The classes consist of a 10/15 minute talk on the subject and 30 minutes of meditation and mindfulness-based resilience practices.This class is extracted from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here: https://www.meditationcourse.live/

The classes consist of a 10/15 minute talk on the subject and 30 minutes of meditation and mindfulness-based resilience practices.This class is extracted from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>

The Loving Awareness Meditation

"Beauty is the purgation of superfluities." - Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (1475 - 1564). An Italian sculptor, painter, architect, poet, and engineer of the High Renaissance. He exerted an unparalleled influence on the development of Western art. From a letter to Rene Lui Descartes XIV (6 March 1540)Michelangelo clarifies here how he believes that art, rather than adding beauty, removes that which is not beautiful.A sculptor chisels away the waste to reveal the form that lies within a block of marble. A meditator builds their skill to release layers of psychological waste. All of the unhelpful beliefs and fears that form over a lifetime and undermine our happiness.We build our skills through continuous practice. Skill with the mind allows us to explore the nature of our minds. Over time we become familiar and comfortable with the mind. Our quirks, and the quirks of others, become clear and lose their intensity.In time we identify with a sense of self that isn't dependent on anything anyone else believes. It isn't a product of our cultural narrative. We can finally discover our personal truth.This week's meditation explores our boundaries. These are boundaries of touch, sensation, emotion, and feeling. In the process, we also can more aware of the very process of awareness.This helps to reveal a sense of self rooted in the Present Moment and grounded in Presence. Free from the endless perambulations of the mind as it searches endlessly for future suffering.From a training session in the Loving Awareness Meditation Course.https://lovingawareness.fmThis class is extracted from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here: https://www.meditationcourse.live/

"Beauty is the purgation of superfluities." - Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (1475 - 1564). An Italian sculptor, painter, architect, poet, and engineer of the High Renaissance. He exerted an unparalleled influence on the development of Western art. From a letter to Rene Lui Descartes XIV (6 March 1540)Michelangelo clarifies here how he believes that art, rather than adding beauty, removes that which is not beautiful.A sculptor chisels away the waste to reveal the form that lies within a block of marble. A meditator builds their skill to release layers of psychological waste. All of the unhelpful beliefs and fears that form over a lifetime and undermine our happiness.We build our skills through continuous practice. Skill with the mind allows us to explore the nature of our minds. Over time we become familiar and comfortable with the mind. Our quirks, and the quirks of others, become clear and lose their intensity.In time we identify with a sense of self that isn't dependent on anything anyone else believes. It isn't a product of our cultural narrative. We can finally discover our personal truth.This week's meditation explores our boundaries. These are boundaries of touch, sensation, emotion, and feeling. In the process, we also can more aware of the very process of awareness.This helps to reveal a sense of self rooted in the Present Moment and grounded in Presence. Free from the endless perambulations of the mind as it searches endlessly for future suffering.From a training session in the Loving Awareness Meditation Course. <a href="https://lovingawareness.fm" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://lovingawareness.fm</a>This class is extracted from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>

The Art of Meditation

When I first began meditating seriously, I found that over time, I became more and more connected to my body. I became more aware of how I felt. Once I had became more familiar with my physical sensations I found it easier to identify my emotions. This connection has a scientific name which is Interoception. Interoception is the source of a great deal of scientific study at the moment, much of it in connection with mindfulness. I found that when I sat and meditated, once I silenced my thoughts, I could experience my predominant emotion directly as a sensation in my body. This was uncomfortable, but not immensely so. I discovered a number of emotional resilience techniques which caused my negative emotions to subside and finally to dissolve completely. These techniques became valuable life tools and the process of releasing my negative emotions became, and remains, part of my daily experience. When I began teaching meditation, I discovered that many of my students were meditating to help them understand their inner experiences and learn how to find happiness despite the painful complexity of thoughts, emotions and behaviours. I have since learned that this connection to the emotions into the body is one of the foundations of meditation and in fact it is the first element of meditation that we experience when we sit and do a body scan or focus on the breath or any other body-based meditation. I taught this meditation to experience this connection... This class is extracted from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here: https://www.meditationcourse.live/

When I first began meditating seriously, I found that over time, I became more and more connected to my body. I became more aware of how I felt. Once I had became more familiar with my physical sensations I found it easier to identify my emotions. This connection has a scientific name which is Interoception. Interoception is the source of a great deal of scientific study at the moment, much of it in connection with mindfulness. I found that when I sat and meditated, once I silenced my thoughts, I could experience my predominant emotion directly as a sensation in my body. This was uncomfortable, but not immensely so. I discovered a number of emotional resilience techniques which caused my negative emotions to subside and finally to dissolve completely. These techniques became valuable life tools and the process of releasing my negative emotions became, and remains, part of my daily experience. When I began teaching meditation, I discovered that many of my students were meditating to help them understand their inner experiences and learn how to find happiness despite the painful complexity of thoughts, emotions and behaviours. I have since learned that this connection to the emotions into the body is one of the foundations of meditation and in fact it is the first element of meditation that we experience when we sit and do a body scan or focus on the breath or any other body-based meditation. I taught this meditation to experience this connection... This class is extracted from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>

The Mind-Body Connection Meditation

Meditating in nature elevates the experience of meditation.Even better if we can find a place where we are completely comfortable.If we are visual people, we can visualise being in nature.If we are not visual thinkers, we can still experience the sense of being in nature.This brings with it the stillness and calmness that we experience when we are in nature. There is nothing special about the experience. We don’t need to do anything. We only need to bring the most evocative natural experiences to mind.For this meditation, Robert uses the mountain stream and the tree. Meditating on a tree is a wonderful experience in itself. You don’t need to do anything other than watch a tree for 20 minutes. Try it. Notice how it makes you feel and then connect with that feeling when you meditate.This class is from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here:https://www.meditationcourse.live/

Meditating in nature elevates the experience of meditation.Even better if we can find a place where we are completely comfortable.If we are visual people, we can visualise being in nature.If we are not visual thinkers, we can still experience the sense of being in nature.This brings with it the stillness and calmness that we experience when we are in nature. There is nothing special about the experience. We don’t need to do anything. We only need to bring the most evocative natural experiences to mind.For this meditation, Robert uses the mountain stream and the tree. Meditating on a tree is a wonderful experience in itself. You don’t need to do anything other than watch a tree for 20 minutes. Try it. Notice how it makes you feel and then connect with that feeling when you meditate.This class is from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>

The Breath, The Mountain Stream, And The Tree Meditation

In 2009, I picked up a book called The Power of Now. It taught me three things that I already knew but had not realised. In other words, it was knowledge but they had not become deep intuitive realisations that formed my model of my reality and on which I acted and made choices.These three things were: The Present Moment is all there is, I Am Not My Thoughts, and I Am Not My Emotions.Realising this was transformative.Over time, I learned that these were not the concepts of the author, Eckhart Tolle, but deep-rooted concepts that reside in the great Eastern wisdom traditions.I teach many meditations and practices but essentially these are foundational concepts.In this meditation from a recent YouTube Live Stream, I focus on the Present Moment.

In 2009, I picked up a book called The Power of Now. It taught me three things that I already knew but had not realised. In other words, it was knowledge but they had not become deep intuitive realisations that formed my model of my reality and on which I acted and made choices.These three things were: The Present Moment is all there is, I Am Not My Thoughts, and I Am Not My Emotions.Realising this was transformative.Over time, I learned that these were not the concepts of the author, Eckhart Tolle, but deep-rooted concepts that reside in the great Eastern wisdom traditions.I teach many meditations and practices but essentially these are foundational concepts.In this meditation from a recent YouTube Live Stream, I focus on the Present Moment.

The Present Moment Meditation

In open awareness meditations, we allow ourselves to experience our present moment experience and everything that arises in itOpen awareness meditation is distinct from focused attention meditations like following the breath where we are focusing on a single element of our experienceIf the mind is busy, we can move from focused attention to open awareness until the open awareness becomes more comfortable.In this session taken from The Meditation Course, Robert teaches three open awareness meditations:The Just Gone MeditationThe Presence MeditationA Pure Open Awareness Meditation.This class is extracted from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here:https://www.meditationcourse.live/

In open awareness meditations, we allow ourselves to experience our present moment experience and everything that arises in itOpen awareness meditation is distinct from focused attention meditations like following the breath where we are focusing on a single element of our experience If the mind is busy, we can move from focused attention to open awareness until the open awareness becomes more comfortable.In this session taken from The Meditation Course, Robert teaches three open awareness meditations:<ul><li>The Just Gone Meditation</li><li>The Presence Meditation</li><li>A Pure Open Awareness Meditation.</li></ul>This class is extracted from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>

Open Awareness Meditation

Clarity meditation is a mandala meditation where are we focus our attention on an object.This isn't like Trataka meditation however, where we focus on a single point. Instead, we are resting our awareness on the entire object patiently, and noticing what arises as part of this experience.To practice this, it is best to use an object that has some meaning to you and is either shiny or translucent. This isn't essential, but it is helpful.As we rest our awareness on the object, thoughts and memories and sensations and the sense of the object itself, or whatever your mind associates with it, arises in your experience.These associations will, as you continue to patiently observe the object, arise and subside.Eventually, the essential visual elements of the object come more clearly into focus and the mental noise subsides.Finally, the mind will select a visual element of the object and all of the mental noise will diminish and finally subside entirely.What this exercise does, is to help us to become aware of how our minds project onto our environment almost all of the attributes of any object or person or experience or phenomena of any kind.Clarity meditation separates the common observable reality of colours, textures, shapes, contrasts, reflections and patterns from all the attributes that our minds project into our experience such as memories, thoughts, and sensory experience that is brought to the experience by our memory and programming.Clarity in meditation is the realization of the actual reality and what we personally bring to our experiences.This class is extracted from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here:https://www.meditationcourse.live/

Clarity meditation is a mandala meditation where are we focus our attention on an object. This isn't like Trataka meditation however, where we focus on a single point. Instead, we are resting our awareness on the entire object patiently, and noticing what arises as part of this experience.To practice this, it is best to use an object that has some meaning to you and is either shiny or translucent. This isn't essential, but it is helpful.As we rest our awareness on the object, thoughts and memories and sensations and the sense of the object itself, or whatever your mind associates with it, arises in your experience.These associations will, as you continue to patiently observe the object, arise and subside. Eventually, the essential visual elements of the object come more clearly into focus and the mental noise subsides.Finally, the mind will select a visual element of the object and all of the mental noise will diminish and finally subside entirely. What this exercise does, is to help us to become aware of how our minds project onto our environment almost all of the attributes of any object or person or experience or phenomena of any kind.Clarity meditation separates the common observable reality of colours, textures, shapes, contrasts, reflections and patterns from all the attributes that our minds project into our experience such as memories, thoughts, and sensory experience that is brought to the experience by our memory and programming.Clarity in meditation is the realization of the actual reality and what we personally bring to our experiences.This class is extracted from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>

The Clarity Meditation

I taught the forest lake meditation in this class on The Loving Awareness Meditation Course on 21 April 2021.This class is structured around a set of practices and concepts that we have been working with for some time in the courses.Recognition of the internal reality of thoughts, emotions and awareness is important to making progress in meditation and to build resilience.This practice works with focus, awareness, thoughts, and emotions. It is a practice that is useful in releasing anxiety for instance.Visit the course site to learn more.The Meditation Coursehttps://www.meditationcourse.live/

I taught the forest lake meditation in this class on The Loving Awareness Meditation Course on 21 April 2021. This class is structured around a set of practices and concepts that we have been working with for some time in the courses. Recognition of the internal reality of thoughts, emotions and awareness is important to making progress in meditation and to build resilience. This practice works with focus, awareness, thoughts, and emotions. It is a practice that is useful in releasing anxiety for instance. Visit the course site to learn more. The Meditation Course https://www.meditationcourse.live/

The Forest Lake Meditation

Sitting in meditation, what arises most commonly in our experience is sound, physical sensations, thoughts and emotions.In this meditation, Robert guides the student through the process of allowing ourselves to be aware of these phenomena (As they are called) while they arise in our awareness, to acknowledge them, to note them, and to witness them passing out of our awareness to be replaced by another phenomena.Noting, or labelling, is one of the most frictionless ways to deal with these experiences that we encounter during meditation and which are most likely to intervene in our practice, draw us out of our awareness of the present moment and into the inner narrative, which of course, is fed directly from the external narrative that is so divisive and fear-driven.By connecting to the present moment and allowing the thoughts and emotions and sensations and sounds to pass we train ourselves to let go of the fear and anxiety that this narrative brings.Learn about the online meditation courses here:https://www.meditationcourse.live/

Sitting in meditation, what arises most commonly in our experience is sound, physical sensations, thoughts and emotions.In this meditation, Robert guides the student through the process of allowing ourselves to be aware of these phenomena (As they are called) while they arise in our awareness, to acknowledge them, to note them, and to witness them passing out of our awareness to be replaced by another phenomena.Noting, or labelling, is one of the most frictionless ways to deal with these experiences that we encounter during meditation and which are most likely to intervene in our practice, draw us out of our awareness of the present moment and into the inner narrative, which of course, is fed directly from the external narrative that is so divisive and fear-driven.By connecting to the present moment and allowing the thoughts and emotions and sensations and sounds to pass we train ourselves to let go of the fear and anxiety that this narrative brings.Learn about the online meditation courses here: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>

Noting Thoughts and Emotions as they Arise in Meditation

This meditation is a favourite among my student base and has evolved over the time that I've been teaching it.It originally began as the typical and famous mountain meditation and developed over time because I needed a metaphorical illustration to contrast the experience of focused awareness of something that is static and seemingly unchanging in nature against the experience of the awareness of the continuous flow of time past the seemingly static observer.The sense of the static nature of the observer and the rock and the space between the eyes helps to illustrate a continuous flow of life and change through time and past the awareness.Each element highlights the other.This meditation was taught in a livestream video I broadcast on the 16th of May 2020 in the Mindfulness-Based Resilience Course Group.Learn about the courses here;https://www.meditationcourse.live/

This meditation is a favourite among my student base and has evolved over the time that I've been teaching it.It originally began as the typical and famous mountain meditation and developed over time because I needed a metaphorical illustration to contrast the experience of focused awareness of something that is static and seemingly unchanging in nature against the experience of the awareness of the continuous flow of time past the seemingly static observer.The sense of the static nature of the observer and the rock and the space between the eyes helps to illustrate a continuous flow of life and change through time and past the awareness.Each element highlights the other.This meditation was taught in a livestream video I broadcast on the 16th of May 2020 in the Mindfulness-Based Resilience Course Group.Learn about the courses here; <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>

The Mountain Stream Meditation

The Meditation Course Podcast is meditations from the regular, weekly meditation classes that I teach in-person or online. The classes offer continuous training rather than just an introductory course. So if you are learning meditation, or returning to meditation, you can pick up where you left off and always find new and engaging content. I run live-streamed meditation classes and there will be at least one new meditation each week. Subscribe now to my course websites for free to be notified when I post new content. The Meditation Course is at https://meditationcourse.live.

There is a set of practices that I teach which are largely based on the wonderful Buddhist tradition of Metta Bhavana which is the practice of Loving Kindness.These practices are the ones I teach as part of #LovingAwareness..Essentially they are meditations in these areas: appreciation, gratitude, compassion, self-compassion, and connection.In this weeks meditation I have added all of these into one single meditation that I am calling the #LovingKindness meditation.This is from a session I taught in The Meditation Course.Details are here: https://www.meditationcourse.live/

There is a set of practices that I teach which are largely based on the wonderful Buddhist tradition of Metta Bhavana which is the practice of Loving Kindness. These practices are the ones I teach as part of #LovingAwareness.. Essentially they are meditations in these areas: appreciation, gratitude, compassion, self-compassion, and connection. In this weeks meditation I have added all of these into one single meditation that I am calling the #LovingKindness meditation. This is from a session I taught in The Meditation Course. Details are here: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>

The Loving Kindness Meditation

A meditation for the moment that we find ourselves in.Right now, we need to find practices to restore some balance to our lives.For most people, for most of the time, the present moment is overwhelmingly good. It is the contents of the mind as it searches for potential threats that pollutes our present moments.Gratitude in the context of meditation is actually a translation of Metta Bhavana, a Pali word which is actually a collection of practices that use positive emotions to help us understand our relationship to the world, and to ourselves and which help us balance our lives in a way that is more helpful for our happiness.Gratitude meditation helps us to find balance and enables us to become familiar with our emotions and inner experience without difficulty.I learned this particular practice at the London Buddhist Centre in Bethnal Green and I have used it ever since and teach it reasonably regularly. I am not a Buddhist but I have great respect for them curating these practices over thousands of years.Gratitude practices are the most transformative that I can widely teach and this practice is part of the backbone of my gratitude practice repertoire.The modern mind, led by the common narrative, inserts what it learns into all of our experiences until every experience can become one of comparison and judgement. This is why people can change so deeply when they learn the gratitude practices, literally at least half of their universe becomes free of the sense that it isn’t good enough.Learn about the online meditation courses here:https://www.meditationcourse.live/

A meditation for the moment that we find ourselves in.Right now, we need to find practices to restore some balance to our lives.For most people, for most of the time, the present moment is overwhelmingly good. It is the contents of the mind as it searches for potential threats that pollutes our present moments.Gratitude in the context of meditation is actually a translation of Metta Bhavana, a Pali word which is actually a collection of practices that use positive emotions to help us understand our relationship to the world, and to ourselves and which help us balance our lives in a way that is more helpful for our happiness.Gratitude meditation helps us to find balance and enables us to become familiar with our emotions and inner experience without difficulty.I learned this particular practice at the London Buddhist Centre in Bethnal Green and I have used it ever since and teach it reasonably regularly. I am not a Buddhist but I have great respect for them curating these practices over thousands of years.Gratitude practices are the most transformative that I can widely teach and this practice is part of the backbone of my gratitude practice repertoire.The modern mind, led by the common narrative, inserts what it learns into all of our experiences until every experience can become one of comparison and judgement. This is why people can change so deeply when they learn the gratitude practices, literally at least half of their universe becomes free of the sense that it isn’t good enough.Learn about the online meditation courses here: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>

The Gratitude Meditation

This practice is part of the core training of The Meditation Course and is fully supported for course members with additional content, training and personally coached support.To find out more about the course, visit our website at: https://www.meditationcourse.live/You can also just subscribe to our mailing list and get updated regularly with new sample content and offers.Compassion isn't an emotion, it is a basic drive for social animals. Chimpanzees for instance, consistently display compassion.I define Compassion as: "The drive to alleviate the suffering of a being that we identify with".Compassion allows us to connect, understand and forgive. It is an essential social lubricant that can overcome the friction of living in a complex world with conflicting loyalties, ideologies, beliefs, perspectives and behaviours.Compassion needs to be practiced. We can easily fall into an unhelpful cycle of being protective and avoidant. Compassion practices can help us to connect and form the important fulfilling relationships that are essential to growth and healing.There has been a significant amount of study into compassion and the effects of a compassionate outlook resulting in the formation of a therapeutic practice known as Compassion Focused Therapy. This has a promising degree of success in some difficult areas such as psychosis and eating disorders.For the rest of us, developing compassion through practicing the Compassion Mantra will help to build a compassionate response in our interactions. It is particularly useful for defusing potential unhelpful angry or resentful responses.May you be well, may you be happy, may you find peace of mind.

This practice is part of the core training of The Meditation Course and is fully supported for course members with additional content, training and personally coached support.To find out more about the course, visit our website at: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a> You can also just subscribe to our mailing list and get updated regularly with new sample content and offers.Compassion isn't an emotion, it is a basic drive for social animals. Chimpanzees for instance, consistently display compassion. I define Compassion as: "The drive to alleviate the suffering of a being that we identify with".Compassion allows us to connect, understand and forgive. It is an essential social lubricant that can overcome the friction of living in a complex world with conflicting loyalties, ideologies, beliefs, perspectives and behaviours.Compassion needs to be practiced. We can easily fall into an unhelpful cycle of being protective and avoidant. Compassion practices can help us to connect and form the important fulfilling relationships that are essential to growth and healing. There has been a significant amount of study into compassion and the effects of a compassionate outlook resulting in the formation of a therapeutic practice known as Compassion Focused Therapy. This has a promising degree of success in some difficult areas such as psychosis and eating disorders.For the rest of us, developing compassion through practicing the Compassion Mantra will help to build a compassionate response in our interactions. It is particularly useful for defusing potential unhelpful angry or resentful responses.May you be well, may you be happy, may you find peace of mind.

The Compassion Meditation

Human beings are genetically programmed from 2 billion years of evolution.Physiological and psychological responses are fine-tuned for the threats that have been predominant throughout this 2 billion years.Often these threats are existential. They are threats to our life such as predators, venomous insects and snakes, precipices, hazards and hostile competitors.The system that has evolved to negotiate this landscape of threat is unconscious and uncompromising in its response to a potential threat. When your mind or your physiology perceives a threat, it switches on a system known as the sympathetic nervous system.The sympathetic nervous system elevates your heart rate and blood pressure and pumps stress chemicals into your body to keep you alert and awake and prepared to fight or run.This is also what happens when you notice an unexpected sum of money missing from your bank account. Your body is kicking in to protect you from a physical threat when to resolve the issue all you normally need to do is make a phone call.When we multiply that unconscious physiological response by the multitude of potential threats to our financial security, our personal integrity, our personal security, our relationships, and threats to whichever groups we identify with, what can result is a thing called chronic stress.Chronic stress consists of a negative feedback loop of stress, anxiety and often worry. These three elements feed into each other maintaining the levels of stress chemicals in our body and keeping us alert so that we can deal with the threat that our physiology is designed to respond to.I teach many ways of intervening with this system and one of the most useful is to re-learn relaxation. I say re-learn, because we literally unlearn it as we grow up.In the modern world, relaxation is having a glass of wine and watching the TV. Relaxation is actually a process of releasing the musculoskeletal tension from our bodies.One of the many things that we lose due to her modern lives, is a connection to our physiology. By connection, I mean the capacity to be aware of things like tension.Re-learning relaxation is a slow process of reconnecting with our bodies and gently, patiently, and over time, training ourselves to be able to relax.I teach a number of practices that assist in relaxation. In this class, the meditation combines two of the other meditations into a relaxing 35 minutes which will assist you with calmness, relaxation, and sleep.This class is extracted from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here:https://www.meditationcourse.live/

Human beings are genetically programmed from 2 billion years of evolution. Physiological and psychological responses are fine-tuned for the threats that have been predominant throughout this 2 billion years. Often these threats are existential. They are threats to our life such as predators, venomous insects and snakes, precipices, hazards and hostile competitors. The system that has evolved to negotiate this landscape of threat is unconscious and uncompromising in its response to a potential threat. When your mind or your physiology perceives a threat, it switches on a system known as the sympathetic nervous system. The sympathetic nervous system elevates your heart rate and blood pressure and pumps stress chemicals into your body to keep you alert and awake and prepared to fight or run. This is also what happens when you notice an unexpected sum of money missing from your bank account. Your body is kicking in to protect you from a physical threat when to resolve the issue all you normally need to do is make a phone call. When we multiply that unconscious physiological response by the multitude of potential threats to our financial security, our personal integrity, our personal security, our relationships, and threats to whichever groups we identify with, what can result is a thing called chronic stress. Chronic stress consists of a negative feedback loop of stress, anxiety and often worry. These three elements feed into each other maintaining the levels of stress chemicals in our body and keeping us alert so that we can deal with the threat that our physiology is designed to respond to. I teach many ways of intervening with this system and one of the most useful is to re-learn relaxation. I say re-learn, because we literally unlearn it as we grow up. In the modern world, relaxation is having a glass of wine and watching the TV. Relaxation is actually a process of releasing the musculoskeletal tension from our bodies. One of the many things that we lose due to her modern lives, is a connection to our physiology. By connection, I mean the capacity to be aware of things like tension. Re-learning relaxation is a slow process of reconnecting with our bodies and gently, patiently, and over time, training ourselves to be able to relax. I teach a number of practices that assist in relaxation. In this class, the meditation combines two of the other meditations into a relaxing 35 minutes which will assist you with calmness, relaxation, and sleep.This class is extracted from The Meditation Course which you can learn more about or subscribe to here: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>

Meditation for Stress and Anxiety - The Relaxation Meditations

A change of plan for the syllabus from now on due to current events.I had intended to teach box breathing this week but I shall instead focus on the body scan.Historically, I haven't taught as the body scan very often largely because, very simply, people don't have the time to do it. however, I believe that For a number of us, there will now be more time, temporarily at least.So here is my version of the body scan.The thing that makes it different to how it is normally taught is that it includes relaxation as well as just focusing on the sensations in the body which is the common teaching method.The reason for this, as you will know if you have listened to my other teaching, is that relaxation relieves stress and the opportunity to learn to relax should not be missed.By doing the body scan with relaxation, not only do we reconnect with our physiology, but also we develop the skill of relaxation which is incredibly important in these difficult and stressful times.Want to Learn More?https://www.meditationcourse.live/

A change of plan for the syllabus from now on due to current events.I had intended to teach box breathing this week but I shall instead focus on the body scan.Historically, I haven't taught as the body scan very often largely because, very simply, people don't have the time to do it. however, I believe that For a number of us, there will now be more time, temporarily at least.So here is my version of the body scan.The thing that makes it different to how it is normally taught is that it includes relaxation as well as just focusing on the sensations in the body which is the common teaching method.The reason for this, as you will know if you have listened to my other teaching, is that relaxation relieves stress and the opportunity to learn to relax should not be missed.By doing the body scan with relaxation, not only do we reconnect with our physiology, but also we develop the skill of relaxation which is incredibly important in these difficult and stressful times.Want to Learn More? <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/ </a>

The Body Scan

This practice is part of the core training of The Meditation Course and is fully supported for course members with additional content, training and personally coached support.To find out more about the course, visit our website at: https://www.meditationcourse.live/You can also just subscribe to our mailing list and get updated regularly with new sample content and offers.It is traditional in secular mindfulness courses to teach the body scan.The body scan was popularised by Satya Narayan Goenka (1924 – 2013), commonly known as S. N. Goenka, a Burmese-Indian teacher of Vipassanā meditation.The body scan consists of focusing on the body as you move your awareness over it.I also taught the body scan in my early days as a meditation teacher but soon realised that it wasn’t delivering as a practice because it takes at least 25 minutes. Most people come to mindfulness because their busy minds and lives are overwhelmed. They are among the last group to dedicate that amount of time to a practice that takes so long to benefit them.My focus has always been on accessibility and inclusivity. If a practice doesn’t resonate with my students and it doesn’t benefit their lives then I will find a replacement that will deliver the same benefits.That replacement is the Destress Meditation.We hold stress as muscular tension in our bodies in the same places: the hands, shoulders, back of the neck and from the forehead down to the abdomen.In this meditation, we move the focus of our attention through only these high stress places on the body, but with the focus on relaxation. We relax the area of focus with the outbreath.The order is: hands, shoulders, back and sides of the neck, down the face starting from the forehead and finally relaxing the throat, chest, upper back, areas around the pelvis, abdomen, lower back slowly then back again.

This practice is part of the core training of The Meditation Course and is fully supported for course members with additional content, training and personally coached support.To find out more about the course, visit our website at: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a> You can also just subscribe to our mailing list and get updated regularly with new sample content and offers.It is traditional in secular mindfulness courses to teach the body scan.The body scan was popularised by Satya Narayan Goenka (1924 – 2013), commonly known as S. N. Goenka, a Burmese-Indian teacher of Vipassanā meditation.The body scan consists of focusing on the body as you move your awareness over it.I also taught the body scan in my early days as a meditation teacher but soon realised that it wasn’t delivering as a practice because it takes at least 25 minutes. Most people come to mindfulness because their busy minds and lives are overwhelmed. They are among the last group to dedicate that amount of time to a practice that takes so long to benefit them.My focus has always been on accessibility and inclusivity. If a practice doesn’t resonate with my students and it doesn’t benefit their lives then I will find a replacement that will deliver the same benefits.That replacement is the Destress Meditation.We hold stress as muscular tension in our bodies in the same places: the hands, shoulders, back of the neck and from the forehead down to the abdomen.In this meditation, we move the focus of our attention through only these high stress places on the body, but with the focus on relaxation. We relax the area of focus with the outbreath.The order is: hands, shoulders, back and sides of the neck, down the face starting from the forehead and finally relaxing the throat, chest, upper back, areas around the pelvis, abdomen, lower back slowly then back again.

The Destress Meditation

The Meditation of No Meditation is partly a meditation and partly an experience of Mindfulness. It is a window into a present moment that isn’t crowded with repetitive thoughts, memories, anxieties, tasks, priorities, worries and all the other baggage of the 21st century.Mindfulness is “The undistracted awareness of the experience of the present moment.” - My definition.The attributes of the Meditation of No Meditation are:- It is entirely frictionless for most new meditation students.- It can be done almost anywhere and at any time.The Meditation of No Meditation is a simple listening exercise that has elements of meditation in it, along with elements of mindfulness.The Meditation of No Meditation isn’t a traditional mindfulness meditation and it won’t build mindfulness like the key mindfulness meditation practices such as 'following the breath' do, but if we follow the Way of No Meditation, practicing it the way I will explain, will help you to build a regular practice! Once you have a regular practice, adding to it becomes possible for even the busiest people. This is a science backed habit formation technique known as Habit Stacking. Once we have one good habit in place, we can amend it or add other new habits to it.To find out more about The Meditation Course, visit our website at: https://www.meditationcourse.live/You can subscribe to our mailing list and get updated regularly with new content and offers.

The Meditation of No Meditation is partly a meditation and partly an experience of Mindfulness. It is a window into a present moment that isn’t crowded with repetitive thoughts, memories, anxieties, tasks, priorities, worries and all the other baggage of the 21st century.Mindfulness is “The undistracted awareness of the experience of the present moment.” - My definition.The attributes of the Meditation of No Meditation are:- It is entirely frictionless for most new meditation students.- It can be done almost anywhere and at any time.The Meditation of No Meditation is a simple listening exercise that has elements of meditation in it, along with elements of mindfulness.The Meditation of No Meditation isn’t a traditional mindfulness meditation and it won’t build mindfulness like the key mindfulness meditation practices such as 'following the breath' do, but if we follow the Way of No Meditation, practicing it the way I will explain, will help you to build a regular practice! Once you have a regular practice, adding to it becomes possible for even the busiest people. This is a science backed habit formation technique known as Habit Stacking. Once we have one good habit in place, we can amend it or add other new habits to it.To find out more about The Meditation Course, visit our website at: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a> You can subscribe to our mailing list and get updated regularly with new content and offers.

The Meditation of No Meditation for Sound

Healing is a process of reconnectionHuman suffering arises from a sense of disconnection of rejection.I am not keen on the concept of 'advanced' meditation but you will probably need to have meditated for some time to be comfortable with this meditation.HumansWe are adaptable and resilient. We inhabit the most hostile places on our planet, and the inhabitants can thrive there.We can endure cruel and inhuman punishments just so long as we have a sense of purpose and meaning.Connection to a higher purpose is the key to resilience.What we cannot cope with is rejection. Rejection is a significant trauma that destroys lives and undermines happiness.We need to learn how to come home to our entire human family and reconnect to the natural world.Healing is learning how to reconnectEmpathy is a big step forward in healing our personal and collective trauma.Empathy is how we share our suffering, learn from each other, and grow together. Words are meaningless if we avoid allowing ourselves to feel. We then become incapable of feeling how others feel, and conflict becomes inevitable.The Karma Yoga Meditation helps us to reconnect. To the present moment. To our bodies. To our minds and finally to nature, to others, and all other beings.The meditation brings us as close to our bodymind (subconscious mind or namarupa as the Buddhists describe it) as we can be because we become aware of the nature of choice and we can observe how it arises in our minds.If you'd like to learn about the online meditation course, go here:https://www.meditationcourse.live/If you have any questions, message me or contact me through my website.

Healing is a process of reconnectionHuman suffering arises from a sense of disconnection of rejection.I am not keen on the concept of 'advanced' meditation but you will probably need to have meditated for some time to be comfortable with this meditation.HumansWe are adaptable and resilient. We inhabit the most hostile places on our planet, and the inhabitants can thrive there.We can endure cruel and inhuman punishments just so long as we have a sense of purpose and meaning.Connection to a higher purpose is the key to resilience.What we cannot cope with is rejection. Rejection is a significant trauma that destroys lives and undermines happiness.We need to learn how to come home to our entire human family and reconnect to the natural world.Healing is learning how to reconnectEmpathy is a big step forward in healing our personal and collective trauma.Empathy is how we share our suffering, learn from each other, and grow together. Words are meaningless if we avoid allowing ourselves to feel. We then become incapable of feeling how others feel, and conflict becomes inevitable.The Karma Yoga Meditation helps us to reconnect. To the present moment. To our bodies. To our minds and finally to nature, to others, and all other beings.The meditation brings us as close to our bodymind (subconscious mind or namarupa as the Buddhists describe it) as we can be because we become aware of the nature of choice and we can observe how it arises in our minds.If you'd like to learn about the online meditation course, go here: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>If you have any questions, message me or contact me through my website.

The Karma Yoga Meditation

This practice is part of the core training of The Meditation Course and is fully supported for course members with additional content, training and personally coached support.To find out more about the course, visit our website at: https://www.meditationcourse.live/You can also just subscribe to our mailing list and get updated regularly with new sample content and offers.Labelling the Quality of Thoughts is a meditation that I have devised. It is possible that I heard it somewhere but if so I have no recollection of that. It is an extension of the brilliant ‘noting’ or labelling practices devised by the great mediation teacher Mahasi Sayadaw.It is an extension of the Labelling the Thoughts Meditation in which the mind needs to choose which of two categories the thought resides in. The categories are arbitrary and are designed to make the choice a frictionless experience as if there is any relevance or importance the minds of many students become bogged down in a spiral of choice.When the technique is practiced as designed the choice is almost a guess. A light and frictionless decision. The meditation is designed to bring our attention to the point where a thought arises in the mind.For more information and training visit https://www.meditationcourse.live/

This practice is part of the core training of The Meditation Course and is fully supported for course members with additional content, training and personally coached support.To find out more about the course, visit our website at: <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a> You can also just subscribe to our mailing list and get updated regularly with new sample content and offers.Labelling the Quality of Thoughts is a meditation that I have devised. It is possible that I heard it somewhere but if so I have no recollection of that. It is an extension of the brilliant ‘noting’ or labelling practices devised by the great mediation teacher Mahasi Sayadaw.It is an extension of the Labelling the Thoughts Meditation in which the mind needs to choose which of two categories the thought resides in. The categories are arbitrary and are designed to make the choice a frictionless experience as if there is any relevance or importance the minds of many students become bogged down in a spiral of choice.When the technique is practiced as designed the choice is almost a guess. A light and frictionless decision. The meditation is designed to bring our attention to the point where a thought arises in the mind.For more information and training visit <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/</a>

Labelling the Quality of Thoughts

This practice is part of the core training of The Meditation Course and is fully supported for course members with additional content, training and personally coached support.This is a meditation that I devised to help calm stubbornly busy mindsIdeally, use it as a precursor to following the breath and not as a replacement for it.Or use it to calm your mind if your mind is stubbornly busy.• Begin by focusing on the breath for about five or ten breaths.• Construct the image of a candle. Notice that the flame flickers in time to your in and out breaths. Add as much detail as possible to the candle. If the image collapses, reconstruct it.• Return your focus to the breath and keep moving the focus between the candle and the breath until the thoughts have quieted.If the mind continues to wander add more detail to the candle.If the mind is still busy, you can count breaths while you are meditating both while you are focusing on the breath and on the candle.Want to Learn More?https://www.meditationcourse.live/Want to Learn about me?https://bromleymindfulness.org.uk/about/robert/Want to Support my work?https://www.paypal.me/bromleymindfulness

This practice is part of the core training of The Meditation Course and is fully supported for course members with additional content, training and personally coached support.This is a meditation that I devised to help calm stubbornly busy mindsIdeally, use it as a precursor to following the breath and not as a replacement for it.Or use it to calm your mind if your mind is stubbornly busy.• Begin by focusing on the breath for about five or ten breaths.• Construct the image of a candle. Notice that the flame flickers in time to your in and out breaths. Add as much detail as possible to the candle. If the image collapses, reconstruct it.• Return your focus to the breath and keep moving the focus between the candle and the breath until the thoughts have quieted.If the mind continues to wander add more detail to the candle.If the mind is still busy, you can count breaths while you are meditating both while you are focusing on the breath and on the candle.Want to Learn More? <a href="https://www.meditationcourse.live/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.meditationcourse.live/ </a> Want to Learn about me? <a href="https://bromleymindfulness.org.uk/about/robert/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://bromleymindfulness.org.uk/about/robert/ </a> Want to Support my work? <a href="https://www.paypal.me/bromleymindfulness" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://www.paypal.me/bromleymindfulness</a>

 The Candle And The Breath

The Meditation Course

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