If you have a regular meditation practice, you will gradually develop mindfulness skills. But if you want to speed up the process, to go deeper and wider, here are four methods we call accelerators:
…Continue reading Go deeper, wider, faster in your meditations
It is a classic joke that if you do not have time to meditate for twenty minutes, you should meditate for an hour. Admittedly, there’s a germ of truth there. But the joke is perhaps not so funny for an overworked single mom or nurse pressured by understaffing.
…Continue reading How Long Do You Need to Meditate? A Review of the Science
Micropleasures are small experiences of pleasure that last less than a minute. They are short meditations that explore, create and cultivate positive and pleasant thoughts and feelings in everyday life. Regular training in micropleasures helps us create a personal culture of satisfaction.
…Continue reading Micropleasures: Delicious small meditations
One way to understand meditation is that it is about creating a habit in our consciousness of constantly trying to be more aware.
For example, when we meditate and notice that we have been distracted, we are helping establish the habit of turning our attention back to the object or technique. We are also establishing the habit of equanimity by transforming distraction into its opposite, concentration.
…Continue reading How to get on the habit train
Nurture Positive is the name we give to all the meditation techniques that involve the intentional cultivation of positive mental images, mental talk, and positive emotion. This category of techniques is perhaps the most colorful and diverse of any other category. In it, we find many different techniques such as song, prayer, mantra, calligraphy, icon paintings, feng shui, and many others.
…Continue reading Nurture positive: Create and cultivate positivity through mindfulness
I enjoy listening to podcasts and lectures on mindfulness and meditation, and here are some of my favorites from last year. Some of them are older than 2020, but they were new discoveries for me.
Most of them are for listening only, but there are also some videos.
I hope they are useful and inspiring to you.
…Continue reading My mindfulness podcast recommendations from 2020
If you have some trauma in your life, you may need to take certain precautions when meditating. While meditation can provide deep relief, calm, and even healing, it can also reveal trauma previously repressed or denied.
…Continue reading Trauma-sensitive mindfulness: PTSD and meditation
In October 2020, I had the honor of being invited to give a presentation on mindfulness for pain relief at The Embodiment Conference. It was an online conference with many of the world’s greatest teachers in meditation, yoga, trauma treatment, and other embodiment modalities.
…Continue reading Video: Mindful Relief Fundamentals for Chronic Pain
(.. and all guided meditation in general ..)
There are many good reasons to use meditation apps to get started with your meditation practice.
However, if they are based on guided meditation, they can keep you from strengthening your attention skills in the best possible way.
…Continue reading Is it time to put away the training wheels? How meditation apps hold you back
Ever since mindfulness became a well-known concept in medical research around 1985, studies of meditation and pain have been central to today’s contemplative neuroscience.
Below is a table with an updated overview of the neurological effects meditation has on pain.
…Continue reading Effects of meditation in patients with chronic pain