chanting – Grow Mindfulness

Tina Turner’s Approach to Mindfulness

Allyson Pimentel, psychologist and meditation practitioner/teacher, fittingly provides a meditation podcast titled, The Mindfulness Teachings of Tina Turner. Allyson describes mindfulness as “a way of attending to your life as it unfolds” while bringing to this awareness an attitude of “openness, friendliness, and kindness” without judgment. Associated with this, is a willingness “to be with things as they are”.

She maintains that the goal in practising meditation is not to master the art of meditation itself but to lead better lives day-to-day though our groundedness, compassion and wisdom. We do this so that we can become “a force for good” in our family, in our work, in our community and in our daily interactions. Allyson maintains that Tina Turner, who died at the age of 83 in May 2023, exemplified this broader goal and drew on mindfulness practices to be a positive influence in people’s lives. Allyson viewed Tina as a personal hero who, in her view, embodied kindness, love, wisdom, resilience and creative talent.

Tina’s approach to personal transformation

In her book, Happiness Becomes You: A Guide to Changing Your Life for Good, Tina explains her Buddhist approach and how she turned her life around after multiple “lifequakes” that threatened to derail her singing career and harm her mental wellbeing. She explains in-depth that chanting enabled her to overcome adversity, develop resilience and realise happiness in her life. Her ability to commune with nature from an early age enabled her to find her true home within, despite the turbulence and torment of her outer world. Besides the vibrational energy and groundedness of chanting, Tina drew on the teachings of Nichiren Buddhism to transform and reframe her life.

Tina explains that this Buddhist approach, that places emphasis on engagement and social activism helped her to move beyond her comfort zone, to appreciate the connectedness of everything, to value diversity in nature and cultures and participate actively in the Beyond Music Project designed to use music as a way to respect and celebrate cultural diversity.

Tina saw experiencing adversity as a way to shape ourselves and build our resilience – in her words, adversity is not a bad thing in itself, it is how we use it that really matters. She contended that adversity could build character, self-awareness, insight and a stronger sense of connection. This perception aligns with the tenets of mindfulness that reinforce the view that while we have little in our life that we can control, we can control our response to what happens to us as well as around us. Mitra Manesh in her podcast on responsibility contends that mindfulness builds our ability to respond to adversity and setbacks – she describes this outcome of mindfulness practice as developing our “response-ability”.

Tina explained in her book that all of life shapes us – the good, the bad and the ugly. We become our transformed selves through the richness and diversity of our life experiences and by developing a constructive, creative and energetic response to whatever occurs. She maintained in her eighties that she had no regrets – she had lived her life to the full, positively impacted numerous people all over the world and experienced deep happiness.

Reflection

Tina demonstrated in her life, music and her writing that as we grow in mindfulness we can overcome adversity, develop resilience, enrich our creativity and build the courage and sense of connectedness to take compassionate action. Her life and music provide an invaluable legacy and a “ripple effect” that has the power to inspire others to work to create a better world.

In her guided meditation podcast, Allyson draws on Tina’s core teachings to help us explore our connection with nature, the influence of our ancestors, our own legacy, and our present moment awareness.

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By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group, and the resources to support the blog.

How to Sustain the Practice of Meditation

Marvin Belzer, Assistant Director of MARC, UCLA, in a recent guided meditation podcast provides some insights into what is required to sustain the practice of meditation. He suggests, for example, that “willingness” is the essence of sustainability in relation to meditation. We have to be willing to give it a go, be patient to stay with the process and avoid any attempt or pressure to achieve perfection. Some of his insights for sustainability, after 30 years of his own mindfulness practice, include the following.

Choose an anchor that is natural and comfortable for you

It is really important to choose an anchor that is easy for you and assists you to sustain the effort needed for meditation. An anchor helps you to focus your attention, sustain the focus and serves as a point of return when you experience distractions. The more common anchors are sounds (within your room or external), bodily sensations and your breath. With sounds, it is important to just tune into what is happening around you but not attempt to identify the sounds (or source) or evaluate them in terms of pleasant/unpleasant, soft/loud or any other evaluation criteria. The essence of sound as an effective anchor is the process of “tuning in”. A focus on bodily sensations can be achieved through a body scan or a simple focus on a particular area of your body. With your breath as an anchor, it helps to focus on where you experience the process of breathing, e.g., abdomen, nose or chest. You are not attempting to control your breath but just to pay attention to the “in-breath”, the “out-breath” and the space between. I find that a focus on breathing is easier for me than sounds because I find the latter distracting if I am inside a room. However, if I am outside, I find it easier to focus on the sounds of birds, both those that are nearby and those further away. It is important to be aware of the need to choose a “trauma-sensitive” anchor if a particular anchor elicits a trauma response (a rare occurrence, but a reality for some people).

Keep it simple

Marvin emphasises the simplicity of meditation. You do not have to “perform” or achieve “mastery” to gain the benefits of meditation practice. It does not involve a process of ongoing measurement or evaluation against some yardstick. There will be days when meditation will feel easy and natural and other days when it is difficult because of what is going on in your life at the time and your level of health/wellness. The amount of time you have available for meditation can also impact your experience of it.

Choose a meditation practice suited to you and your available time

You do not have to master all possible forms of meditation (which are numerous). For sustainability, it is important that you try to focus on a particular form of meditation that suits you and your lifestyle. Some people like to sit quietly in their home, others like to meditate externally in nature, while others like an active meditation process such as movement meditation. Some people prefer to employ meditation within a yoga framework. I find that Tai Chi is the form of meditation that I can practise more regularly because I have spent a lot of my life in activities such as playing tennis, bike riding, competitive athletics and walking. Some people find that mantra meditations or chanting suits them best and their situation. Tina Turner, for example, found that chanting a particular mantra enabled her to achieve balance in times of adversity, which were sometimes extreme such as being an abusive relationship.

Remind yourself of the benefits that accrue as you meditate

Recalling the benefits of meditation practice provides positive reinforcement for your practice and helps you to sustain the effort. Invariably, you can experience calmness, equanimity and clarity if you persist. However, there may be particular benefits that you experience that are personal to you, e.g., reduction in difficult emotions, better stress management or ease in daily life. I find that Tai Chi helps me to play tennis better because it improves my reflexes, coordination, concentration and flexibility. The flow-over benefits of Tai Chi for my tennis performance (and enjoyment of social tennis) are a source of reinforcement for my mindfulness practice.

Reflection

Marvin reinforces the need to not be discouraged when you experience distractions such as planning thinking or strong emotions. It is natural, no matter how experienced you are, to find distractions intruding into your meditation practice. You can acknowledge the distracting thought or planning process and return to your focus. I find that planning my day is a major source of distraction for me during meditation but recognising this, I have adopted the practice of just naming what is happening and returning to my anchor. Marvin suggests that with emotions you experience during meditation, you can just notice what they are like and how you experience them in your body, e.g. anxiety might be experienced as tightness in your chest or stomach. After tuning in to the emotion and its bodily manifestation, he encourages you to return to your anchor. The very act of continually returning to your anchor after a distraction serves to build your awareness muscle and your capacity to sustain concentration. As we grow in mindfulness through sustained meditation practice, we will experience an ever-widening range of benefits that will serve, in turn, to reinforce our practice.

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By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group, and the resources to support the blog.

Healing Trauma – Dealing with the Visceral Imprint

In a previous post I discussed the complexity of trauma and the need to adopt treatment practices that recognise and respect this complexity. Bessel van der Kolk in his book, The Body Keeps the Score: Mind, brain and body in the transformation of trauma, expresses serious concern with the overreliance on medication to treat trauma, especially for returning veterans suffering from PTSD. He contends that “drugs cannot cure trauma” but only serve to “dampen down” manifestations of a “disturbed physiology” such as violence, overwhelm and uncontrolled anger. He argues that the side effects of reliance on drug therapy include addiction, lessening the capacity for self-regulation and blocking the senses that otherwise would be the source of pleasure and motivation, emotion and pain. In his view, the treatment aim is not to “blunt emotional sensitivity” but to achieve integration of the traumatic experience into a person’s “arc of life”.

Bessel argues that a traumatised person’s basic challenge in recovery is to re-establish ownership of themselves – the whole person, mind, body and soul. He contends that this plays out as a fourfold challenge – (1) developing ways to become focused and calm, (2) sustaining calmness when confronted with stimuli such as noise, images and smells that otherwise would trigger a traumatised response, (3) becoming fully engaged with life and relationships and (4) being open to one’s real self without hiding behind “secrets” that are designed as self-protection (e.g. against shame and self-loathing). Bessel suggests that the effectiveness of each of the four approaches can vary with the individual and the stage of the healing process. He illustrates through case studies that the healing journey can be a life-long process with occasional or frequent relapses.

Bessel maintains that, in the long run, confronting the traumatic event(s) in all their horror is necessary for healing. However, he cautions about rushing this process without first building a person’s capacity to cope with the fullness of the “visceral imprint” and its related sensitivities (e.g. to specific sounds, smells, thoughts). Confronting the harsh reality of the precipitating event(s) too soon, when the person is ill-equipped, can lead to an individual being re-traumatised.

Bessel contends that the focus of recovery has to switch from the “rational brain” to the “emotional brain” which manifests trauma in the form of physical sensations impacting the heart, breathing, voice, gut and movement of the body (e.g. resulting in bodily movements “that signify collapse, rigidity, rage or defensiveness”.) The overall aim is to restore the “the balance between the rational brain and the emotional brain”, because in a traumatised person the rational brain is often overwhelmed by the emotional brain that can “see” danger where it does not exist and inappropriately activates a fight, flight or freeze response

Healing modalities for trauma that recognise the mind-body-emotion connection

Throughout his book, Bessel discusses a range of trauma healing modalities that he has researched and practiced with his clients. His approach is quite eclectic, drawing on both Western and Eastern healing traditions. He demonstrates through case histories that one modality more than another, or a particular mix of modalities, may prove effective in individual cases. He appears to adopt a trial-and-error approach to achieve the best fit for a traumatised individual, informed in part by their life skills and the precipitating trauma event. Some of the healing modalities he adopts are identified below:

Controlled breathing – here he encourages slow, deep breathing that that tap into the parasympathetic nervous system and its capacity to reduce arousal and induce calm. Breathing also serves to enhance oxygen flow to energise the body.
Movement modalities – these can include Tai Chi, yoga, martial arts and the rhythmic movement associated with African drumming. Bessel notes that each of these modalities simultaneously involve not only movement but also breathing and meditation.
Mindfulness practices – Bessel points out that traumatised people often avoid their challenging feelings and related bodily sensations. Mindfulness which generates self-awareness enables the traumatised person to notice their feelings and sensations and the precipitating triggers. This can lead to emotional regulation, rather than emotional overwhelm which can occur when people try to ignore or hide their real feelings and sensations. Peter Levine’s “somatic experiencing” approach is an example of a related mindfulness practice that can contribute to healing trauma.
Singing – can engage the whole person (body, mind, soul and emotions). Effective singing requires appropriate posture and breath control, opening up the airways and, at the same time, releasing emotions. In group sessions with singing teacher, Chris James, I have often observed the spontaneous flow of emotions as people, both men and women, become more engaged and absorbed in the process, learn to let themselves go and find their “natural voice”. Chris maintains that singing enhances “vibrational awareness”, engenders “self-discovery” and builds “conscious presence”.
Chanting and mantra meditations – chanting can reduce depression, increase positivity and heighten relaxation. It has been proven to be effective in helping veterans suffering from PTSD. Tina Turner found Buddhist chanting to be very effective in overcoming her trauma and re-building her singing career. Likewise, mantra meditations (that typically incorporate chants) can lead to calm, peace and energy and enable reintegration of body, mind, emotion and spirit.

Reflection

Bessel encourages the use of multiple healing modalities when working with traumatised individuals. He suggests too that the modalities described above can help anyone deal with life’s challenges, restore balance and build energy. As we grow in mindfulness through meditation and related mindfulness practices, we can gain self-awareness, develop self-management and heal from trauma and the scars of adverse experiences, whether in childhood or adulthood.

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By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group, and the resources to support the blog.

Anxiety Management with Mindfulness

Diana Winston offers a mindfulness meditation podcast, Working with Anxiety, as one of the weekly meditations conducted by the Mindful Awareness Research Center (MARC), UCLA. As Director of Mindfulness Education for MARC, Diana frequently leads these weekly meditations. She stresses that mindfulness enables us to be more fully in the present moment and to accept what is in our life (including anxiety) with curiosity and openness.

Diana maintains that mindfulness helps us to work effectively with anxiety because it, (1) enables us to be present in the moment, rather than absorbed in the past or the future; (2) facilitates reframing of our experience, and (3) provides a place of rest and ease from the turbulence and waves of daily life. As Diana asserts, anxiety is part and parcel of daily life, given the human condition and the uncertainty of the world around us today. The world situation with the global pandemic and devastating conflict between Russia and Ukraine add to anxiety-producing situations we experience on the home and local front. In consequence, there is an increase in mental health issues along with restricted resources to deal with explosive demand.

Guided meditation for working with anxiety

Diana’s approach is consistent with trauma-sensitive mindfulness in that she allows a choice of posture, meditation anchor and overall focus. She encourages us to find a posture that is comfortable with eyes closed or open (ideally, looking down). At the beginning of the meditation, she has us focus on something that gives us a sense of being grounded and supported by something of strength, e.g. our feet on the ground/floor or back against the chair. It is important to tap into something that enables us to slow our minds and calm our feelings

Diana then suggests that we focus on our breath as a neutral experience of the present moment. For some people, breath may not be a neutral aspect and could in fact trigger a trauma response. So, she offers an alternative focus such as sounds in the environment, the room tone or rhythm in some music. Whatever we choose as an anchor, we can return to it whenever we notice our thoughts distracting us and leading to anxiety-producing images, recollections or anticipations.

The next stage of the guided meditation involves focus on some source of anxiety and exploring the bodily sensations associated with it. Diana suggests that if we are new to meditation we should focus on a minor source of anxiety rather than a major issue. Whatever our focal anxiety source, the idea is to notice what is happening in our body, e.g. tightness around our neck and shoulders, quickening or unevenness of our breath or pain in our back. By bringing our consciousness to these bodily sensations, we can work to release the tension involved and restore some level of equanimity.

Diana suggests that at any stage we could use imagery as a way to achieve an anchor that gives us strength and/or a sense of peace. The image could be of a tall mountain withstanding the buffeting of strong winds and rain or a still lake reflecting surrounding trees and supporting the smooth gliding of swans or ducks. Imagery can take us out of our anxiety-producing imagination and transport us to a place of strength and/or peace.

In the final stage of the meditation, Diana encourages us to offer ourselves loving-kindness, acknowledging that we are only human after all and that the world is anxiety-producing. She urges us to extend positive thoughts towards ourselves, rather then beat ourselves up for our fragility. We could focus on times when we have demonstrated resilience to overcome difficulties, extended compassionate action to those in need or expressed gratitude for all that we have.

Reflection

There are many tools to help us work with, and manage, anxiety. These include chanting and/or mantra meditations such as the calming mantra produced by Lulu & Mischka, Stillness in Motion – Sailing and Singing with whales. As we grow in mindfulness through meditation, chanting, mantras or other mindfulness practices, we can learn to be more fully present in the moment, to manage our anxiety-producing thoughts, regulate our emotions and find the peace and ease that lie within.

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By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group, and the resources to support the blog.

Managing Fear and Anxiety through Mindfulness Meditation

Diana Winston, Director of the Mindfulness Education Division in UCLA, provides a guided meditation podcast on the use of mindfulness to manage fear and anxiety. She suggests that our fears can be real (e.g. a physical threat) or imagined (e.g. anxiety about some perceived future scenario which may never happen). Fear is focused on perceptions about the present moment whereas anxiety tends to be longer term and related to imagined adverse futures in whatever form they may take.

We can be fearful about the risk of contracting the Coronavirus, COVID19, and experiencing the associated debilitating effects of this pandemic. We might also be putting off our meaningful work because of unfounded rationalisations about what might go wrong. We might have found that a generalised state of anxiety has disabled us and that our fear response has blocked us from our creativity and capacity to perform at a competent level. Our fear response can be manifested behaviourally as fight, flight or freeze.

In the guided meditation, Diana offers a four stage meditation process to address whatever form our fear or anxiety takes. She maintains that a mindfulness approach can not only increase self-awareness and regulation of our emotions but also enable us to restore our centredness and strengthen our wellbeing and the associated ease.

The four-stage approach to managing fear and anxiety through mindfulness meditation

Diana’s four stage approach incorporates becoming physically grounded, exploring what is happening in the moment, accessing the “wisdom mind” and extending loving kindness towards yourself. The processes in each of the four stages can be summarised as follows:

Stage 1 – This involves establishing a sense of physical groundedness by feeling your feet on the floor and experiencing the solidity, physical support and stability beneath you. The associated feelings can be strengthened by picturing the solid earth beneath, no matter how much your are above ground level at the time of the meditation. ‘

Stage 2 – Here you are encouraged to face the fear in its various manifestations – bodily sensations, racing mind and unsettling feelings. The core question is, What does fear feel like? Do you experience increase heart rate, sweating, headache or a “clenched stomach”. What thoughts are generating your fear and/or anxiety and what negative thoughts and worldview are you adopting? What is happening for you emotionally, e.g. crying, withdrawing, being angry and/or aggressive or experiencing inertia?

Stage 3 – Once you achieve a degree of calmness, you can seek to access your “wisdom mind” which deserts you when you are in turmoil. Mindfulness can provide a pathway to wisdom and open the door to our intuition and creativity. Sharon Salzberg maintains that meditation can stimulate our innate wisdom through recognition of agency, appreciating moments of joy and richness, identifying boundaries of control, strengthening our sense of connectedness (replacing a sense of aloneness) and assisting us to deal effectively with difficult thoughts and emotions.

Stage 4 – Here you are encouraged to tap into loving kindness towards yourself – providing understanding, a non-judgmental stance and reassurance. You can extend towards yourself the same thoughtfulness, forgiveness and generosity that you show towards others in need.

Reflection

If we are anxious, we may need to explore a range of regular practices to restore balance in our life. Judson Brewer, in his book Unwinding Anxiety, maintains that mindfulness does not stop anxious thoughts or change them but “changes our relationship to those thoughts and emotions”. He offers a “mindfulness personality quiz” to help you identify your behavioural patterns and provides ways to “train your brain to heal your mind”.

Meditation and other mindfulness practices such as chanting help us to reframe our life and overcome adversity by developing insight and resilience. As we grow in mindfulness, we can deepen our self-awareness, regain control over our thoughts and emotions and build the resilience required to live in these challenging times.

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By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group, and the resources to support the blog.

Finding Your Life Purpose

In his book, The Human Quest for Meaning, Paul Wong maintains that finding a unique purpose that transcends yourself and realises your full potential as one of the pillars of a meaningful life. Identifying and pursuing your life purpose is a key ingredient to experiencing happiness in your life. People often experience dissatisfaction and unhappiness if they are not able to use their core skills, knowledge, and experience in the pursuit of something that is meaningful and transcends themselves. Each of us is attempting to create a meaningful story for our life that is not constrained by limiting, negative self-talk.

There are many pathways to identifying and pursuing your life purpose and each of us has to find our own path. For some, the catalyst for finding their life purpose is a life crisis experienced by themselves, e.g., a life-threatening illness or major job loss; for others, the catalyst can be observing others experiencing extreme or destitute conditions. Some people consciously pursue their life purpose through meditation and mindfulness practices and find the strength and sensitivity to pursue their life purpose.

Discovering and pursuing life purpose through nature

Ruth Allen, author of Grounded: How Connection with Nature can Improve Our Mental and Physical Wellbeing, tells the story of how she was totally absorbed by nature as a child and loved being amongst trees and wildlife. Motivated by this love of nature, she decided to complete a degree in geology and undertake related PhD research. However, she found that she ended up further and further away from nature as she pursued her research and work in a laboratory studying tiny samples through a microscope.

Ruth lost the sense of the expansiveness and the interconnectedness of nature and her own connection with it. She decided that to identify her true purpose in life, she had to get back into nature which she did over a number of years in forests and the wild. She had lost her way and sought to rebalance her life through her immersion in nature. She eventually discovered her life purpose as a counsellor and eco-psychotherapist helping other people to regain balance in their life through connection with nature. She is able to use eco-therapies in her outdoor practice and to motivate others to connect to nature through her speaking, writing and adventure modelling.

Discovering and pursuing life purpose through meditation and chanting

Tina Turner tells the story of how she overcame the various traumas in her life through meditation and chanting. She felt totally disillusioned with life and distressed by her abusive relationship. By persistent, daily practice of Buddhist meditation and chanting, she was able to find the energy, insight, and courage to pursue her life purpose as a singer who moved people and a social activist through her work as co-founder and contributor to the Beyond Music Project which seeks to develop connectedness and unity through the celebration of cultural diversity. Despite her adversity, she was able to develop resilience and happiness in pursuit of a meaningful and rewarding life.

Motivated to a life of compassionate action after observing the desperate plight of other people

There are numerous instances where people have discovered their life purpose by observing the destitution, desperation, or debilitating life of others. Here are some examples:

Nicolle Edwards and husband Gareth set up the domestic violence support service RizeUp Australia when they observed the plight of women fleeing domestic violence with their children. Their focus is on providing the set-up requirements for emergency housing and they have established the charity to gather donations (money and furniture) to support their work in helping domestic violence victims transition into a different housing environment. They have been surprised by the level of support that they have been able to muster through unified action in pursuit of what has become their life purpose.
Isabel Allende, in her recent book The Soul of a Woman, recounts how through her research of violence against women (including a visit to a small community of women in Kenya whose lives had been devastated by war and AIDS), she was moved to establish the Isabelle Allende Foundation whose mission is to empower women to “to secure reproductive rights, economic independence and freedom from violence”. Isabel’s poignant and soul-searching memoir, Paula, written during her daughter’s fatal, porphyria-induced coma was an outstanding success and generated the income which Isabel used to create the Foundation. She sees her life purpose as enabling women to be safe, valued and loved and to have empowerment through control over their own bodies and personal resources. Isabel pursues her life purpose through her Foundation and her writing – she has written 26 books selling over 74 million copies.
Olga Murray, a highly successful and widely respected lawyer, was moved by the impoverishment of children in Nepal when she visited Kathmandu and observed their destitute conditions, including young girls being sold into slavery and prostitution during a Festival. She established the Nepal Youth Foundation in 1990 to provide children who were the most impoverished with “education, housing, medical care and human rights.” She has continued to work to support the Foundation in her 90’s and the Foundation continues to save girls from slavery through their “indentured daughters” program.
Goldie Hawn, through her own experience of panic attacks as a child, developed a very strong empathy for children suffering unhappiness and depression through mental illness. She had used meditation throughout her own life to develop self-awareness and manage her own emotional stress and she became acutely aware of how mindfulness enables children to manage the stresses of their lives. This led her to establish the Goldie Hawn Foundation which developed the MindUP program which employs educational programs to facilitate the well-being of children. The programs for both children and teachers are soundly based on “neuroscience, mindfulness awareness, positive psychology and social-emotional learning (SEL)”.

Reflection

Many things can be a catalyst for discovering our life purpose and providing the energy and motivation to pursue it with courage and focused action. As we grow in mindfulness through meditation, mindfulness practices and reflection on our life experiences, we can develop the insight to identify our unique purpose and the resilience to pursue it through compassionate action.

Hugh Van Cuylenburg developed the GEM pathway to happiness and resilience – gratitude, empathy, mindfulness – after a visit to a poor village in India. He now pursues his life purpose as a motivational speaker and writer working with multiple organisations, including elite sport’s teams.

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By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group, and the resources to support the blog.

Bodily Awareness: Movement and Stillness

The UCLA meditation podcast at the end of April 2021 was conducted by Tom Heah who has particular expertise in movement meditation and offers a range of Mindfulness in Action courses. Tom’s guided meditation on Awareness in Movement and Stillness offers a way to pay attention to bodily sensations with openness and curiosity while moving and keeping still. He makes the point that our body is always in the present moment through our senses while our mind is often consumed with thinking about the past or the future, e.g., planning, analysing, categorising, criticising, or summarising. Tom describes the mind as a “thinking machine” while he sees our body as a pathway to the present moment and mindfulness. His podcast meditation has three core parts – seeing, moving, being still.

Paying attention to what we see

As Tom’s meditation was conducted online via Zoom, he encouraged participants from around the world to turn their videos on and look to see who else is present in the collaborative meditation. He maintained that through our sight we can reinforce our sense of connection to others wherever they may be in the world. He suggested that “separation” is really a “conception of the mind” – ignoring the reality of our connectedness to every living thing. He encouraged participants to spend a short time as they were looking at others to check into their own bodily sensations. Tom reinforced the fact that our bodies enable us to experience our connection to the earth as well as to others.

Paying attention to our bodies while we move

Tom encouraged participants to stand or sit to undertake a number of conscious movements involving the arms, neck, and shoulders. He offered stretching exercises for the arms, neck and shoulder rolls as forms of movement. His main focus was on the bodily sensations experienced while undertaking the movements – encouraging the identification of points of ease or tension.

On completing the movements, Tom suggested that participants choose an anchor to be able to refocus the mind if wandering occurs – e.g., room scanning, focus on sounds within and/or without the room, focusing on the breath or remaining with bodily sensations. He indicated that like a lot of other people his mind has been racing with the advent of the pandemic, as everything in life is impacted – work location, availability of work, physical and mental health, relationships, shopping patterns, income flow and capacity for free movement within a State or outside a country.

Tom suggested that focus on our body and body sensations is a way to still the mind and recapture peace, ease, and tranquility. Movement meditations such as Tai Chi provide an excellent means to build bodily focus and concentration as well as to realise physical and mental health benefits.

Paying attention to our bodies while being still

Tom suggested that the stillness meditation can involve sitting, standing, or lying down – whatever is comfortable and facilitates your ability to get in touch with your bodily sensations. One of the easiest ways to pay attention to bodily sensations is to focus on our feet – observing sensations of touch, tingling, heaviness, connectedness to the floor or ground or other sensation. I find that joining my fingers together from each hand also provides me with easy access to bodily awareness – to a sense of energy flow, warmth, connection, tingling and stillness.

Mantra meditations involving generation of bodily energy through voice and vibration, can still the mind and body. Lulu & Mischka, exemplars of the art of mantra meditations, maintain that in times such as the pandemic, mantra meditations can enable us to achieve both stillness and joy despite the pervasive challenges in our lives. Their stillness in motion mantra meditation epitomises becoming grounded and connected through observing whales and singing while sailing close to these majestic marine mammals.

Reflection

Our bodies are the immediate and accessible pathway to being in the present moment. We can readily still our minds and grow in mindfulness through body scans, chanting, mantra meditations and movement meditations such as Tai Chi. The benefits are enhanced through daily mindfulness practice whatever form it takes according to our preference and however much time we can devote to the practice. The increasing benefits over time serve to provide positive reinforcement so that what may have once been a chore becomes a pleasant and rewarding experience.

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By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.

Creating a Personal Transformation: Reframing Your Life

Tina Turner argues in her book, Happiness Becomes You: A Guide to Changing Your Life for Good, that a transformation or total revolution of mind and heart takes considerable energy and courage. It is clear that her own transformation was powered by the vibrational energy of her chanting. What is not so clear is that she was able to reframe her life through the insight and mindset gained through her research of Buddhism, particularly Nichiren Buddhism.

Tina asserted that if we never challenge our comfort zone or have it challenged through our life circumstances, we will not be able to realise our potential. In her view, in challenge there is real learning and strength – a mindset that sees challenges as opportunities for insight, growth and development of resilience.

Tina challenged her own comfort zone by working with songs that she initially did not like and searching for some meaning in them that she could explore and express. One such song, What’s Love Got to Do With It, became an international hit – like many other successful songs that she initially did not like, but pushed past her initial reaction to challenge herself.

And so it is with us, if we hold back or procrastinate, we can deprive ourself of realising some element of our potential and our capacity to help others. Our example alone of pushing through the comfort barrier can assist others who are struggling to achieve something important in their lives. Tina argues that we can’t wait until we are fully confident of success (with no chance of failure) before we act – life is too short for such procrastination.

Our inherent connectedness

Tina maintains that an essential element in the growth of consciousness is the realisation, both conceptually and energetically, that we are connected to every other person and every living thing through our reliance on and contribution to the flow of universal energy. She quotes Matin Luther King Jr. who puts this reality very simply by saying that we all belong to an “inescapable network of mutuality”.

Tina points out that in this interconnected reality, there is no room for racism, ageism, sexism, or any other divisive discrimination. In her view, we are like the dots in a Pointillism painting where coloured dots form a pattern that the eye can discern as an integrated image. Georges Seurat, an early proponent of this approach, maintains that “unifying diverse colors in this way made his art more brilliant”. Tina used this analogy to express our interconnectedness because it “honours each colour, each dot, its distinct characteristics”.

Tina was very conscious that every person has “great worth” and “inherent potential” that can be progressively released over a lifetime (as she has shown in her own life). Recognition of the rich tapestry of difference makes our world an absorbing place to be. This diversity of perspectives throws light on the unfathomable depth of our inner landscape, the pervasiveness of energy and its many forms and the infinite reach of our universe – undeniable grounds for wonder and awe.

In acknowledgement of our inherent connectedness, many Nichiren Buddhists, in this day and age, have engagement and social activism “as a vital part of their practice”. This is particularly true of Tina who has co-founded and contributed to the Beyond Music Project designed to “celebrate unity in its cultural diversity” through music.

Nichiren Buddhism and science

In her book, Tina explains how she developed her understanding of, and commitment to, Nichiren Buddhism. She does not attempt to explain the science of Buddhism nor the neuroscience confirmation of its benefits but describes how it has transformed her heart and mind and underpinned her success in life.

However, Susanne Matsudo-Killani and Yukio Matsudo, in their book, Transform your Energy – Change your life! : Nichiren Buddhism 3.0, draw on the metaphorical language of Nichiren to explore the links between his approach and that of quantum physics and bio-feedback which effectively “integrate energy and consciousness” in their explanations of nature and human reality. As scientists begin to explore Meditation, Buddhism and Science, they are beginning to realise that these different worldviews are complementary and enrich each other.

Reflection

Tina has demonstrated that if we push our perceived personal boundaries, we can realise higher levels of awareness, consciousness, and achievement – we can actualize our hidden potential. Buddhist practices enable us to tap into the universal energy that is within and around us.

As we grow in mindfulness through meditation, chanting and exploration of different worldviews, we can open our horizons, transform our hearts and minds, and make a real difference in our world.

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Image by Hamsterfreund from Pixabay

By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.

Mantra Meditations for Calm, Peace and Energy

Mantra meditation involves the repetition of a sound, word or phrase during meditation. The mantra can be repeated silently, spoken or chanted, sometimes accompanied by music. The singing of mantras can provide variation through intonation, pace, pitch, and volume. The content can be rich in meaning drawing on ancient traditions or simply a single word. Instrumentation can be added and often involves guitar, harmonium and/or flute.

Famous yogi-musician, Girish, combines neuroscience and the art of singing mantras in his book, Music and Mantras: The Yoga of Mindful Singing for Health, Happiness, Peace and Prosperity. Girish maintains that “Mantra is a sound vibration through which we mindfully focus our thoughts, our feelings, and our highest intention”. In this statement he captures not only the power of focus inherent in chanted mantra meditations but also the energetic effect of the vibrations of music and singing.

Singing of mantras has gained a resurgence through the development of the relatively new discipline of music therapy and the advent of neuroscience along with the understanding of the vibrational energy of sound and voice.

The benefits of mantra meditations

Like any meditation, mantras build attention and capacity to focus which in itself has a beneficial effect. Typically practitioners return to their focus whenever a distracting thought interferes with their concentration on the mantra. Neuroscience has highlighted this benefit and explained how meditation positively impacts the mind, emotions and the body.

Susan Moran focuses on the distinctive nature of mantra meditations and summarises the science that supports this approach to meditation. In her article, she identifies several research-based benefits:

Reduces distractions generated by the default-mode network of our brains (with its inherent negative bias)
Minimises negative self-talk that leads to depression
Activates the “relaxation response” and builds resilience in the face of stress.

Turning depression into a deep well of calm, peace and centredness through mantra meditation

The beneficial effects of mantra meditations were clearly articulated by Tina Malia in her interview with Kara Johnstad. Tina Malia is globally famous for her song writing, singing, instrumentation and integration of different mantra traditions, and at the time of the interview, was working on her seventh album.

Tina told the story of her very deep depression in her twenties and her experience of the “dark night of the soul”. She indicated that she had all the trappings of external success but experienced despair and a “deep, deep aching loneliness” that would not go away – she lost her meaning in life and considered ending her life through suicide. At the time, she was a backing singer for world music singer/songwriter Jai Uttal and his band. Jai suggested that she start a daily practice of Japa – silently singing the Ram mantra meditation while passing beads through her fingers.

Tina reports that this practice which she undertook conscientiously every day, although having little effect in the first few weeks, enabled her to find peace, harmony and an inner well of calm and creative energy. She explained that it “completely lifted me out of despair” and she still continued the practice daily at the time of the interview. She finds chanting mantra meditations a tool for helping her when she feels frazzled at busy times while touring the world. She describes her silent mantra meditations as a well – an internal source of pure water that brings the experience of visiting a calming, familiar room.

Kara Johnstad, who is herself a visionary singer-songwriter, describes chanting mantra meditations as creating “a higher vibrational field” that protects us against the turbulence of daily life and its many challenges.

Reflection

I have found just listening to the chanting of mantra meditations very calming, particularly those of Lulu & Mischka and the many mantra meditations of Deva Premal & Miten. From my reading and listening to Tina’s story, it is clear that the real benefit of chanting mantra meditations comes not only from repetition of the mantra but from daily practice over an extended period (in Tina’s case over many months and years).

It takes time to absorb the positive messages of a mantra into our consciousness so that over time it displaces our negative self-thoughts. Tina suggests that mantra meditations are like a tool to explore our inner reality, “a shovel to go inside and dig”. In this way we can develop a deep level of self-intimacy.

As we grow in mindfulness through chanting mantra meditations, we can unearth our disturbing negative thoughts and difficult emotions and replace them with a deep well of calm, peace and energy. Tina has demonstrated yet again that discipline creates freedom and success. Her latest album, Anahata (Heart Wide Open) can be obtained through Sounds True.

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Image by enriquelopezgarre from Pixabay

By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.

Stillness of Mind and Body through Mantra Meditations

Lulu & Mischka recorded the final day of their 6-day online journey into mantra meditation that brought together hundreds of people around the world at this time of anxiety and uncertainty brought on by the Coronavirus. Their chanting and accompanying music on the guitar and harmonium provided a haven in these turbulent times. Their harmonies are enriched by Lulu’s operatically trained voice that transports you into another reality – beyond fear and anxiety.

In today’s recorded session, Lulu & Mischka focused on the mantra, Jaya Ganesha, which they translate to mean:

Ease and flow wherever we go, open to the mystery each day. Calling for protection on our journey, guidance and blessings on our way. Bless away the obstacles, open to the miracles.

Inherent in the mantra is acceptance of what is and letting go of the resistance that aggravates the suffering of the present moment. Their mantra meditations can bring “openness of the heart, quietness of the mind and comfort of the body” in times of enforced lockdowns, social distancing and social isolation. They have designed an online mantra meditation course to enable their global audience to continue their journey into inner peace.

Incorporating yoga breathing

At the beginning of their mantra meditation sessions, Lulu & Mischka incorporate yoga breathing and often finish with this practice. Lulu describes this process as deep breathing, as if drawing breath through a straw – the inbreath moving from the lower abdomen, expanding the lungs and filling the chest. The outbreath reverses this process and enables release of tension, stress and resentment.

The deep breathing enhances the calming influence of the chanting and movement that forms part of their daily ritual that they share with others through their recorded music such as the Enchanted CD which is available as a download. Lulu and Mischka are strong supporters of the charity, A Sound Life, that helps people in need to improve their wellbeing through yoga, meditation and music.

Reflection

There is something about Lulu & Mischka and their approach to mantra meditation that is engaging and effortless and appeals to people around the world. Their international festival appearances attest to this appeal. The combination of chanting accompanied by deep breathing and musical instruments (the harmonium and guitar) act as a form of music therapy that is capable of transporting us beyond the pain and preoccupations of the present to a place of calm and equanimity. As we grow in mindfulness through mantra meditation, we can find an inner peace, a strengthened resolve and a willingness to extend compassionate action to others.

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Image by S. Hermann & F. Richter from Pixabay

By Ron Passfield – Copyright (Creative Commons license, Attribution–Non Commercial–No Derivatives)

Disclosure: If you purchase a product through this site, I may earn a commission which will help to pay for the site, the associated Meetup group and the resources to support the blog.