Are you getting the most out of your mindfulness meditation? Odds are that you could be getting a lot more out of it, without making massive changes to your practice. The beauty of mindfulness meditation is that it’s a practice that grows with you, one that you can mold with intention. Whether you’ve been practicing […]
Many of us have heard about the benefits of meditation, but sometimes find it hard to do. Fewer of us know about the profound benefits of artistic expression. Creating art, however, is another way to access a meditative state of mind and the profound healing it brings.
Living a mindful life is beautiful. . . It’s a life that unchains you from your deepest fears and gives you a steady, reassuring platform to stand on when obstacles are tossed on your path. As wonderful as mindfulness can be, make no mistake. Mindfulness takes work.
Do you ever feel like your mind is a computer browser with 100 tabs open all at once? You flick through them, a million thoughts swirling around your mind, pulling you down through different ideas, stories, memories, and possibilities. Let me teach you some tools to create a day that’s both productive and fun.
The latest wellness trend spreading throughout the U.S has nothing to do with exercise or nutrition. Instead, people are heading to studios to sit with their breath and their thoughts. Yes, meditation is drawing crowds, according to this Washington Post piece. In Washington D.C. alone, three new meditation centers have opened in the last few […]
Being overweight is stressful on the body, and stress can worsen obesity-related health issues and make it harder to shed pounds—throwing people into a vicious cycle that seems impossible to escape. Now, a new study published in the journal Obesity offers a strategy that may help.
While many studies have focused on how mindfulness meditation affects newcomers to the practice, a new study out of the University of Pittsburgh examined the brains of long-time meditators specifically when they were not meditating. “MRI scans show that after an eight-week course of mindfulness practice, the brain’s ‘fight or flight’ center, the amygdala, appears […]
Walking can be another wonderful opportunity to cultivate mindfulness. Movement can strengthen our awareness and sometimes is a more accessible object for meditation than the breath.
“Greater than the tread of mighty armies is an idea whose time has come.” ~ Victor Hugo You’ve probably noticed that talk about mindfulness meditation is much more common today than it was just a few years ago. Nowadays, I hear about mindfulness meditation from a variety of different sources: on the news, television talk […]
Garrison Institute looks a little like Hogwarts. The retreat center is housed in a former monastery amid tranquil green hills overlooking the Hudson River, 60 miles north and a world away from New York City. Inside the airy chapel on a recent summer afternoon, about 35 educators from the U.S. and at least five foreign […]
When was the last time you sat quietly at your desk and did nothing but think? How would you react if you observed a peer, employee, or manager doing so? Encouraging employees to slow down to focus on the present can seem at odds with a corporate culture of speed and goal attainment.
If you’re pregnant, chances are you’re more than a little bit anxious about childbirth. But according to a new study, a simple practice could make both your experience in the delivery room and your early days as a mother more pleasant.
Your heart is a muscle, and just like any other, you have to work it out to keep it strong. (And by that, we don’t mean heart rate-boosting cardio, though that helps too.) Whether you’re “training” your heart for romantic love, self love, or food love, the best way to flex those heart-warming muscles is […]
Aging has been around for as long as we have—so you’d think we might have accepted it by now. By the same token, you’d think we’d also had enough of cats on the internet, but they’re just so darn cute. The past 20 years has given birth to a booming “anti-aging” industry, replete with creams, […]
In our first installment of the Meditation How-Tos marriage advice series, the Kundalini guide behind Benshen, Desiree Pais, gives you the step-by-step methods you need to practice to stay focused and calm before, during, and after you tie the knot. I’m about to tell you the secret to planning the best wedding of your life.
It is no secret or surprise that practicing yoga can yield tremendous benefits for the body, mind and spirit. Luckily, the explosion of research supporting mindfulness-based therapies in the healthcare field has meant that more investigators are also looking into the specific benefits of yoga.
Although I teach and study mindfulness — we all have our moments. I just gave the biggest speech of my life, for TEDx Athens, and… I procrastinated on writing it. I procrastinated so much I finished a 33-page book proposal instead of writing the talk!
When Rob Stephens, a 22-year-old senior, walks into the Mindfulness Room at Carnegie Mellon University, he leaves his homework and stress at the door. He is surrounded by a waterfall wall, plants, lots of natural light and an open space with cushions on the floor — a 24/7 space is set aside for meditation or […]
There are some things that don’t just metaphorically change your brain, but physically change it, too. Mindfulness (along with narcotics) is one of them, but it changes it for the better. You’ve probably heard all the buzz about mindfulness, and if you practice yoga in a studio on a regular basis, you might even be […]
Nowadays, mindfulness and meditation are often used to mean the same thing, which can be confusing, while not many are clear on what ‘mindfulness meditation’ is and how it differs from either of the above. So here’s our version: Mindfulness is being aware. It’s noticing and paying attention to thoughts, feelings, behavior, and everything else. […]
New research has shown that the use of Mindfulness training in cancer patients can produce negative results to their wellbeing compared to using simple relaxation techniques.
Mindfulness in its most general sense is about waking up from a life on automatic, and being sensitive to novelty in our everyday experiences. With mindful awareness the flow of energy and information that is our mind enters our conscious attention and we can both appreciate its contents and come to regulate its flow in […]
Award-winning emotional wellness app Stop, Breathe & Think announced the launch of their children’s mindfulness app Stop, Breathe & Think Kids for ages 5-10. The free app features customized content and activities based on user emotions and provides tools to help children develop mindfulness and emotional awareness.
You know how it feels when stress starts to infect you from the outside in—you might tense up, your stomach may hurt, or you might even find yourself feeling totally numb. One of the most helpful actions you can take in the moment is to pause, evaluate your mental state, and pull yourself out of […]
You’d have to be living under a rock not to have been recommended mindfulness meditation by someone in the past few years. Big name entrepreneurs swear by it, whole conferences are dedicated to it, and prominent dissenters have even pushed back against the mindfulness craze (so you know it’s really reached peak buzz).
In 2000-2001 I was carrying out action research for my PhD, investigating why some pupils got excluded and others didn’t and what schools could do about it. I introduced meditation and sharing circles to Year 7 drama at a time when it seemed new and radical, and it had a positive impact on the pupils […]
The first 2017 study conducted by the researchers from the Yale School of Medicine, Brown University, and Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, and published in Frontiers in Psychology, has found that women reap more benefits from meditation than men.
Awe is the experience we have when we encounter things that are vast and large and that transcend our current understanding of the world. The Greek philosopher Protagoras believed that our capacity for awe is our defining strength, the engine of creativity, discovery, purpose, and health.
This systematic review adds to the growing literature on integrative therapies for patients with breast cancer and other cancer populations. The latest results are published online and in print in CA: A Cancer Journal for Clinicians, a publication of the American Cancer Society.
We’ve all done things we’re not proud of. Some of us have even done things we’re downright ashamed of. The feelings of guilt, shame, and remorse can be major obstacles to our spiritual development. The good news is that through the practice of mindfulness meditation, we can learn to forgive ourselves and to let go […]
Mindfulness is the practice of paying attention to our present moment experience, whether it be a sight, a sound, a taste, a smell, a sensation in the body, or mental activity (the latter includes emotions and thoughts). Practice it for a few moments or for a few minutes—lying on your bed, sitting in a doctor’s […]
It would be pointless to tell a child engrossed in a coloring book that they’re practicing a form of mindfulness. After all, young children generally live in the moment anyway. Adults around the globe, though, have found that picking up a coloring book is an incredibly useful way to allow everyday worries to melt into […]
My favorite definition of mindfulness is “to pay attention with abiding faith in a loving universe,” from Meditations from the Mat by Rolf Gates. Put more simply, mindfulness is a practice of first observing and then letting go of various thoughts and feelings. It takes practice to learn to rein our brains in, but research […]
As you read this, wiggle your toes. Feel the way they push against your shoes, and the weight of your feet on the floor. Really think about what your feet feel like right now – their heaviness. If you’ve never heard of mindfulness meditation, congratulations, you’ve just done a few moments of it.
Are you a complainer? Do you sometimes feel like anything you do can be complained about? Complaining feels good, like how smoking and eating chocolate feel good. It lets us vent our negativity. Although we know it’s not necessarily good for us but we do it anyway as a guilty pleasure. Researchers have found that […]
Cancer can certainly make it be difficult to be present and feel engaged in what is happening. And for patients who have been diagnosed with advanced cancer or facing end-of-life issues, their mind can be so full of worry and stress, they struggle to be present and aware of the time they have right now.
Can meditation positively affect teenagers’ lives? Absolutely it can! Research in neuroscience and attention provides evidence that meditation strengthens the neural systems of the brain that are responsible for concentration and generating empathy. Becoming more mindful helps children and adolescents better regulate how life circumstances impact their mental health.
When we’re falling behind in one area of our lives, sleep is often the first sacrifice we make. Too often, in fact. According to the CDC, more than one-third of Americans don’t get enough sleep. It’s officially a public health problem. Lack of sleep is making us fat, sick, inflamed, and imbalanced. Over time, depriving […]
For some women, booking a reflective spa holiday can turn out to be a life-changing manoeuvre. Nicola Moulton shares their stories in this piece originally printed in Vogue’s August 2016 issue.
As you read this, wiggle your toes. Feel the way they push against your shoes, and the weight of your feet on the floor. Really think about what your feet feel like right now – their heaviness. If you’ve never heard of mindfulness meditation, congratulations, you’ve just done a few moments of it.
Mindfulness continues to garner significant attention in business. And it makes sense. When companies like Google, Apple, McKinsey, Intel, and General Mills all focus in a particular direction, others will naturally follow—especially when research paints such a compelling picture of the possible benefits of mindfulness, from stress reduction to improved relationships to better problem solving […]
Meditation looks easy. How could sitting on a cushion and doing nothing be hard? Yet when I first learned to meditate, it reminded me of playing with a Russian nesting doll: open it and there’s another just like it inside, only smaller, and then another, and several more, until the littlest doll is finally revealed.
Vipassana, or insight meditation, is the practice of continued close attention to sensation, through which one ultimately sees the true nature of existence. It is believed to be the form of meditation practice taught by the Buddha himself, and although the specific form of the practice may vary, it is the basis of all traditions […]
It was with great dismay and astonishment to read that some members of the Florida Legislature are considering funding $200 million to charter schools as a way of solving failing public schools.
Do you consider yourself your own worst critic? Even the toughest condemnation from a stranger seldom surpasses the judgment people put on themselves. It takes considerable effort, mindfulness, and endurance to stop judging yourself.