guided meditation – Page 9 – Grow Mindfulness

Breathing with the Earth

Diana Winston, Director of Mindfulness Education at MARC (UCLA), offers a unique perspective on developing mindfulness through breathing. In her meditation podcast, she introduces the idea of breathing with the earth – expanding consciousness of our own breathing to connect with the earth’s breath. She encourages us to deepen inner awareness of our breathing and, from this foundation, expand our outer awareness to connecting with every living creature and the earth’s breath. The process develops a sense of connectedness, calm and wonder.

The earth’s breath

Diana begins her meditation podcast by playing a video from Chilean artist, Glenda Leon. The video artistically depicts (with an embedded breathing sound) the earth breathing. Glenda has titled the video Cada Respire (Tierra), which is Portuguese for every earth breath. Diana suggests that as you watch the video you attune your own breathing to the sound of the earth breathing as depicted in the video.

In an article titled, The Earth Has Lungs. Watch Them Breathe, Robert Krulwich (writing for the National Geographic) highlights the NASA time lapse video depicting an “unimaginably vast planetary breathing system” over the cycle of a year. As the seasons change around the world, the growth of trees and their leaves (numbered in their trillions) act as the lungs of the earth breathing in carbon dioxide and releasing life giving oxygen. Robert highlights the fact that every leaf on every tree has thousands of “little breathing tubes called stoma” which enable the leaf to take in air from the outside. He uses a photograph by Robert Dash to illustrate the stoma on the surface of a leaf which has been magnified 150 times.

John Denver in the song Tremble If You Must recalls that “the trees are just leaves on a big breathing globe”. Eva Cassidy, in her amazing rendition of the song What a Wonderful World, reminds us that as we reflect on the ordinary things in our life, we can experience wonder if we open our eyes and minds. As we expand our consciousness of our breathing to that of the earth’s breath, we can experience connectedness and calm through awareness of the reality that surrounds us.

Breathing with the earth

Diana’s guided meditation provides a way to focus on your own breathing that serves as a gateway to breathing with the earth. For a start, she suggests that you become aware of your own breathing, focusing on your in-breath and out-breath wherever you can experience the act of breathing in your own body. This may be the air passing through your nose or the undulations in your abdomen or chest as you breathe in and out. You can expand this inner awareness to lower-belly breathing with a little practice.

Diana guides you to explore your breathing further by doing two things, (1) focusing on other parts of your body as you breathe, and (2) exploring the path of a single breath. She suggests that this expanded awareness can begin with focusing on parts of your body other than your torso to observe the sensations that accompany your breathing to see if their movements are attuned to your breathing, e.g. tingling in your fingers or feet. This can then be followed by observing the movement of a single breath through your body (if you cannot capture the explicit sensation, you can imagine this flow).

If you find that you become distracted from your focus on your breathing, you can let the thoughts or feelings pass and return to your breath. This requires discipline but will increase your capacity to focus over time. Once you have become grounded in your own breathing you can expand your awareness to the earth’s breath.

One way to consciously breathe with the earth is to envisage the earth breathing (aided by the earth breath video introduced above). This will build a strong sense of connectedness to the earth. You can then expand your awareness to the breathing of other people and every living creature on the earth.

What can strengthen your capacity to connect with the breath of the earth is to stand on the ground outside your home and feel the sensation of the earth’s movement, being conscious of the trees and plants and their life-giving breathing.

As we grow in mindfulness through mindful breathing, we can develop our inner awareness, enhance our external awareness, learn to breathe with the earth and build a sense of calm and connection to every living thing.

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

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Breaking Out of Our Belief Trance

Tara Brach suggests that we often live in a self-absorbed trance generated by our false beliefs about ourselves and our learned beliefs about others. She offers ways to address these beliefs and their damaging effects in her new course, Releasing Negative Beliefs & Thought Patterns: Using Mindfulness to Break Out of the Trance. Her mindfulness course, involving 26 lectures and 2.5 hours of video, provides ways to identify and manage our harmful beliefs.

How harmful beliefs arise

Harmful beliefs about ourselves and our self-worth develop at an early age through a range of influences – parental, peer and/or religious education. Our parents can sow the seeds for a diminished self-esteem by reminding us that we are not as good as some comparative child, a sibling or classmate. We might be told that our academic or sporting achievements fall below their expectations of us or what they themselves achieved. Our peers are constantly comparing us to themselves and other peers as they too are consumed by the self-absorption trance. Our religious education might reinforce our low self-esteem by telling us that we are inherently “bad” and sinful.

These influences on the formation of our negative self-beliefs can be compounded by traumatic childhood experiences such as getting lost in a store, being placed in an orphanage for a period or being left in the custody of one parent following a divorce. These experiences can deepen our sense of rejection and heighten our beliefs about our “unworthiness” or our sense of being “unlovable”. Over time, these beliefs can become deeply embedded in our psyche and confirmed by our unconscious bias towards a negative interpretation of events impacting us.

Impact of harmful beliefs

Our self-beliefs play out in our thoughts and emotions and impact our interactions with others. Negative beliefs leading to diminished self-evaluation can reinforce our sense of separateness and the need to protect our self from others who might further damage our self-esteem.

We may try to conceal our shame or project it onto others through anger and resentment. Underlying our interactions is a constant fear that we will be damaged by others – a fear reinforced by our past experiences. We may have difficulty developing close relationships (we keep trying to “keep our distance”), building motivation to take on new challenges or overcoming a deepening sadness or depression. We begin to see the world and others through dark clouds that distort our perception of people and reality and their inherent beauty.

Breaking out of the belief trance

Tara’s course is designed to help us to identify our harmful beliefs, understand how they play out in our life and interaction with others and develop techniques and strategies to limit the harm caused to our self and others as a result of these beliefs.

She offers, among other things, a brief guided meditation focused on a recent, conflicted interaction we have had with someone else. After taking time to become grounded, she suggests that you focus on the conflicted interaction and explore your self-beliefs that are playing out from your side of the conflict. You might ask yourself, “What nerve is the interaction activating? (e.g. a fear of criticism); “What am I doing to the other person in the conflict? (e.g. destructive criticism or calling them names); or “What am I doing to protect myself and my sense of self-worth (e.g. justifying my words and/or behaviour).

Having teased out what is going on for you in the interaction in terms of personal sensitivities and your self-protective behaviour, you can begin to explore the self-beliefs that underlie your part in the interaction. These may not be immediately evident as they are so deeply embedded and reinforced, but over time they will emerge from the mist of self-deflection. If you repeat the guided meditation on harmful beliefs following other conflicted interactions, you can gradually begin to see more clearly and notice a pattern of behaviour, thoughts and underlying beliefs. Once you have identified what is going on for you, you are better placed to manage your personal interactions.

As we grow in mindfulness through meditation on our conflicted interactions, we can become more attentive to what is happening for us, understand our part in the conflict, identify our harmful self-beliefs and progressively manage our beliefs, thoughts, emotions and behaviours. We can become more connected to the world and others and less insistent on defining and reinforcing our separateness. In this growing self-realisation lies the seeds of compassion.

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

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A Meditation Practice for Taming Feelings of Shame

Meditation can help us tame our strong emotions by helping us to isolate the source of the related feelings and identify our automatic response, which is often inappropriate or unhelpful. Shame is one such emotion that generates strong feelings that can lead to anger, envy, devaluing self, depression, passivity or inability to cope.

Mary C. Lamia, a clinical psychologist, explains that shame occurs when we perceive ourselves to be inadequate, unworthy, dishonourable or failing to live up to our own or other’s expectations. For example, shame experienced in not living up to the expectations of others as a new or accomplished author, is a central theme of John Boyne’s book, A Ladder to the Sky. His book also starkly illustrates Mary Lamia’s description of shame as a “concealed, contagious and dangerous emotion“. Mary’s in-depth discussion of shame and how it manifests is illuminating and helps us to understand how shame can induce our own dysfunctional behaviour and that of bullies and narcissistic people.

A meditation to tame feelings of shame

Patricia Rockman provides a meditation designed to tame feelings of shame. Her 10-minute, guided meditation podcast provides a way to uncover this often-concealed emotion, explore its manifestation in bodily sensations and denigrating thoughts, and eventually to get in touch with how we contaminate our relationships through feelings of shame.

The starting point for the meditation is to clearly form the intention to address the feelings of shame, rather than push them away or hide from them. This may take a concerted effort over time with repetition of this guided meditation. Feelings of shame may be deeply embedded in our bodies and minds and we can feel resistance to dealing with these uncomfortable emotions and feelings. Over time, we may have become practised at concealing shame or projecting our sense of shame onto others.

As we grow in mindfulness through meditating on our feelings of shame
we can learn to tame our shame and its impact by naming our feelings and facing the discomfort that shame elicits in us bodily and mentally. This growth in self-awareness, a progressive unveiling of ourselves, can replace shame with kind attention, and build resilience.

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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.

Re-energise through Meditation

In this day and age of hectic living, people are constantly tired or exhausted – basically drained of energy. In the absence of a conscious effort to re-energise ourselves, we can become prone to all kinds of physical and mental illness. Meditation provides multiple ways to re-energise and restore physical and mental balance.

The daily pressures at home and work can leave us drained. Added to this are increasing financial demands, adverse environmental conditions (e.g. extreme weather reflected in floods, cyclones and bushfires), increasing violence in communities and the growth of terrorism.

The human impact of these multiple pressures is reflected in constant tiredness and fatigue experienced by people of all ages, even children who are experiencing the demands of exams, parental expectations and university entry requirements. This constant energy drain can be reflected in many illnesses, not the least of these being chronic fatigue syndrome. Alan Jansson, Japanese acupuncturist with more than 30 years experience, has noted that chronic fatigue syndrome, which used to be the province of elite athletes, is now being experienced by managers in large organisations and people of all ages, including teenagers.

Re-energising through meditation

It seems contradictory that meditation, noted for its focus on stillness and silence, should be a source of energy. In fact, there are specific guided meditations that focus on re-energising the body and mind. One such 10-minute guided meditation offers an approach designed to boost energy and build positivity.

Other forms of meditation help us to release tension and trauma, e.g. somatic meditation, remove the energy draining effects of negative thoughts, build positive energy through appreciation and expression of gratitude, and access the energy in the natural world around us through open awareness. Even mindful listening, being fully present and attuned to another person, can energise us through openness to their ideas and passionate pursuits and through the power of connection.

Reasons why meditation re-energises

The Exploration of Consciousness Research Institute (EOC), drawing on the latest resesearch, advances five reasons why meditation increases energy. These reasons are summarised below:

Meditation changes the way we respond to stress: replacing energy-sapping fear and anxiety with resilience through a reduction in the “energy-zapping” chemical, cortisol.
Boosts endorphins thus increasing calm and focus and reducing the need for energy-depleting, temporary stimulants such as “energy drinks” and coffee.
Induces deeper sleep and energy restoration through increased awareness of the present moment (not locked into the past or the future) and through an increase in the sleep-enhancing hormone, melatonin.
Boosts two key chemicals DHEA (develops overall sense of well-being) and Growth Hormone (GH) which increases our strength and energy storage. The overall effect of these two chemicals is a reduction in fatigue and an increase in the energy of motivation.
Upgrades our personal battery and recharges it – by enhancing our emotional control centre (the pre-frontal cortex) and reducing our fear centre (the amygdala).

As we grow in mindfulness through meditation, we can re-energise our personal batteries when they run low, build resilience, reduce energy-sapping emotions and chemicals, and increase chemicals that have a positive effect on our overall strength, the restorative quality of our sleep and our sense of well-being.

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

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Meditation For Increased Energy: How & Why it Works – 5 Reasons

Accessing the “Spaciousness Within” through Mindfulness

Often, we are at our “wit’s end” trying to solve problems, overcome challenges or address conflicts. Deborah Eden Tull reminds us that through meditation and mindfulness practice, we can access what she calls the “spaciousness within” – wherein lies peace, calmness, creativity and well-being. In a meditation podcast for the Mindful Awareness Research Center (MARC), Deborah provides two guided meditations and commentary to help us to access this spaciousness while listening to her and to continue to do so beyond the specific meditations.

Initial brief meditation – arriving at the present moment

At the beginning of her podcast, Deborah provides a way for you to transfer your attention from what you have been doing to arriving at being present in-the-moment. This assumes that you still have some level of involvement in your previous activity despite changing your location or attempting to change your focus.

As part of the process of becoming grounded, Deborah suggests that you make yourself comfortable in the first instance through a conscious, restful posture and then begin with a few conscious breaths to help you to become centred. The next part of this centring meditation involves a progressive process of getting in touch with your thoughts, then feelings and finally the bodily sensations that have accompanied you to your meditation exercise.

Following the development of this inner awareness, she suggests that you get in touch with your personal motivation for undertaking the meditation or listening to her podcast – what is it that you are hoping to achieve for yourself? This initial brief meditation closes with taking a deep, full-body breath to open yourself to the experience of listening to her commentary and undertaking the subsequent meditation practice.

Reflection – observing people texting while walking

As part of her commentary on accessing our inner spaciousness, Deborah reflected on observing people on the university campus texting while they were walking between buildings/ classes. She observed that this practice actually builds our habit of busyness – the antithesis of developing the spaciousness within. This multi-tasking activity strengthens our conditioning to be always busy – thinking, planning, evaluating, dramatizing, revisiting the past (depression), anticipating the future (anxiety) – and builds on our overall penchant for distraction.

We can choose to cultivate a life of serenity, ease, calmness and resilience through developing present moment awareness or opt for a life that intensifies restlessness, dis-ease, agitation and fragility. Deborah reminds us that the quality of our life experience is determined by the focus of our attention.

Her second meditation (beginning at the 14-minute mark) helps you to cultivate the spaciousness within through a focus on your breathing and exploration of the imagery of the ocean.

Mindful breathing and ocean imagery

Deborah’s second guided meditation focuses on breathing. She reminds us that this meditation process should be free of the everyday habit of striving or seeking to change ourselves for the better. It is very much about being rather than doing.

In focussing on your breathing in this meditation exercise, you learn to develop awareness about your breathing in the moment – whether your breathing is deep or shallow, fast or slow, even or choppy. You are encouraged to rest in your breathing and accept it the way it is – not trying to force a desired pattern on your breathing.

Following this focus on breathing, Deborah asks you to imagine an ocean – the turbulence of the waves above and the stillness and vastness of the water below. She encourages you to envisage the calm waters below the waves as the mirror of your “spaciousness within”.

Accessing the spaciousness within

You can choose to develop awareness of the spaciousness within through formal meditation or through informal practices such as mindful eating, mindful walking or stopping/ pausing in the midst of a situation to ground yourself in the present moment.

As we develop mindfulness through formal meditation and other mindful practices, we can access the spaciousness within and experience calmness, resilience, creativity, ease and well-being to improve the quality of our lives.

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

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Developing Trust and Your Sense of Belonging

Tara Brach in a video presentation on Basic Trust highlights the importance of trust and a sense of belonging in our lives. She stresses the role of trust in shaping our view of ourselves, the quality of our relationships and our perception of the world around us. Tara contrasts this positive sense with the distrust and sense of separation that can pervade our view of ourselves, others we encounter and the world at large.

The sense of separation versus the sense of belonging

Tara suggests that our sense of separation is part of our evolutionary condition – we develop a sense of our separate self very early on. However, our culture and our parental influences can potentially drive a wedge between ourselves and our sense of belonging. If in our early stage of development, our needs are not recognised or met, we begin to sense that we are “not good enough” – we begin to feel separation and distrust. Our culture stresses the importance of “making it” – whether in terms of economic status, job role, relationship status or intelligence levels. If we have not made it in terms of cultural expectations, then we feel we are not a genuine part of our group or community.

If we are different at school – failing to fall into the narrow band of children gifted with left-brain intelligence – we can feel less than others, even though we may excel at other forms of intelligence, such as spatial intelligene or musical intelligence. If our personality is different from the dominant personality type in our work organisation, we can feel less than others or even a “misfit”.

There are many ways we can receive messages about our separateness or not being good enough to belong. Many religions reinforce our “sinfulness” or unworthiness, highlighting what is deficient in us rather than what is good and kind in our nature. As we feel a sense of separateness, we tend to build up our defences to protect our fragile ego and this can lead to a tendency to only see the defects in others, to become blinded to what is good in them.

A sense of belonging builds trust

Much of what we hear about ourselves and reinforce in our own narratives, is that we do not belong. However, if we can develop a sense of our own goodness and that of others we can learn to trust ourselves and those around us and be less ego-driven and self-protective. Tara suggests a brief meditation to highlight our sense of belonging that involves several core questions:

To what extent do we belong to our bodies (accepting them as they are)?
How much are we in touch with our own heart and kind feelings?
How strong is our feeling of belonging in our significant relationship?
Do we experience a sense of belonging in our family?
How much are we connected to the people around us, in our work or our community?

Developing a sense of trust and belonging

The absence of trust impacts our sense of belonging. However, we can build our sense of trust in ourselves and others by meditating on (1) our inherent goodness and (2) the goodness in others. We can become aware of our inherent goodness by focusing on our appreciation of beauty in nature, in music, or in art; by a sense of gratitude for kindnesses extended to ourselves or others; by experiencing a collective sense of joy when someone overcomes adversity; or by valuing the connection with family or friends.

Our sense of our own goodness can be realised through the experience of positive emotions through music or musical performances. We can perceive our own thoughtfulness when we go out of our way to help someone in need. Our essential goodness is evident when we appreciate when someone else has a achieved mastery of some skill or activity. It is at times like these that we feel “at home” with ourselves and who we are.

Tara provides a brief guided meditation (at the 31.55min. mark) that helps us to feel good about ourselves and identify the goodness in others around us. She strongly suggests that we share our appreciation of others with them directly – we all need reinforcement of our essential goodness to build our trust and sense of belonging.

As we grow in mindfulness through meditation on the inherent goodness of ourselves and others, we experience a freedom from the binds of negative self-evaluation and become more open to acts of kindness and creative use of our core skills and knowledge in the service of others. Meditation helps us to “lift the veil” on our goodness and to see ourselves as we really are in our essence.

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

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Managing Anxiety with Mindfulness

Bob Stahl, co-author of A Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Workbook, explains how mindfulness can help to manage anxiety in an article titled, Explore Anxiety with Mindfulness. In the article, he explains the nature of anxiety and offers a mindfulness approach involving writing. In another article discussed here he also provides a guided anxiety meditation.

The nature of anxiety

Bob explains that anxiety can arise at any time for anyone and can be episodic or chronic, mild or intense. It can be precipitated by our family, work, relationship or financial situation. Anxiety is not the sole province of people who are disadvantaged in some way – even the wealthy, the successful and elite sportspeople can, and do, suffer from anxiety.

Bob explains that anxiety is underpinned by fear catalysed by some event that caused you to worry and that becomes the focus of ongoing fearful anticipation. Anxiety typically manifests in three ways – physically, mentally and emotionally. Physically, anxiety can make you feel constricted, tied up in knots, smothered, having difficulty with breathing; mentally, you may be absorbed by thoughts that consume you with foreboding or restlessness; and emotionally, you may feel distress, lack the ability to concentrate and experience profound nervousness. The physical, mental and emotional symptoms of anxiety can vary considerably for different people, as can their intensity and prevalence.

Managing anxiety with mindfulness

Mindfulness, in contrast to anxiety, can generate calm and clarity, the ability to be in-the-moment (not absorbed by the future), the capacity to develop self-awareness (of your body, your emotions and debilitating thoughts) and self-regulation. Neuroscience has demonstrated unequivocally the positive benefits of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction for anxiety , even for cases of extreme and/or chronic anxiety.

There are multiple approaches to developing mindfulness and Bob advocates two approaches that can assist in the management of anxiety, a writing exercise and a specific anxiety meditation.

A writing exercise for anxiety

In the abovementioned article, Bob explains his approach to using writing to alleviate anxiety. It basically involves focusing on one experience of anxiety (that was not too intense) and exploring its impacts on you physically, mentally and emotionally. He offers three core questions to explore a specific anxiety experience through writing your responses:

What bodily sensations did you experience during the event?
What thoughts or thinking processes were happening during the event?
What emotions or feeling tones were present during that event?

Bob stresses the need to be grounded before you start reflecting and writing, be as specific as possible (to aid self-discovery) and to congratulate yourself for making the effort to explore the path to recovery (despite your uncertainty about the outcome).

A meditation for anxiety

In another article, Bob Stahl provides a detailed explanation and meditation podcast for a meditation on anxious emotions. His written explanation of this meditation for anxiety provides you with step by step instructions on how to undertake this meditation. His approach focuses on your bodily sensations and the associated feelings that arise as you reflect on an anxiety-inducing event/situation.

The guided meditation podcast that he also provides follows these suggested steps but also acts as an additional aid by enabling you to concentrate on your experience without having to read and supporting you through his calming voice.

Bob suggests again that you become grounded at the start of the meditation and that you acknowledge to yourself that you have taken an important step on the road to recovery. This self-praise can be realised if you pause at the end of the meditation and take the time to bask in your achievement, rather than rushing off to do something else.

The writing exercise and meditation are complementary and can reinforce each other. As you write you become more self-aware and this, in turn, enables you more easily to tap into your bodily sensations and feelings.

As you grow in mindfulness through writing and meditation, you can face your anxiety, increase your self-awareness and better manage your thoughts, physical reactions and emotions. It takes courage and conviction to begin to manage anxiety through mindfulness, but many people have successfully walked this path, and this is in itself a source of encouragement. Reading about these successes can help build your own courage and conviction.

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

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Some Simple Gratitude Exercises

The expression of gratitude does not have to be confined to extended gratitude meditations. In fact, the more often you can find simple ways to express gratitude, the more readily will you achieve a brain makeover from negative thoughts to a positive outlook and impact positively on those you interact with. It is a two-way street though – an extended gratitude meditation can deepen your overall sense of gratitude while regular expressions of gratitude can keep this positive emotion top of mind and impact your behaviour on an ongoing basis.

Simple gratitude exercises

If you have a suite of simple gratitude exercises, you are more likely to practise them and extend your expression of gratitude throughout the day as different gratitude prompts occur. Here are some gratitude exercises to get you started:

Making your “thank you” a conscious act

Stephanie Domet suggests that we can improve the quality of our daily expression of gratitude to others by being really present when we say “thank you”. We can often be distracted, mouth the words as a matter of course without real feeling behind them or become focused on our next action without being really present to the person we are “communicating” with. The person receiving the communication can sense whether you mean what you say or are just going through the motions. If you are not present when you say the words, your positive intent is lost as are the benefits for yourself and the other person.

Savour the moment through your senses

Elaine Smookler provides a comprehensive explanation of a 5-minute exercise that involves progressively engaging each of your senses in-the-moment. She maintains that this practice builds personal resilience when the waves of life wash over you – when things don’t turn out as you expected. Elaine also provides a guided meditation podcast within her article. This approach helps to switch your brain from a deficit mentality to one of appreciating life’s small blessings.

Reflecting on your day with gratitude

Towards the end of each day, it pays to look back on the day and reflect on what you have appreciated about your day – the people you have interacted with and the friendships involved, the opportunities that have come your way, the ease of conversation, the chance to achieve something worthwhile, acquiring new skills or knowledge (or enhancing existing knowledge/skills), gaining insights, growing in awareness (both internal and external). The list of things to be grateful for goes on endlessly once you set your mind to it. This simple exercise of appreciating the small things in life on a daily basis helps us to break free of self-doubt or negative thoughts and builds our confidence and potentiality.

Building gratitude into your daily life – choosing a simple or extended gratitude exercise

You can build your appreciation and sense of gratitude very quickly through these exercises and deepen your gratitude with more extended meditation practice. The secret is to head down this path of appreciation and its attendant benefits by choosing something, a simple or extended practice, that you can build into your daily life. It needs to be something that suits your lifestyle so that you can sustain it over time and make it an integral part of your life. One gratitude practice will then lead to another and change your outlook on life as well as your interactions.

As you grow in mindfulness through simple gratitude exercises and/or extended gratitude meditation, you will build your awareness of the positive aspects of your life, develop greater resilience and strengthen your relationships. Time spent reflecting on the things you appreciate each day will bring a rich reward.

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

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Developing Choiceless Awareness

In the previous post, I discussed three dimensions of awareness in meditation – the narrow, broad and “choiceless awareness”. In this post, I want to focus on the latter form of awareness that, to some degree, requires foundational skills in narrow awareness or focused awareness.

Choiceless awareness is a recognised form of meditation that has developed over time to increase self-awareness and self-regulation. For example, Tara Brach offers a free, guided meditation on choiceless awareness which incorporates the use of the mantra “OM“.

Choiceless awareness is not directed to a specific focus as in narrow awareness focused on breath or sounds; it is open to whatever enters your inner awareness. You might become aware of bodily sensations – pain, tightness, tingling or warmth – in your arms, legs, back, shoulders, feet or chest.

You could become aware of your thoughts as they enter your mind and notice whether they relate to analysing, planning, critiquing, estimating, organising or summarising. You could ascertain whether your thoughts relate to the past or the future – whether they are concerned with past situations/events or anticipated situations/events. The main thing is not to entertain the thoughts but to let them pass you by, like bubbles floating to the surface and bursting.

You could become aware of your emotions generated by your thoughts or sensations and become conscious of anxiety, fear, joy, peace, disappointment, hope or any other positive or negative emotion. You could name the emotion and acknowledge it, e.g. I am feeling sad, and then move your awareness to what else is happening for you.

With choiceless awareness, the focus shifts constantly, and this can become disorientating. What is recommended if this happens is to turn to focused awareness of your breathing to ground yourself again. This is why it is suggested that even with choiceless awareness, the starting point should be some form of focused/narrow awareness so that you can return to the grounding offered by the narrower form of meditation.

As we grow in mindfulness by engaging in different forms of meditation, including choiceless awareness, we can increase our self-awareness and self-regulation and be better able to manage situations that are stressful.

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

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Training the Mindfulness Trainers

In their report, Mindful Nation UK, the Mindfulness All-Party Parliamentary Group (MAPPG) expressed concern that many people offering mindfulness training to organisations are not adequately trained or not trained at all. When there is any major movement, there are all sorts of people who “get on the bandwagon” to make a name for themselves and/or to make large profits. For example, Reg Revans, the father of action learning, complained that unqualified and unskilled people were offering action learning consultancy at USD$10,000 per day and were in it only for the money.

MAPPG stated at the time (2015) that there seemed to be no recognised way for trainers in mindfulness to gain appropriate training and certification. This gap in training and certification is closing with a number of reputable organisations moving to ensure that people who offer training in meditation are themselves properly trained and certified.

Training and Certification for Trainers in Mindfulness and Meditation

Sounds True, is a multimedia publisher founded by Tami Simon in 1985. The organisation provides resources and training to enable personal transformation with a strong emphasis on mindfulness and meditation.

Resources include free weekly audio interviews with inspiring speakers such as Goldie Hawn, downloads of videos & other publications, and online training tools. These resources are provided to support you in your own mindfulness journey.

The Mindful Nation UK report acknowledged the growth of digital mindfulness training in many organisations throughout the UK and viewed it positively as a means of extending access to mindfulness training in the workplace as well as providing back-up resources for trainer-led mindfulness activities. The report acknowledged, however, that there needs to be more research to support the efficacy of digitally-based programs (p.43).

Sounds True combines the best of both worlds – interaction with mindfulness trainers along with digital delivery – in a series of offerings that are available, some paid and others free. For example, the recent Mindfulness and Meditation Summit, one of a number throughout the year, included video presentations by leading mindfulness trainers such as Jon Kabat-Zinn, Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach with Q & A sessions at the end of each presentation. The summit was offered free during the live presentations by 32 speakers over 10 days, along with guided audio meditation practices. A paid, upgrade option is also available to be able to download the video presentations and additional resources from the completed summit.

Sounds True also offers more formal training for potential teachers of mindfulness and meditation. A paid, online course, The Power of Awareness, offered over 7 weeks by Jack Kornfield and Tara Brach includes live video presentations (downloadable), online library resources and other gifts. The online course offers both interactive and personal study resources:

26 mindfulness training sessions recorded live and available on video for download
Personal Mentor and Group Online Study Sessions
Resources for guided meditation practices
Workbook incorporating reflections
Exercises for personal journaling.

Completion of the Power of Awareness Course entitles the participant to a Certificate of Completion provided jointly by The Greater Good Science Center at The University of California, Berkeley and The Awareness Training Institute (ATI).

As you grow in mindfulness and experience its many benefits, you will feel compelled to share your experience and insights with others. One way to do this is to provide training in meditation and mindfulness. However, you really need to have established your own mindfulness practices and undertaken adequate training to be able to effectively helps others as a teacher.

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

Image source: courtesy of pasja1000 on Pixabay

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