I love it when someone writes honestly about their struggle to become a meditator -- that's what I did in "Choosing to Be." Here is Priscilla Warner sharing her experiences as a new meditator. Her story feels pretty familiar to me. ~Kat Tansey 
This is an excellent article about how to bring the practice of mindfulness to work with you. Consider picking one of these ideas and trying it out for a few days. Then consider adding another and see where that takes you. These are simple ideas that can produce powerful results with practice. . .
Kat Tansey 
I was fortunate to see Congressman Tim Ryan from Ohio speak at the Wisdom 2.0 Conference in February. I bought an early copy of his book, "A Mindful Nation" in which he presents studies on the effectiveness of mindfulness training in the military, healthcare, and schools.
Tim Ryan is stumping not for votes but for his book -- to awaken the American public to the many benefits of meditation and mindfulness. He is a fresh face in the mindfulness circuit, and a passionate, well informed advocate.
Read "A Mindful Nature" and share it with others -- it, to me, is a beacon of hope and a call for action. Where can you go to introduce others to mindfulness practice and make a difference?
Kat Tansey 
This is a brief, nicely done video of how one military officer is sharing meditation and mindfulness with military families stationed in Germany.
I like the format of this class, particularly the part at the end where participants get to speak about how what they are learning affects their lives. Instead of everyone leaving the class to go their separate ways, this allows participants to develop a sense of a shared community, which reinforces their practice and their connection to the class.
<Kat Tansey, www.choosingtobe.com> 
"How does the mind act like tea?"
"Just as tea takes the shape of whatever container it’s poured into, the mind tends to assume the shape of whatever thought, emotion, or sensation captures its attention. But it doesn’t just assume the shape of what is arising– it identifies with the object of attention." ~ Eric Klein
Eric Klein is a superb teacher who brings a very special energy to his teachings I've not encountered elsewhere. He doodles. Not just any doodles, but doodles that touch us, inspire us, make us laugh -- as we take a deep breath, go inside ourselves, and smile.
<Kat Tansey> 
The end of January is often a time of reckoning for those people who make New Year's Resolutions. If you are beginning to beat yourself up because you haven't kept your promises to yourself, perhaps it's time to take a new approach.
I like Elisha Goldstein's idea for a Mindful Strategy for a Resilient New Year much better than the old New Year's Resolutions. Resolutions hardly ever work, then we beat ourselves up, give up, and wait until next year to start over. It is not the resolution that is so critical, it is our ability to be resilient in the implementation of it. Read what Goldstein has to say, and give yourself a do-over for 2012.
Kat Tansey 
I love meditators who have a sense of humor -- hope you enjoy Tim Brownson's tongue-in-cheek post as much as I did! 
--Amy Gross was editor in chief of O, the Oprah Magazine from 2000 to 2008. She writes . . .
"After decades of the monthly magazine cycle, the thrill of spotting a fresh idea, shaping it for our audience, commissioning the right writer --that thrill had subsided to a small tickle. Instead I was finding challenge, purpose, and meaning offsite, in mindfulness meditation, the Buddha’s prescription to end suffering. He discovered that if you pay attention to what’s going on, moment to moment—without trying to hold onto what feels good or push away what feels bad—your relationship to pain changes."
Kat's Note: I'm not advocating that we drop out of our busy lives -- but learning to meditate provides respite and a new perspective that will help reduce stress and increase our happiness.
Kat Tansey 
An Eastern practice that once seemed like something more common among the hippy crowd, meditation is making its way into the mainstream workplace, and its results are doing everybody good. 
Sometimes meditation practitioners take themselves much too seriously. I've had this espresso drinking, cell phone talking Buddha doll on my dashboard for many years, so I really identified with this article by Sarah Hampson in The Globe and Mail. If you find yourself reacting to suggestions about the value of meditation like this: "Do what? You've got to be kidding! I don't live on a mountaintop. I live in the real world." --- then you too will enjoy Sarah's article. Being human doesn't mean you can't benefit from meditation. Most importantly, you don't have to give up your sense of humor. Most of us who meditate are not enlightened beings who live on mountaintops. I still have temper tantrums, think badly of others sometimes, have little fits of anxiety (there, I've said it). But imagine who I would be if I didn't meditate? 
"I want them (people who are suffering) to know that their experience is part of our humanity, part of the difficulty and the gift of human incarnation and we are all called upon to bear our sorrows as well as our joys, and that we can bear them and they’re not the end of the story. Our sufferings don’t define us and we don’t have to be so loyal to our suffering that we don’t see that there is a greater mysterious majestic dance that we’re a part of." ~~ Jack Kornfield, talking about how he works with people who are dealing with past trauma as they learn to meditate. 
More research studies are showing that practicing lovingkindness meditation positively affects health and well-being. In some of these studies, the benefits were revealed after only twelve hours of meditation.
~~ Note from Kat Tansey ~~ I had a lot of resistance to this practice, but when I finally broke through and was able to incorporate it into my own practice, I experienced significant healing -- both emotionally and physically. I write about this in Chapter Eight of Choosing to Be. Via Pamir Kiciman 
"Contemplating the goodness within ourselves is a classical meditation, done to bring light, joy, and rapture to the mind. In contemporary times this practice might be considered rather embarrassing, because so often the emphasis is on all the unfortunate things we have done, all the disturbing mistakes we have made. Yet this classical reflection is not a way of increasing conceit. It is rather a commitment to our own happiness, seeing our happiness as the basis for intimacy with all of life. It fills us with joy and love for ourselves and a great deal of self-respect." ~~ Sharon Salzberg, from her book Lovingkindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness
(This is a long excerpt, but well worth reading, as is this extraordinary book.) |
If you want the greatest benefits from your sleep, whether eight-hours of uninterrupted sleep, or a four-hour insomniac’s sleep, you've got to meditate!
Meditator Jerome Stone makes this statement, and as a meditator and a researcher about insomnia, I know this to be true.
There are times in our life when we sleep more hours straight through than other times -- but if we practice meditation, we find that we don't need to get in a panic about a bout of what we might think of as that dreaded "insomnia."
I occasionally wake up around 3 am to go to the bathroom. When I come back to bed, I arrange the pillows for a backrest and sit in my usual meditation position. Often just 10-15 minutes of meditation brings my brainwaves down to the more relaxed Alpha state.
Then I just change the pillows back to the sleeping position, turn off the light, and drop off like a baby.
(Note: Many "experts" will tell you to get out of bed when you wake up and go do something else until you are sleepy again. I suspect these people are not meditators.)
Enjoy Jerome's post -- his blog is worth following, in my humble opinion.
Kat Tansey 
I've seen a few videos of meditation flashmobs -- the problem is that watching one via video is pretty much like watching paint dry. Here is a live report from a Brit who had her doubts but went to see for herself what it was like actually being part of one.
Naseem Khan reflects on her experience in this article -- "Meditating in public places has always made me uneasy, but this flashmob was half an hour of the purest sanity..."
I'm grateful to Naseem for her report -- much more interesting than a video. . .
Kat Tansey
This is a nice collection of resources and creative ideas for helping children learn how to meditate.
Kat Tansey 
Researchers have found that long-term meditators have larger amounts of gyrification ("folding" of the cortex, which may allow the brain to process information faster) then non-meditators.
I usually like to focus on the proven benefits of meditation that might be realized within a relatively short time frame, however this recently publicized study has such significant implications for the long term that it caught my eye.
Imagine -- over the 20 years of my meditation practice, my cortex has folded much more often than that of non-meditators. I love picturing all those folds -- and I'm looking forward to developing many more. . .
Kat Tansey 
As conceptualizations of ADHD now increasingly recognize the importance of executive functioning and self-regulation in the disorder, mindfulness meditation — which can be thought of as a type of attention/cognitive exercise program that is focused in improving self-regulation — is a complementary treatment that is well worth investigating.
<This study is small, but encouraging. -- Kat Tansey> 
This is a wonderful article about Resolutions that are grounded in wisdom and might very well enrich our lives, even if they are not made at the beginning of the New Year. In fact, we might consider reading this list every month, just to remind us of the possibilities for the rest of the year. <Kat Tansey> 
As a 20-year practitioner of mindfulness meditation, and the researcher/author of Insomnia Relief Recipes several years ago, I am intimately familiar with the major impact that meditation can have in resolving sleep problems. I am delighted to share this article by Ruth Buczynski about a study comparing the results of meditation versus medication to help people sleep better -- there really is a better, safer way to get the sleep you need, and it's not spelled medication.
Kat Tansey
This article was written by Ruth Buczynsky, who is the President and Co-Founder of The National Institute for the Clinical Application of Behavioral Medicine. NICABM, as it is called, has created a program to help practioners learn now to use mindfulness to help themselves and their patients.
In this piece, Ruth provides an excellent description of what mindfulness practice is all about. This is one of the best descriptions I have read -- enjoy! 
I hadn't thought about this stage of my meditation practice for some time until I read this excellent article. As I reflected on my life before meditation (20 years ago), I remembered my need for drama, for big wins, for brilliant breakthroughs in order to feel alive.
And then I remembered that at some point in my meditation practice I too experienced this passage, this time when I felt that being a meditator had made me boring. I was comparing my mind to the minds of my friends and colleagues who valued the drama in their lives. As I let go of these comparisons, I felt a sense of freedom and was able to experience the joy that mindfulness brings.
I think you will find this Psychology Today article quite insightful.
Kat Tansey 
Like most meditators, I faced many obstacles in establishing a regular meditation practice. So I've created a free e-book that identifies the obstacles to establishing a meditation practice and provides steps to overcome them.
Many people have been helped in establishing their meditation practice by the information in this brief e-book. This is practical information you won’t get anywhere else. It’s short, with stories, pictures, and a bit of humor.
PS - I created this Promise of Mindfulness Meditation blog you are reading now because I know without a shadow of a doubt that the practice of meditation makes a difference in peoples' lives. I hope you will follow this publication and share it with your friends. Together we can change the world -- one mind at a time!
Kat Tansey 
In today’s busy world, it’s easy to lose our connection to the Still Point, and the further we get from it, the less it even occurs to us that we might need to visit it – because, after all, we have THINGS TO THINK ABOUT! THINGS TO DO!
When I hear people say they have tried to meditate, but it is just too hard, I know they have forgotten about (or maybe never knew) the inestimable and necessary beauty of the Still Point. . . 
"When I started meditating three years ago, I read countless “how to” guides. I watched instructional videos. I listened to guided meditations. I went to workshops. I tried very hard to learn to meditate the “right” way. I tried it with my eyes open and closed. I tried meditating while staring at a candle flame, a single carpet thread, and about every other way imaginable. I have meditated with Gregorian chants, Tibetan chimes, classical and ambient music, native drumming, chirping birds, and white noise in the background.
After all of this and with time and practice, I have come to the conclusion that there is no right or wrong way to meditate. What is “right” is whatever works for me that day."
--Debbie Hampton is a remarkable woman who writes about the neuroplasticity of the brain. She knows a lot about this, as she has learned and applied a wide variety of modalities to help herself recover from brain injury. Meditation is an important part of her continuing progress and her life today. 
Harvard psychologist Ellen Langer is one of the leading experts on mindfulness from the perspective of Western academic psychology.
The way to pay sustained attention, she says, is to notice new things. Staring at something quickly becomes boring, so don't just look at the whole object, look at its parts, and their relation to the whole. You'll find things you never noticed before right in front of your nose.
~~ Note from Kat Tansey about this article~~
Mindfulness is about Paying Attention with a capital P and a capital A. In my book Choosing to Be, I learn about paying attention when I see how completely absorbed my kitten Catzenbear is while watching the whirlpool of water as it drains out of the tub.
In this excellent 5 minute video, Ellen Langer gives some other examples that illustrate how easy it can be to begin a practice of mindfulness. |
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