Meditation, Self Awarness, Healing, Spirituality
In this episode of A Quiet Mind I will be smashing some paradigms of spirituality, enlightenment and do-goodery.
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A guided meditation using the sounds of nature to calm the mind
Life is difficult. There is pain and suffering and at times there is a deep misery or depression beyond our control. Sometimes we fail and sometimes the world just kicks our ass.
It's ok to fail, forget, blow it, lose it and fall. To move forward we must allow ourselves to look the fool, to trip up and make mistakes. The saying goes, fall six times and get up seven but no one tells you how long you can stay down. I say, stay down as long as you need to and you'll know when to get back up.
Just know this: what keeps us down is how we talk to ourselves in our heads. Watch out for self deprecating thoughts and actions but don't try to use positive mantras to get up again. Your job is to just watch and observe where the thoughts come from and become aware of how you may be sustaining your own failures by your thinking patterns.
We can move forward without the harsh inner critic and the condescending mind chatter. Be aware of the difficulties in going against the stream of normalcy and learn how to coast where you need to coast.
Things to remember:
We don't need to feel bliss to be ok in life. That type of thinking denotes that there is someone who is feeling bliss and someone who is not. Bliss just is and we are that.
Create time to be natural and discover what the natural state is without using the mind to define what is natural.
Give yourself permission to fail.
Watch out for holding on to expectations of perfection.
See that it's all perfect when the judgements and expectations are silent.
In life we are goal driven and it's ok to have a goal to pay the bills and put food on the table but we should be weary of holding onto goals of being a perfect person.
Observe without taking notes and labeling your progress. Just watch the one who watches. Once we start to become aware of the witness inside, the pure awareness that we are, we can experience the non dual (our natural state) first hand.
Reminders on the path
Don't worry so much.
Just relax.
You're only doing the best you can.
Fully embrace every aspect of who you are right now.
Rest in being here right now.
Decided to feel good.
Don't try so hard.
Just stop
Just sit
Just be yourself
Be the ONE
When sitting in meditation be comfortable, don't try to meditate.
Watch your breath go in and out.
If you have thoughts, no problem just keep sitting.
If your butt hurts that's fine just keep sitting.
If you can't sit, just sit anyway.
Once upon a time there was a thought, and the thought was, "a quiet mind is all you need." A quiet mind is all anyone needs to feel happy, peaceful, whole and complete. If your mind just stops and becomes still, what remains? It’s simple really and anyone can see this. What remains is quiet and quiet by its very nature is peaceful and peace is nice. Peace feels good, it feels serene, and who doesn't like serene?
Boy oh boy, what a crazy thought (to quiet the mind) because now there was a goal and a mission, an impossible mission at that. I must tell you, if you give the hyper analytical mind of an obsessive being such as myself a goal, you better watch out because it will stop at nothing to achieve said goal. So began the twenty year quest to achieve the impossible, to achieve having a quiet mind.
What a wonderful journey it has been. I have seen so much and learned so much. I'm literally bursting with things to share with you at this plateau of understanding, you the listeners, you the fellow travelers. If I haven't said it before or often enough, I want to say it again and again. Thank you, fellow adventurer from the bottom of my heart for being here, for being my listening ears. I bow to you all with the deepest, heartfelt gratitude. Without you my friends, I would never have been able to make such a difficult journey.
How can one achieve a quiet mind and feel peace, happiness and contentment all the time? Those questions and many others will be answered in this next series of podcasts that will deal directly with how to quiet your mind. What do you need to do? All you need to do is show up and listen. I’m here to remind you that you are what you seek and happiness is your true nature. We are THAT and a quiet mind can bring peace, happiness and contentment to your life. Is that the end? No I think it's only a good start but it's a powerful start. So together let’s do this thing.
Do you have lizard brain behind the wheel? Scared? Fearful? Angry? Defensive? This podcast addresses our survival instinct we may have while driving and how we can evolve beyond a scared reptile into a calm, kind and compassionate traveler. Know the warning signs of lizard brain driving:
You are not your car; this is not your hermit shell that needs protection. Do you want to defend your car and your opinion or do you want to feel peaceful and calm in this moment? Remember you are not your story, your feelings, emotions, thoughts or possessions. You are something much bigger than that. Your co-pilot is calm.
It's Monday morning and your late again. Your stuck in bumper to bumper traffic and losing it. That jerk in the convertible just cut you off and that crazy person behind you is ridding your ass. Your trapped behind a Wal-Mart truck that is spewing diesel fumes into your passenger side widow making you choke and tear up. The widows rolled down because the air conditioner is on the fritz again and your spritzing like an animal. You can feel the rage beginning to build up inside you.
It's hot, smelly, overcrowded and insane. Your on the edge…
How can you possibly meditate or relax in this situation? Listen to this podcast to learn some ways to help you navigate through the chaos and noise. Explore some innate abilities that help you cope and relive your suffering, dis-ease and stress.When the attachment to thoughts subsides our mind naturally gets quiet and we begin to experience gaps between thoughts. In these gaps we can hear the soft -spoken voice of the heart. This soft-spoken voice is a compass, that can point us to the direction we need to travel - inward.
In life sometimes we need guidance and advice so we may look outward to our friends and family for counsel and wisdom. My advice to you is this, seek the inward path to your own inner teacher, it’s there for us at anytime and any place. This guide has always been there within us we were born with it, at times it’s just difficult or impossible to hear. The voice of the heart is quiet, soft and non intrusive. On the other had the external noises of life are often so harsh and loud that the soto voice of our heart is drowned out completely.
What can we do to hear our inner guidance? Daily seek a place of solitude and calm and simply stop. Set everything down. Be still. Take several long slow deep breathes in and out. Allow yourself to settle. Each day we have the opportunity to acknowledge this inner stillness and the soft voice of our can our heart-mind. Each day we can make this moment of stillness a priority. It’s up to us.
