Blog
Grounding in Light Meditation
Looking for a new way to practice mindfulness and feel more grounded? I love this "grounding in light" meditation written by Nancy Napier and found in her book "Sacred Practices for Conscious Living." If you're just starting out with mindfulness meditation, you can read more about mindfulness in an earlier post. You may also want to give mindfulness of breathing a try before you engage in this meditation.
Quiet your inner critic with self compassion
If you’re like most women I know and work with you’re way more critical of yourself than you are towards other people. We have a harsh voice running in our minds all day long: “why did I say that?” … “I really should lose weight” … “I’m so stupid and can’t do anything right”.
Instead of judging yourself, try self-compassion. Dr. Kristin Neff describes self-compassion as having the same kindness and understanding towards yourself that you have towards others when they are having a difficult time.
Mindfulness in Everyday Life
How many times have you gone through your day on automatic pilot - and then wondered where the day went? This happens to everyone in many ways. Maybe you had a conversation with a friend and realized you didn't even know what they had just said to you because your mind was somewhere else. You might have been driving and suddenly noticed that you missed your exit because you had been so caught up in your thoughts.
My favorite meditation book for women. And a meditation exercise to get you out of your head!
Playful and sensual - not words that you'd typically associate with meditation! But Camille Maurine and Lorin Roche, Ph.D. opened my eyes to different, more sensory and flexible ways to meditate and enjoy it. Meditation Secrets for Women is full of accessible meditations and practical ideas about how to incorporate meditation and a meditative state of mind into your daily life.
Mindfulness of Emotions Meditation
Want a new skill to practice that will help you feel less overwhelmed by your emotions? Try this mindfulness of emotion meditation. It's one way to practice making some room for unwanted emotions. When you allow difficult emotions to be present, they have less control over your behavior. The purpose of this practice is give you space to slow down and observe your inner experience. Emotions can be the scariest when you become focused on running away from them. In this exercise, you have the opportunity to practice doing the opposite. Over time, with continued practice, emotions or fear of emotions no longer have to drive your life!
Mindfully eat chocolate. An exercise in mindful enjoyment.
As a follow-up to a previous post on the basics of mindful eating, I'm sharing a mindful chocolate meditation. Chocolate tends to bring up strong associations and sometimes strong emotions and/or cravings for individuals. What do you think of when you hear the world "chocolate" or are reminded of chocolate? How does it make you feel to eat chocolate? Chocolate may be associated with pleasant events or pleasant feelings. Or it may be associated with guilt, overeating, and overindulging. Perhaps it can bring up both for you.
What is mindful eating? An adaptive way to manage the modern food environment.
It's the holiday season and food is everywhere! How does one navigate the modern food environment without gaining weight? This is a tough question to answer, as we have evolved in an environment where food was scarce. In order to survive, it was best to eat anything and everything available. Our world has evolved too quickly for us to keep up - in terms of keeping our bodies healthy. For many people in the developed world, food is too available given our biological predisposition. Food is also designed to hit the "need more" and "want more" triggers, as it's particularly sweet and fatty - good things for beefing up before the next food shortage.
Mindfulness of Breathing
As promised in an earlier post on mindfulness and the benefits of regular mindfulness practice, I want to share with you a mindfulness of breathing exercise. For years I have been guiding clients through this and similar exercises.