Happy Monday!
I hope you’ve been well. I’ve had a rollercoaster of a week – lots of emotional highs and lows. At times like these, I tune into my personal practices – meditation, yoga, journaling – to help keep me grounded. Have you been successful in developing your own grounding practices? Have you discovered anything new there?
As you may know, my morning routine is my most sacred ritual. Without if I feel tossed into the day. What I’ve been noticing lately is that even before I open my eyes in the morning, my mind is already racing. It’s almost as if a part of me wakes up early, drinks two cups of coffee, and is sitting there waiting for me to stir, anxiously holding onto a thousand different thoughts – and as soon as I wake up, wham, she throws them at me all at once. It’s been making morning meditation difficult – and also essential. By the end of the 20 or so minutes I dedicate to stillness, that part of me has usually settled, at least enough for me to narrow my focus. And I’m learning that’s a lot of what meditation is about. The thoughts will always be there. Few learn to fully escape the thinking mind. But we are equipped with the ability to concentrate. And as I practice concentrating on the space between the thoughts, I am able to nurture stronger sensations of calm and quiet.
Calm and quiet.
How do those words make you feel?
Is it a resounding, “yes, please!?” Or perhaps the idea of being idle makes you feel a bit uneasy. For me, sometimes it’s both these responses. I love the idea of relaxation, but there is a part of me that always wishes to be doing.
That’s what’s so cool about mindfulness. You ARE doing. It might not look like it from the outside, but when you practice narrowing your focus, you may find there is plenty to explore!
Last week’s posted meditation is an opportunity to do just that. It is an exploration of the space in and around your heart and an invitation to tap into all the love and goodness that resides there, and allow it to grow, maybe so big that you can’t help but share it with others. I hope you enjoy it.
I can’t leave you today without apologizing for any ads you’ve experienced in my Youtube videos. The platform has taken a liking to my channel, which is great, but is then placing ads right smack in the middle of my guided meditations, which definitely is not great. As some viewers have kindly pointed out, if you let the video run through once, the ads won’t play the second time. I’m hoping to be able to control ad placement very soon. If you’re not already subscribed to the channel, I would love it if you did. This will help me gain control over ad placement more quickly. Thank you for your patience, and I hope you’ll keep returning to mediate with me!
That’s all for today. Thank you for letting me spend a little time with you! I hope you have a week filled with lots of love and happy times, or at the very least, a little stillness.
Bye for now!