Just feel the breath coming in your nose and going out your nose. This is a great way to calm the body as well. Often our mind races ahead of us and we become a little ungrounded. Meditating on the breath bridges the mind and the body and can help you feel more centered.

Too stressed to sit down? -
If you get frustrated with sitting meditation, you might try walking meditation. This is the one type of meditation that always calms me down when I'm stressed out. Just choose a path, around a room or between two and walk very slowly. Pay attention to each foot as you lift it and place it back on the floor. Having your mind pay attention to your body and the sensation of your feet on the ground can really help bring you out of your thoughts and into your body.

You can create a ritual and specific place to meditate, or you can do it whenever you are sitting with nothing to do. A friend of mine sometimes meditates on the train during her daily commute. I've meditated during terrible movies.

The main point is to calm the mind. You want to limit distractions as much as you can, but remember that when you do get distracted, just bring your attention back to your breath.

Hope that helps!