	SEARCH Advanced Search
Blog SHOPPING CART MY ACCOUNT

Current Articles | Categories | Search | Syndication

Articles from meditation

Friday, November 20, 2009

bedtime rituals; empty your mind

Excerpt from five good minutes in the evening

If kids can have bedtime rituals, why can’t you? Tonight, be mindful of your bedtime routine and be fully present in each moment-to-moment ritual. Take extra care in brushing your teeth, washing your face, drying your hands, changing into your comfy pajamas, pulling back the blankets, fluffing your favorite pillow, and hugging yourself good night.

Posted By newharb / 9:00 AM / Friday, November 20, 2009

Friday, September 25, 2009

Ways of Seeing: Mindfulness Meditation

Excerpt from Peaceful Mind

Meditation starts with simply observing the mind and body without necessarily trying to change what is seen or the seer. Most people come to meditation with the hope of changing their sense of self, but the inherent framework of a meditation practice is actually not geared towards self-improvement. Rather, meditation is more radically geared towards accepting life as it is.

Posted By newharb / 12:00 AM / Friday, September 25, 2009

Thursday, July 02, 2009

Cultivate Patience

Excerpt from Daily Meditations for Calming Your Anxious Mind by Jeffrey Brantley, MD, and Wendy Millstine, NC

.... Cultivating patience involves being tolerant of life’s temporary, unsolved predicaments and uncertainties while you wait for a solution or opportunity to emerge. Patience requires trust. You nurture your ability to trust that the natural flow of life has moments that cannot be controlled or easily fixed. Life has an uncanny way of working itself out, with or without you.

Posted By newharb / 12:00 AM / Thursday, July 02, 2009

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

The Secret First Step to Mindful Eating

by guest blogger Susan Albers, Psy.D. Acceptance is one of the seven skills of a mindful eater. It sounds counterintuitive that accepting yourself just as you are is a necessary step to mindful eating and losing weight. If you have struggled with disordered eating or dieting, you know first hand the emotional tug-of-war that comes with accepting your natural body shape as it is. Too often, disliking your body or refusing to accept your size leads to repetitive fad dieting, self-hate and a harsh inner critic. You can easily get caught in punishing yourself by depriving yourself of food, wearing uncomfortable clothes, or you might rob yourself of good times because you are afraid to be in a bathing suit around friends. The path to mindful eating begins with looking at your situation threw a new lens. So, what is acceptance? Acceptance is defined as experiencing a situation and having no intention of trying to change it. If acceptance is tou...

Posted By newharb / 12:00 AM / Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Pleasure Healing: What and Why?

by guest blogger Mary Beth Janssen Henry Miller said “the aim of life is to live, and to live means to be aware—joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware.” Amen. Pleasure Healing is a dynamic 21st century approach to waking up to your full human potential, to higher levels of consciousness, and the resultant well-being. Many of us are simply living on the surface. Pleasure healing encourages you to plunge into the depths of who you are—your essence. Pleasure healing activities nurture you and give you a respite from the stressors in your life. They get you to pay attention. You come inside to the core of your being and commune with your higher self. When you pay exquisite attention, your energy shifts and you become the best that you can be—and you have fun while you’re at it! The capacity for delight is awakened and enlivened. Pleasure healing is when we engage in mindful practices, therapies and treatments drawn from the spa world for purposes of nurturing ourselves a...

Posted By newharb / 12:00 AM / Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Monday, May 18, 2009

Urge Surfing - A Mindfulness Skill to Cope with Self-Harm Urges

Find a quiet place where you will be relatively free from distractions and unlikely to be bothered by anyone. Sit in a comfortable position. Write down how strong your urge is on a scale from 0 (no urge at all) to 10 (the strongest urge you’ve ever had). Then, write down how much you feel as if you can handle your urge on a scale from 0 (can’t take it for one more second) to 10 (could handle it for ten hours straight if you had to). Imagine that you’re standing on a surfboard on the ocean in a warm, tropical place. You can see the white, sandy shore in front of you, there’s a slight breeze, and you can smell the salt of the ocean. There are a few fluffy, white clouds overhead, and the sun feels warm on your back. Really transport your mind to this scene. Now, imagine that your urge to harm yourself is the wave that you’re riding. Really notice what the urge feels like in your body. Zero in on the sensations you feel (for example, tightness in your muscles). Now, imagine that you’...

Posted By newharb / 12:00 AM / Monday, May 18, 2009

Tuesday, May 05, 2009

Mindful Acceptance

Your relationship with your body and how you view it can affect everything you do in life. When you’re feeling well and looking good, you give little thought to where you go or whom you might run into. But if you’re feeling self-conscious or preoccupied with something you don’t like about your body, then you might avoid other people or situations where others might see your perceived flaws. For example, one woman admitted that when her acne flared up, she spent days isolating at home. This next exercise will teach you how to accept your body nonjudgmentally. Begin by observing the negative thoughts and criticisms that you have toward your body, such as “I’m fat and ugly” or “I’m too scrawny and need more muscles” or “I hate my thighs.” Take a quiet moment to experience these random negative thoughts. Then, begin to practice nonjudgmental acceptance of yourself by saying aloud or thinking, “I’m not perfect. This is the body that I was born with and I am learning ...

Posted By newharb / 12:00 AM / Tuesday, May 05, 2009

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Keeping Hope Afloat

Hope is an inside job. Although poet Alexander Pope said, “Hope springs eternal in the human breast,” hope springs faster and more consistently when we consciously encourage and consistently practice keeping hope afloat in our hearts and souls. In order to keep hope alive, it’s extremely important that we monitor what we allow ourselves to see, hear, and feel, especially in regards to the media. Because our subconscious minds accept as real not only our personal experiences but also those we watch or imagine vividly, it’s up to us to choose mindfully and wisely what we watch and read. Because images imprint deeply, the disturbing pictures and commentary favored by the media can act as an emotional acid, etching the pain and suffering we witness into our own psyches. Such images can pull the plug on our reserves of hope. Limiting your exposure to sensationalism of all kinds is wise. Allow yourself to be as informed as you feel the need to be but not deformed by overexposure and overs...

Posted By newharb / 12:00 AM / Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Page 2 of 3

First Previous 1 [2] 3 Next Last