20 Minute Meditation

there is hope ...

2011-12-11T12:08:00.000-08:00

Thanks for landing on my meditation blog. I haven't been updating it lately; because I am busier over here on my other site, a little free-form space I set up to share smoke signals from my world up here in northwestern Wyoming. I called it "There is hope in beauty," after sitting through a dark night of soul-rollercoaster riding one night last winter. What shifted me out of that inner whirlwind was stumbling across a piece of art so simple and beautiful that it triggered a surge of hope and faith.

It unleashed, in an instant, the desire to participate in creating the world I want, not grieve about the world I don't. The feeling of this urge was so much simpler than anything I'd landed on so far in my search for understanding.... The urge to detect and create beauty, or simply to sink into the world that is around you with all your senses fully awake, is when humankind is in alignment with the divine. From that place, everything starts.

In this time of massive change and reinvention, when a lot can seem difficult or even hopeless, the most powerful driver that exists to keep us moving forward are the moments when the already-existing beauty around us is suddenly illuminated. When something in us opens, like curtains parting, and we see deeper into the ordinary reality in which we exist. The heart shudders and swoops to life; the pulse speeds up. Delight rides our circuitry like electricity round the grid. We wake.

I don't think this is hokey. It's not sentimental. It's about what happens when we—intentionally or accidentally—make contact with the invisible, benevolent force that is guiding us to something so big and so grand, we so far, can only handle glimpses. Please visit me there @ www.thereishopeinbeauty.com and feel free to read the content on this site, too!

To the Women of Our Time-Spiritual Group by Phone

2011-06-06T07:49:00.000-07:00

I co-created this new Spiritual Group with my dear mentor, and beloved guide and friend, Deirdre Hade. It starts Tuesday June 7th by phone, and will continue weekly. The link is below at the bottom of this message, or you can send me a message personally if you are interested.

To the Women of our Time,

We are entering into a global transformation, which has never been seen before. This global transformation is dependent upon you, to step forward with courage and strength. For our world to heal, the power of the nurturing and caring heart must stand boldly in the face of those who think that nurturing and caring is weak and unnecessary.

You must begin to see yourself as an explorer into the Universe of True Love. In order to accomplish this, there are many places in your psyche that are wounded and broken and bent, which we must heal together so you can truly be the woman of the Power of Heart.

We cannot do this alone. You need the other women. I need you. A single woman alone without her sisters, mothers, daughters, and friends is a woman of isolation. This is the despair and the depression and the cancer that is eating away upon our souls.

When do we reach out to one another? When do we look beyond judgment, beyond separation, and see our other women as co-patriots and guardians of each other’s heart?

We must learn again to be safe with one another. We must heal the wounds between us from the things we’ve said when we were ignorant. And, we must begin to build bridges amongst each other. These bridges are millions of arms that can reach around this world and hug this world. For what you have to give is the hug of wisdom, the hug of truth, the hug of caring, and the hug of a prophetess.

Look within now and see this magnificent priestess of extraordinary ability shining within you. Know that it is so right now, in this moment, and join me, and the many women who have come in wis-DOM.

Join today. Don’t wait another moment to begin to join the sacred hoop of tithing to the care of our planet.

Give your light for one month to the creation of a new Angel upon the earth. We cannot do it without your participation. You are so important –each and every one of you. Your individual light is a ray that, without, we cannot complete our mission.

Join as women of the world meet tomorrow evening to become one mighty voice for the wisdom and the understanding of what it means to bring the Shekinah, Divine Mother, the Miriam of all creation, into our world to heal, to give hope, to uplift, to give grace, to sing song, to take flight, to take root, to sprout wings, to plant fields, to harvest rapture, to taste the delight of the passion - of what it means to be a woman of wisdom.

Thank you. My heart is with you.

Many blessings,
Deirdre

Join now: http://www.deirdrehade.com/daughters-of-miriam.php

there is hope in beauty

2011-03-23T07:22:00.000-07:00

Those wondering, Why aren't you posting more on this blog?, i invite you to read my personal blog, thereishopeinbeauty.com, which combines spirit, nature, life, and beauty. At the moment, I am focusing more on writing and living in the mountains than teaching meditation—but I have plenty of amazing colleagues in meditation for you if you want to learn, from Los Angeles to New York to Vancouver to Chicago to Nashville to London, Australia, and beyond. I can help you find your meditation teacher, beautifully, I hope. Check the links to the right, below, or write me for help.

Nuclear reactors and Meditation

2011-03-15T10:51:00.001-07:00

Those of you who are connected to me on Facebook have seen my fairly frequent posts about the nuclear reactor situation in Japan. I feel very strongly about this moment; it strikes me as an extremely important time to be attuned, and not ignoring what is happening. I thought I'd take a second to reach out to you meditators to spur you all to action - through meditation, through intention, through holding the highest thoughts of positive outcome.

There is a lot of anxiety in the air, and a heavy weight of sorrow and grief. You are probably feeling it. This mood will intensify in the coming days I believe. On the one hand, I want to encourage you, now more than ever, to use your twice daily meditation to empower and stabilize yourself at a time when there is a lot of unrest and fear in the air. Take the time for it. Become settled, become clear, become calm, most of all so that your heart can stay open, and your innovation and ability to help the whole flows fast and clear. In fear and stress, we shut down those capacities, and we get rocked, and disempowered.

Secondly, what I have held on to personally in this moment is the understanding that individuals can affect outcomes and can affect the field of energy of which we are one integral part. We affect the field through our minds and through thought. We were designed this way. Ancient peoples knew this. Some today know this. But on the broad mainstream level, we have forgotten.

Many studies have shown how meditators, when they gather together to meditate, quantifiably shift the levels of violence and crime in the cities around them. They literally generate peaceful waves that ripple out to soothe the whole and change individuals' choices. Other studies show how group intentions, when focused on specific outcomes for healing or physical change, and when done in a place of least excited awareness like after meditation or prayer, show quantifiable physical change.

After all, expectation breeds reality, say the physicists. It is the law of nature; it's how reality works.

Why, then, would it not follow that when a global collective of people meditate, pray, and intend for an outcome of cooling the Japanese reactors and containing damage safely, would work?

I do believe this is what is happening now. Many of my friends, my colleagues, and my spiritual mentors are engaging in this effort, to turn their hearts and minds towards a safe resolution of this crisis, and to contain the damage and protect all sentient beings and the earth.

You can do it too. Will you? Will you meditate today; will you hold this outcome in your hearts and minds today? Know that you have an impact. You, I, we, are all facets of one wholeness. With our minds and thoughts we tug on the fabric of reality and give it shape and form. Take time for some ritual. Meditate. Pray. Create the reality we need. You are that important.

Many people on the more progressive edges are talking about this year, 2011 leading to 2012, as a time of great turbulence and, through the turbulence, a mass awakening to our connection to each other, to the earth, to the whole, and to our monumental divine nature. I know that to be true. But it's coming with a major kick in the ass.

Stay with your practice. Connect with others who do similar practices. Go to a Vedic meditation knowledge meeting. Start meditating again if you have stopped. Keep faith, hope, trust, and your will turned up to high. Because what is also coming in this time, is a massive wave of compassion and alturism. The one "global brain" of connected individuals is firing up as we realize how connected we are and pour light, attention, compassion through those pathways. (Even posting concern on Facebook is part of this). As I wrote to my Jamaican friend yesterday, the phrase that keeps coming to me is, "One Love." Ya Mon.

My One Love thoughts to you and to those in Japan, and my highest thoughts for a safe resolution and compassion in this turbulent time. We are moving towards something, but we need to stay connected to each other as we take each step. Meditate, take care of your own state of consciousness, know that it is having an effect. Watch the news: not so much you go to fear, but enough to know what is going on, and what protective measures you may need to take too. Being awake and aware means paying attention to the crude reality as well as the subtle.

Jai Guru Deva, Amely

Cowboy Wisdom

2011-01-04T14:56:00.000-08:00

On Wyoming NPR this morning, they were talking about a Western songwriter who has some "trademark phrases," including the following: Always ride the horse in the direction it's going. I thought, "He's a Vedic cowboy!" A central tennet of the Veda is that happiness and a richer experience of life comes when you learn to detect, at every moment, where things are evolving forward in your world, and where the blocks and obstacles are, and when you choose to move in the direction of the former, not the latter.

When you meditate, you begin to peel away the noise and distraction so you start to notice, at every moment, where this frictionless path is. It's already there; like a river that is flowing forward, things are always evolving, renewing, moving forward creatively. The problem is, we are often too caught up in our thoughts, expectations, and worries to notice where this "evolutionary path" lies. We end up getting into situations that are dead ends; relationships that repeat old funky patterns, jobs where we feel frustrated and stuck.

From a quieter and less stressed state as a daily meditator, however, we find that we're naturally looking around our environment with sharper vision and more space in our awareness to notice, Where are things flowing more easily, where is there effortless opportunity and support? Where are the "coincidences" and "serendipity" happening to help our ideas come to pass? Where are there obstacles seemingly in the way, blocking us from getting things done?

Nature is always organizing things to evolve and improve and refine. The nature of all things is to grow and keep creating. But there is an aspect of Nature, of course, which involves stasis—non-growth—and an aspect that, naturally, is about destruction, death, and decay. All these aspects exist in every moment of every day, and it's our choice where we align ourselves and our efforts. Going with the forward, creative, growth-oriented flow, or riding the horse in the direction it's already going, is one of the basic principles that begin to truly change your life, IMHE. (That's In My Humble Experience for you non-acronym types).

Best Places on Earth to Meditate, Part One

2010-06-07T09:43:00.001-07:00

Any meditator who lives life somewhat on the move becomes an expert in guerilla meditation. You learn to get down and dirty and meditate anywhere, anytime. A bench on a street corner, a restaurant booth, a cinema seat before showtime—we've all used them as twenty-minute refueling stations and they work just fine. Sometimes, though, you score an unexpected luxury spot.

Last week, after a month living and writing in New Mexico, I did a solo road trip around Southwestern Colorado. On the drive back south, I crossed the state line in the late afternoon, following Route 84 through massive fields of sage-green ranch land to sun-kissed bluffs of golden-red sandstone. It was time to meditate—but where to pull over?

That's when I saw what looked like a massive clamshell carved out of the rock walls that loom over the highway. A sign said "Echo Amphitheater." It's a natural phenomenon, a Hollywood Bowl-like structure of carved-out rock where, I'm guessing, Pueblo indians surely came to hoot, chant, and sing to the sky gods. I drove in as the last tourists of the day drove out. The sun was setting behind the rocks; the whole vast site was open and vulnerable in the way all natural sites are after the visitors leave and they can—sigh—have their space back again.

I took off my shoes and walked towards the concave dome, and what struck me was the silence. It was profound—dense and delicious. It was the dominant feature of the place. If the silence had been a color, it would have been red. Something obvious and unmissable. The acoustics of the rock wall made it so you could not avoid becoming quiet in yourself and falling into alignment with the environment.

I had a little hooting moment under the dome. "Love!" I blurted out and "...love! love! love!" came echoing back. "Thank you!" went my vocal chords and "...thank you! thank you! thank you!" came the boomerang response. Frank Gehry couldn't have done a better job of designing this thing: the reverb was terrific. I found a bench under the shadow of the dome, and as the "golden hour" flooded the landscape all around me, I did my evening meditation before finishing the drive back to my temporary home about an hour down the road, with its old friends and its puppies, goats, and starlight.
(Photo by Paul Chesley)

Next Course: June 17, 2010

2010-01-24T17:18:00.000-08:00

I'll be teaching one last course for beginner meditators in Los Angeles before heading mountain-wards for the summer. If you're interested in learning to meditate, I invite you to come meet me and hear about this practice for about an hour on THURSDAY, JUNE 17th at 7.30pm in Laurel Canyon. Those who'd like to learn will then return for one session per day on the next four days, FRIDAY - MONDAY. To RSVP, and for more information, please write me at info@twentyminutemeditation.com.

If you're new to Vedic meditation, see the links on the far right column, below, about what kind of meditation this is, why to do it, and so forth.

Panic, Freak Outs, and Uncool Behavior

2010-01-24T17:00:00.000-08:00

I've been meditating and teaching meditation for some time. Daily life is constantly delivering new lessons, and new clarifications, about what this practice does to improve life and let us live in better ways. Some recent family events brought home in Technicolor, Surround Sound detail how high levels of unremitting stress can tripwire even the most careful and kind-hearted person into reactivity and fear.

When stress builds up, it erodes your energy to deal with challenges. It muffles your sensitivity to the big picture and to other peoples' needs. It blinds you to the consequences of your actions on those around you. It narrows your viewpoint as your body tenses into a survival mode. All that your body and your reptilian brain know (that's the old part of the brain that dominates under stress, while the sharper, smarter, more recently evolved part gets knocked offline) is that things feel dangerous—and you need to take immediate action to save your butt.

The result of living under sustained pressure? A fun little bounty:

Reactive, rash decisions that you'd never normally make, but that put other people out and force them to have to accommodate your "urgent" needs.
The perception that big changes have to be made immediately, as if your whole life is on 911, when normally you might take a calmer and more thoughtful approach.
Coming at your life, relationships, and future from a place of fear, which drives behavior that can be selfish and exclusive, instead of a place of love, which is co-creative and inclusive.
Feeling generally crap, run-down, and negative about what's happening.

The list goes on. When you notice yourself acting in a way that falls short of your highest potential, or doing or saying things that disappoint you for their lameness—but that feel impossible to change—it's time to do an inventory of your stress levels. Then, take responsibility for your own stressed-state and find a way to release the pressure valve yourself.

When under persistent stress, we tend to blame others for our state. The job situation, the demanding family, the maxed-out world, we say, are making us feel this way. All those factors influence us, sure. They pull at our equanimity like hungry vultures sometimes. But all we can do is change our inner state to meet those external factors.

We can increase our energy, adaptability, grace, humor, and capacity for thoughtful response and avert getting to the point of panic and freak-out. We can cultivate the spaciousness in our awareness, what some call the witness quality. It's the part of your awareness that watches ourselves in action and that, in times of pressure, can go, "Holy wow, I'm so stressed I'm about to do something very uncool, I better go for a walk alone for half an hour." All this is why, basically, I and the majority of my friends meditate daily!

The Still Point

2010-01-24T09:50:00.000-08:00

Thousands of years into the future, when we look back at this funny time in human evolution, we'll smile (or whatever our version of smiling may be) about a few of our early mis-takes.
1. That we prized independence so fiercely, moving as far away from our families as fast and as early as we could, living in boxes alone, transporting ourselves around alone, having babies alone (even if it's with a partner), eating alone, entertaining ourselves alone. When what we really wanted all along was the opposite thing: Connection.
2. That in our rush to independence and progress, we chucked out some extremely useful tools. Such as using techniques for de-exciting the mind and body, like meditation. Things our forefathers knew how to do naturally: Accessing that Still Point within ourselves—that quiet, massive reserve that lies at the seabed of our conscious mind, underneath all the mental noise.
3. That we spent so much time talking about, reading books about, and consulting experts about how to be better, we totally forgot we came equipped with our own inner GPS. It was trying to guide us the right way all along, but like an avalanche beacon buried under huge snowfall, it was muffled and hard to hear.

I use a lot of different tools to find health and happiness, and take the best tips I can from some incredible experts to heal imbalance and make better choices. But these things are all scenes in the Second Act. They come after Act One, which is the fundamental, daily, and totally ordinary process of de-exciting the mind and body deliberately. To me, meditating is finding the way to that seabed again and again--being in or near the Still Point for a few minutes. It is so integral to being fully functional--my favorite new phrase, by the way--that I'm not sure how we're supposed to get by without it.

The Still Point is where the deep rest we need to fuel our multi-faceted, independent-but-actually-when-you-think-about-it-making-new-webs-of-connection-that-are-just-different-from-our-forefathers lifestyles.

The Still Point is where we begin to hear that peep! peep! of our inner GPS, the innate knowledge of what's good for us, who to align with, and when to act and when to just sit still and wait.

The Still Point is where we begin to actually experience--instead of thinking, talking, or reading about--that thing, that lovely indescribable gossamer durable powerful thing: Connection.

Are you In ... or are you Out?

2010-01-23T16:15:00.000-08:00

Just like the contestants on Project Runway, I lay myself before some sharp-minded critics. You can read a few reviews of me from people I've taught by clicking here.

Detox the Mind, Detox the Body

2010-01-05T21:44:00.000-08:00

A full year after its release, my recent book collaboration,

CLEAN: The Revolutionary Program to Restore Your Body's Natural Ability to Heal Itself

with Dr. Alejandro Junger, is still going strong. It's pretty amazing to see how the Community Site that Alejandro developed as part of his Clean program has mushroomed in size. I've not seen anything quite like it; a web forum devoted to a book/program, where ordinary Americans get to share their wisdom, pose their questions, vent their frustrations, and celebrate their achievements in building health, passing on first-person knowledge from peer to peer. If you read it, or if you do the program, drop me a note to let me know about your experience.

My Forecast for Twenty Ten

2010-01-04T20:58:00.000-08:00

A meditator wrote me and asked, Why was 2009 so intensely turbulent and dramatic? I know several people who went through a lot of drama and who are happy that the year is finally behind us. I would love to know more about this.

Here's what I wrote: 2009? Well, to me, it was the time when things truly began to rumble. The clarity about just how unsustainable are our current paradigms rose up like a wave in consciousness—as well as waves in nature—and anyone with a pulse could feel it in their body. It was like a massive inner earthquake. I, for one, had moments of hanging onto the floorboards. But not everyone could recognize it as a collective rumbling. Most people felt the shaking was coming from themselves, their lives, from all the things that urgently needed to change, right now! And so they began to break things left, right, and center, partly to stop the rumbling, to stop the pain.

That breaking apart is important. Old things must be pruned away for new things to grow. But it seems that, because we were so dulled to the small tremors—missing all the cues from earth’s early warning signs—the breaking, when it happened, was a violent chain sawing instead of a gentle clipping. That’s nobody’s fault. It’s just the way the mechanics of nature work. Ignore the early clues of rumbling sidewalks or rising tides, and you get slammed by falling debris and giant surf.

Perhaps we've cleared some overgrowth now. What I'm feeling in myself and in some of the peers and friends who I admire the most, is this sense that NOW IS TIME FOR ACTION. Like warriors who’ve shed heavy armor that was outdated and outmoded, and who’ve been initiated by the storms of change, we now have the courage to go into battle barefoot, semi nude, armed mainly with cunning skills and vast, multi-dimensional awareness. I’m talking about the people with I come into contact daily: writers, mothers, teachers, creators, doctors, scientists, athletes, marines, and more. I have this sense that a generation is rising and is going to go out into the field and make progressive change. These are the heroes. Us. If you can hear or see or sense or feel it’s almost impossible to do otherwise. I'm excited.

So perhaps 2009 was a necessary, uncomfortable shedding of old skin, like a snake slithering out of its scaly leather. Or, as many people have noted, like a caterpillar turning into a butterfly, an evolutionary process, which, it turns out, is incredibly violent. New cells attack old cells inside the organism before the butterfly is created and can unfold her wings and fly.

I still think it's a major transition time; there is no sudden "smooth sailing". It will be turbulent. It will cause great collateral damage. But more of us have been initiated into the new warrior way. We have more skills, more resiliency, and a functional passion that’s grounded in capability not tethered to the stars. In 2010, we'll be more active, less passive. More vocal, more connected, and more powerful.

Mothers Who Meditate

2010-01-03T21:13:00.000-08:00

One of the recurring themes of my Fall and Winter was mothers under pressure. Full-time moms with almost zero home help; business-owning mothers juggling kids, entrepreneurship, and mortgage payments; writer mothers whose minds are pulled in one direction by massive deadlines—and whose hearts are pulled in the other by the needs of their young.

How do we support mothers better in our society? It's a question I think and talk about frequently. The urgent priority: Insert deeply functional rest into the equation of the day. Meditation isn't just about taking a "time out." It is more of a "time in." It allows for a profound de-excitation of body and mind; a return to the still point within, the place where energy comes from and where healing, reorganizing, and rebalancing takes place.

This would all sound like some kind of twee Oprah magazine article, if it weren't for the reality check. Moms, especially those with young kids, have more of a challenge in meditating daily. They don't get the luxury of full twenty-minute sittings. They take what they can. With a baby at their breast. Their kids interrupt. They rise before five a.m. to get their practice done. They pull over their car on noticing the little ones have fallen asleep, and hope to get their full practice in.

I'm not saying fathers don't do this also. Maybe it's because I'm a woman—other women share their stories with me more. But what strikes me deeply are the validations my mothers-who-meditate have been sending about the benefits of their practice during some unsettled months. "It is literally the thing saving me right now." "My four year old said, 'Mom, you didn't shout at me today—it's because you meditated!" and I nearly cried." "There's been a shift in the family; my husband's stress has gone down. He's even started doing yoga on his own." Even with imperfect practice, these mothers have self-engineered a more stable life experience.

One of my favorite things about meditating mothers is witnessing what gets set up in utero. This weekend I ran into a meditator whose three-month old, Sebastian, was bundled against her chest. Lucky boy: Forty weeks of sharing a meditating mother's body chemistry had created a bliss baby, who'd been sleeping through the night since his first days and whose presence was saturated with wise-eyed calm.

Reducing Heart Disease 50% - without statins

2009-07-07T21:30:00.000-07:00

A new study carried out at the Medical College of Wisconsin revealed that over the long term, men and women who practice a short, twice daily meditation had almost 50% lower rates of heart attacks, strokes, and cardiovascular deaths compared to non-meditators. The practice's results were so striking, it was as if the participants who meditated were taking a new class of medications, the authors said.

Meanwhile, a study done of college students at the American University in Washington showed that those who meditated reduced blood pressure significantly, lowering their future risk of hypertension by 52%. Not surprisingly, they significantly improved their ability to cope with school and life stresses, and reduced anxiety, depression, and anger.

D.I.Y. Age Reversal, Stress Resistance

2009-05-20T10:43:00.000-07:00

What's the elevator pitch for Vedic meditation?

When you meditate, it's like you have a new power tool in your kit. Once you learn to operate it, this tool is your go-to for demolishing stress, building a stronger foundation against disease and anxiety, and renovating your exterior so it looks and feels radically younger. (8 years younger on average over time.)

There are lots of tools on offer today to make life better. Meditators love this one because it is easy, effective, reliable, and totally portable. They take it with them wherever they go. Done!

Meditation Builds a Bigger Brain

2009-05-19T10:58:00.000-07:00

We go to the gym to build up our body strength—but what can we do to increase our brain power? This week UCLA's Lab of Neuro Imaging released its findings on meditation's brain-building effects. Researchers used magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) to scan the brains of meditators and non-meditators. Science Daily reported, "Meditators showed significantly larger volumes of the hippocampus and areas within the orbito-frontal cortex, the thalamus and the inferior temporal gyrus — all regions known for regulating emotions.

"We know that people who consistently meditate have a singular ability to cultivate positive emotions, retain emotional stability and engage in mindful behavior," said Eileen Luders, lead author and a postdoctoral research fellow at the Laboratory. "The observed differences in brain anatomy might give us a clue why meditators have these exceptional abilities."

In my experience, meditators frequently report how their responses to the challenges and demands of life become clearer, calmer, more confident and less reactive. They'll report that emotional state is steadier and more optimistic. Cognitive function increases--work gets done quicker and decisions made swifter--and productivity rises. Science is therefore confirming what anecdotal reporting has said for eons; that the brain's remarkable plasticity lets it reshape, reorganize, and upgrade itself throughout adulthood.

This study reminds me of a fascinating piece in National Geographic magazine four years ago, which explains brain plasticity in detail and ends up explaining how meditation increases activity in the prefrontal cortex, contributing to greater happiness. Researchers claim, rather wonderfully, that the noble, hooked-up Tibetan monk above has such heightened activity in that area, he may just "quantifiably" be the happiest person on earth.

Survey Says...

2009-05-18T12:36:00.000-07:00

It's been such a joy to share this practice with all sorts of people from Los Angeles, San Francisco, Nashville, and the UK. Here are some comments that recently found their way into my inbox, from freshly-minted meditators, and from one who has been on the program for a year now.

"I'm constantly so amazed and happy with the way my practice has just woven itself into my life. It's usually so hard for me to sustain any new routine, but this one has definitely stuck with me and created such subtle yet profound changes. All I can say is thank you!!!!!"

"Somehow, I feel as though I have created a bit more space between my inner awareness and the outer me that faces the world everyday."

"It's been an incredible experience so far. I've been able to keep up with my practice and make time for those 20 minutes, which is a really wonderful respite amid my hectic days."

"Meditation has allowed me to shed a tiny bit of what was enabling me to hide out and not step into myself fully. It has spiraled into all facets of my life in such a short period of time and I am so
happy that I chose to have you point me in the right direction."

Thanks for all you comments, and keep sending them, along with your questions.

Bloom Where You're Planted

2009-05-09T19:11:00.000-07:00

The writings of the ancient sages can be very illuminating, but sometimes the most profound truths arise from everyday conversations. The other morning, I attended a breakfast-time social event here in Los Angeles, organized by hostess extraordinaire (and Vedic meditator) Audrey Bernstein as a kind of "cross-pollination" event, a way for people to meet and talk in the broad light of day instead of smokey, dark nights. One of the attendees, a striking English film director, was asked, "Where do you live?" "Well, it seems like I live here in L.A. now," she replied. "I never officially moved here, but apparently I've ended up here." She paused for a moment and then added, with equanimity, "I suppose you bloom where you're planted."

"Eureka!" I thought. That is it. The wisdom of the ages captured in the kind of common-sense lingo our grandmother would have used. You bloom where you're planted. We spend so much energy today distracted by thoughts of how much better life might be if we lived somewhere else; how we might hit on enduring, all-solving happiness if we just changed everything (job, city, partner, lifestyle).

Yet the truth is the simple, wake-up-every-day-and-
feel-content-where-I-am happiness doesn't come from juggling and re-jigging the external circumstances. Sure, sometimes change is necessary and new chapters worthy of starting. But we're mistaken if we think that mythical "other place" will deliver the unconditional sense of quiet fulfillment we seek. We're erroneous if we think that by ploughing through Craigs List for new apartments across the country, we'll no longer be seeking.

We need to locate that stable happiness where we are today (clue: it's inside us, and meditation is a vehicle to go discover it) and then draw off that fulfillment--really use it--by taking action in our lives, using our inner reserves of creativity, our compassion, our humor and grace in all sorts of everyday ways. Like attending breakfasts with strangers on a Thursday morning.

And then we find, almost magically, we're blooming. We're unfolding. Our happiness has been located at its source--literally, its roots. And in not always running "somewhere else, somewhere else," we've given it a chance to bloom.

Simple Truths

2009-04-26T15:19:00.000-07:00

In reading mystic and scholar Andrew Harvey's wonderful book, 'Dialogues with a Modern Mystic,' I came across this quote. Harvey's use of words, especially when describing the mysterious realms of those things that can never adequately be described, but only experienced, are exquisite—and as close to capturing the ineffable as anyone gets. (Amongst other things, he is an expert on the sublime poetry of Sufi mystic Rumi.) This paragraph stands out in its simplicity; I expect all those with an ongoing practice will agree, his words sound somewhere deep and subtle in their bodies with the sweet ring of truth.

"It is very important to realize that there is a person inside who is not dying, who is not anxious, who doesn’t need anything, who is calm, tender, confident and far more deeply himself or herself than this bundle of contradictions and repetitions we confuse with our truth. The one way to remember this person and your origin is through a sustained and patient practice of meditation. As you learn to slowly quiet the mind, your divine identity shyly steps forward.”

C is for Calm

2008-02-22T16:10:00.000-08:00

Thanks to C Magazine for letting me spread the word about this practice, ("the ultimate preventative measure" as I say in the piece) to a new audience. Sometimes people know at some quiet inner level of feeling that they want to meditate, but just aren't sure how to find their way to it. Press stories like this make it easier to find. (Their "C" stands for California, by the way.)

“The Revolution Will Not be Televised”*

2008-02-22T01:00:00.000-08:00

I was asked to speak about meditation at an “inspired cross-pollination” salon called Mindshare, held in LA’s Brewery art district—a sprawling complex of giant warehouses, occupied by artists and designers, in an industrial part of downtown. The challenge? To win over the crowd in only five minutes. The gritty-yet-beautiful setting was a loft overlooking a ghostly train yard, illuminated by the light show of trucks flying down the adjacent interstate. No yoga pants and raw-food smoothies at this party, so I spoke to what I felt in the room.

“Meditation is an act of cultural resistance,” I said. “It’s a silent, yet potent action of refusal.”

The beer-toting artists and architects with black-rimmed glasses looked intrigued.

“When we meditate and give our bodies the chance to restore order and optimize health, we are saying “No!” to some pervasive cultural norms. Those messages telling us that it’s inevitable to be on multiple prescription drugs by your sixties; that it’s ‘part of the deal’ of modern life to have sleepless nights and take Ambien; that depression or anxiety needs the magic bullet of medication.“ I went on, “When we commit to a meditation practice, we’re saying a big “No!”to the idea that we can mortgage our way to happiness and find permanent fulfillment through buying the next gadget; and “No!” to the idea that some expert with a book to sell holds our keys to happiness.”

I told them how 72 million Americans are said to have cardio-vascular disease, if you include the 50 million with high-blood pressure, and how Vedic meditators have been shown to have 87% less cardio-vascular disease than non-meditators. How cancer is the second biggest killer in our country, yet meditation helps the body organize to stay cancer free, with 55% fewer incidences in those who practice. And I told them how one of my recent students, who claimed to have been sleep deprived for “37 years” (she’s 37) reported on the second day of her meditation course, “I slept like a rock last night!”

It’s not a miracle nor a panacea for every ill, but it is a foundational tool for optimal health and personal transformation. Vedic meditation allows the body to unwind the stress that manifests as disease, and lets us locate the ocean of happiness that lies within. In this era, a practice this self-empowering seems like nothing short of a radical act.

*At the exact moment I was debating whether to take “radical meditation”as my thesis, the 1974 Gil Scott-Heron song, “The Revolution Will Not Be Televised,” came on the radio. Green light.
**Some may think this blog post contradicts the “Meditation as Modern Luxury” post below? Different crowd; different way into the subject; same benefits.

The price of happiness: A round-the-world airline ticket?

2008-02-21T07:00:00.000-08:00

“What did you think of ‘Eat, Pray, Love'?” is an unavoidable question when you’re a meditation teacher. My personal response? On the one hand, extremely glad to see meditation, one of the themes of the book, given such tremendously wide exposure via a personality with whom many people easily relate. (Oprah devoted an entire show to the author Elizabeth Gilbert, and they spent several minutes discussing her practice—which if you’re wondering, is different from Vedic meditation.)

On the other hand, the incessant chattiness of the book drove me to distraction. Irony of ironies: in meditation, we learn to pay no attention to the meaning of thoughts as they arise. In this book, we’re forced to get a replay of every wisp of content passing through the author’s mind. Some reviewers called Gilbert’s voice, and its constant monologue, “irresistible”; I confess that by page 200 I deemed it just a little “aggravating.” (And just wait until it’s paired with Julia Roberts’ “irresistible” grin in the upcoming movie version!)

What’s most interesting about the book, though, is the debate it’s inspired in the blogosphere, between those readers who call Gilbert’s journey—one that takes her through the dark night of the soul and out the other side to tropical sunsets—“self-indulgent” and “self-absorbed” and those who say it’s inspirational, triggering their own inner voice to whisper, “Could my life be better than this?” This thread on Amazon gets quite impassioned.

Love it or resist it, 'Eat, Pray, Love' is hugely significant for generating such lively conversation about whether, and how much, each one of us deserve happiness. For that, I raise my hat and give profound thanks to Gilbert--a one-woman catalyst sparking rumblings of change amongst so many. Yet I’d love to know how many of its fans have found a way to their own meditation practice. Does the author’s year-long odyssey around the globe subtly reinforce the idea, so dominant in our culture, that true peace and quiet is acquired only by escaping to other, “more peaceful,” or even “more spiritual” locations (whatever that means)? Do readers become armchair travelers on one woman’s exotic pilgrimage—then dub her self-realization out of reach for themselves? I hope not. The point of meditation is that the meditator need not go anywhere drastic or change her or his whole life to experience peace, fortitude, and joy: the direction is, sit down on the sofa and let the senses turn within. We don’t want to be waiting until we can organize that once-in-a-lifetime trip to Bali to acquire the bliss that is our birthright!

Meditation as Modern Luxury?

2008-01-29T13:50:00.000-08:00

Vedic meditation found its way into Angeleno magazine this month—the high-end glossy that, as its subtitle suggests, is home to all things Modern Luxury. (I was featured in a wellness story as one of “one of LA’s expert de-stressers and detoxers.” Click to enlarge.)

Is “modern luxury” at odds with meditation—a practice that is, essentially, allowing us to transcend the relative world and all its trappings for a few, powerfully restorative minutes? It’s funny, I’ve always told my friends (admittedly with tongue slightly in cheek) that meditation delivered the ultimate luxuries: inner peace and unshakable bliss. After all, in this era of unprecedented wealth for many, and unprecedented access to information and stimulation for most, we’re still doing a great job of suffering. True happiness—the kind of unconditional, unshakable inner contentment that stays switched on no matter what’s going on around us—is no easier to maintain and sustain than it was when we had access to less.

There’s nothing wrong with luxuries like beautiful possessions, sensory pleasures, and breathtaking views from the Amalfi Coast. These things have the potential to awaken our senses, add to our poetic storylines, and tickle our creativity, after all. But, if we are fortunate enough to access these things, we won’t truly enjoy them if we’re distracted, stressed, or too busy organizing the-next-thing-that-might-deliver-happiness to notice what we already have. And if we look to these things for our fulfillment, we’ll always be a little disappointed. Possessions may break, senses may fade with age, and jaw-dropping views may disappear when the bank account dips.

Meditation is the foolproof strategy we use to engineer our own, reliable, non-conditional state of peace and happiness; it allows us to make contact with the quiet inner field where fulfillment is located. In so doing, we find that whatever our life’s particular flavor may be—extravagance? simplicity? austerity?—gets clarified and enhanced. A daily meditation practice is the delivery vehicle for happiness in all these cases, the foundation upon which everything else plays out (whether you do it in ultra-deluxe cashmere or your worn-out college sweats).

Meditation and the Empowered Woman

2008-01-01T15:26:00.000-08:00

I wrote the following in response to a request to develop a meditation course for some top female athletes and outdoorswomen doing a retreat in the Utah desert. Perhaps it will resonate with you, too. For more basic info on this practice, click on the Why Meditate? link at right. Photo borrowed from the amazing Mr. Carlos Serrao

Why would an athletic, adventurous woman, one who’s interested in making tracks and blazing trails out there in the snow, sands, and surf—and maybe even the stars—want to devote the time to journeying deeper in here, into the quieter strata of her own consciousness? Or to put it more succinctly, why, if there’s so much to achieve in this short time on planet Earth, would she want to sit still, doing nothing, for minutes at a time?

Why, after developing the instrument of her body so finely and fueling up her willpower, would she want to, on a daily basis, forget her body and let go of her will—and just “be”?

Because being supports doing.

Humans have known since the dawn of time that we need to access those quiet, and sometimes silent, strata of awareness inside ourselves where the chattering mind isn’t heard and an awareness of our own “isness,” our vaster, wholer nature, can be had. That is the place of being. Still awareness.

Somehow, in the rush to modernize, to do more, do more, get more, get more, we forgot this fundamental.

We need to visit this place now more than ever. Why? First of all, because we are so insanely oriented towards doing in our culture—living four lives at once, it seems—we are overexcited, constantly stimulated, and consequently, wound up and exhausted. This means we tip into stress, lose our focus, and need longer recovery times because the amount of sleep we get nightly is never quite enough to fund the multiple levels of mental and physical demands we’re meeting daily. There’s only one choice: to be effective and to avoid suffering, we need to incorporate deeper levels of rest into what we do. Meditation’s rest is scientifically proven to be deeper than that of sleep. Energy levels and endurance levels rise as a result. Naps and caffeine shots fall out of favor. Potential that is held “on pause” by the weight of stress and busyness gets recruited as the brain finds its own way to a more organized state. Meditators manage pain better; perform more accurately under pressure, and work better as a team.

Secondly, because moments of dynamic rest fund dynamic activity. De-exciting the mind and body through meditation is like pulling back a big archer’s bow. It is unmoving—though, to be fair, it is also often bubbling and buzzing, for reasons you begin to smilingly accept when you learn to meditate—but in all cases, it is quivering with dynamic tension. Come out of meditation and you are charged with momentum and lucidity. You pick an action, you aim your bow of attention, and you find that the new energy and clarity you just scooped up makes your arrow fly extra direct and fast to its target. (Athletes tested in eye-hand coordination had 40% faster responses if they meditated; resilience to stress and physical sickness rises exponentially in everyone who does it.)

Thirdly, because in that place of mental and physical de-excitement, a huge amount of resting, healing, and reorganization, on all levels from gross to subtle, is done. We get renewed. We strip away the old and evolve towards that which is newer, better, and higher. And this is most important of all if we are not only to be happy in our lifetimes (a worthy enough goal!) but especially if we are to be the leaders, inspirations, and lighthouses for others that the world desperately needs now. It’s time to help everyone evolve. It’s time to think for ourselves; to act from a place of community not relentless individuality; to have the awareness to understand our relationship with Mother Earth, and the energy to birth conscious children who will steward the next few decades wisely. We can’t afford at this time to be clouded, scared, and sick, or shrinking from our shadows.

How does sitting with your eyes closed help in this giant mission? Briefly: Nature always wants to restore balance when given half a chance. In the deep rest of meditation, layers of gunk—from cellular distortions that cause illness, to repetitive thoughts that keep us stuck in redundant or painful patterns, to the big fears that we’ll be alone, unsupported, and unloved—get a chance to be released. They’ve just got to go, because all those things aren’t helpful to our evolution. They get in the way of us shining our true light out into the world. They keep us small, fearful, uncertain, fatigued. And so subtly, over time, they peel away, peel away, like leaves off a tree heading into fall. Nothing magical, nothing miraculous: just Nature doing its job of evolving things, keeping growing. It’s not a conquering of our nature that we’re engaged in through this practice—it’s actually a giant letting go.

Though we all want this evolution, and read a hundred books to intellectually “get” it, we can’t successfully “think” our way out of these sticky layers (“just think positive!”) to find fulfillment and grace, we actually need to start having the experience of accessing our reservoir of quiet stability and unchanging happiness. This is part of the bigger effect of meditation. With time, you notice, gosh, my way of being in the world has shifted. My fears are fading. People are responding to me more effortlessly. Almost as if I am adding to their experience by being me. I am present to the now and I can sense or intuit what I need to be doing to be a very relevant player in this drama of life. I am someone who is creative and pushing things forward, not lurking timidly in the back hoping to just ‘make it by.’ I trust in the support I feel—I take more risks as a result.

For outdoors lovers, that experience of being might be had in the midst of action—halfway up a rock face, or gazing at a glacial panorama, you feel that noisy brain fall still and your sense of connection to the whole takes over. Nature is in that instance showing us the truth. But we want to have the reliable, consistent experience of that truth within ourselves. We want to start taking our sanctuary with us everywhere we go, and we want it not to just be a ‘happy accident’. In a sense, we want to become so familiar with that place that it goes from extraordinary (“holy wow!”) to ordinary (“of course”).

By this point, hopefully any notions of meditation being something for bliss bunnies who tell you the sky is blue even when it’s obviously gun-metal gray, or something for those looking for a cosmic escape hatch from life, are getting dissolved. It’s pragmatic. It’s a survival tool. It ultimately becomes a key to thriving.

There’s no magic bullet. Meditation doesn’t solve every ill or sorrow or turn us superheroed overnight (except in rare cases). But gradually we move to a new paradigm when we have a daily meditation practice. We start finding that we can “do less and achieve more,” in the words of the ancient sages. We find we are drawing off that inner, infinite reservoir of energy, creativity, and intelligence, not living in the end zone of adrenaline, anxiety, and sheer willpower that, while effective in spurts, is ultimately exhausting (and can leave a trail of stress behind us). We begin to move wakefully and gracefully through life. We step into our full potential and individual power, little by little.

Being supports Doing. Moments of a meditation practice—if you make the commitment to do it daily, no excuses--become the foundation to a happier, more effective, more productive, less fearful, more inspired life. It takes commitment, it takes curiosity, and it takes a willingness to trust that sitting on the sidelines for a spell, even when it’s boring and you have itchy feet, supports better, faster, and much funner playing overall. Millions practice it; in this doing, doing, doing-oriented world, you have to ask yourself, can we afford to get so far from our being? Don’t we want to unfold more of our potential, and get more out of, and give more to life? Game on!

Why Meditate?

2007-11-16T17:02:00.000-08:00

When it comes to building a balanced, healthy life, meditation is the most powerful tool in our kit. Quieting the mind and deeply resting the body through a short, daily practice allows stress and fatigue to get released, awareness to expand, and happiness to increase.

When stress is dissolved in the body more quickly than it can accumulate, our entire nervous system can function at its optimum level. Our organs and systems function normally, our healing faculties work energetically, and disease and chronic pain have a harder time taking hold. Our rate of aging is slowed down considerably so that we look and feel younger. And with less stress cluttering up the system, our five senses begin to function at finer, subtler levels: we begin to notice more of each moment and the fast pace of life slows down.

When mental chatter and noise are wiped from the mind each day, we gain clarity, lucidity, and calmness of thought. Anxiety is reduced; memory, creativity, and learning ability is enhanced, and we can fit more things into our awareness without feeling cramped. Meditating is like turning down the volume, only to discover there’s extra bandwidth available for use.

The equation is: do less, achieve more. By putting activity on hold for just twenty minutes, and resting profoundly, we fill up our fuel tanks of energy and adaptability. By making contact with the quiet reserves of serenity, strength, and joy that exist deep within ourselves, we experience equanimity no matter what storms are blowing on the surface. By waking up more of our awareness and our innate potential to act, meditation enables us to be the kind of conscious and compassionate citizens that the world needs now.

Why Meditate Now?

2007-11-16T17:01:00.000-08:00

The 21st-century environment is not gentle on any of us. In a single day, our attention is asked to process more information and stimulation than at any other point in mankind’s evolution. Our body must accommodate an avalanche of demands as it attempts to stay balanced and well. That’s why it often feels like sleep is not enough to restore us to balance: human bodies haven’t evolved as fast as the external environment has! We are capable of adapting to this ever-changing world brilliantly—after all, we only use a small percentage of our total mental potential—but we need to get set up for it. In order to flourish, not wilt, we need to balance the busyness with equal amounts of decompression time each day.

Far from being an esoteric practice or escapist indulgence, meditation serves vital and tangible purposes:
-It is a powerful preventative measure against stress-related illness like cardiovascular disease and cancer.
-It reduces anxiety, boosts creativity, and sharpens mental performance.
-It tends to normalize sleep patterns and reduce insomnia.
-It slows down the body's rate of aging significantly.
-It retrains the brain to find fulfillment within, instead of seeking it without. In so doing, meditation often results in a lessening of harmful or unsustainable behaviors.
-It aligns and connects us with our authentic self and ameliorates feelings of disconnection, longing, and lack.
Put simply, meditation allows ordinary people—those with jobs and relationships, ambitions and passions—to be more effective, more efficient, and to enjoy all the opportunities that modern living presents.

What Type of Meditation is This?

2007-11-16T16:23:00.000-08:00

I teach Vedic meditation, a simple, natural, and effortless mental technique that is practiced sitting comfortably in a chair, with eyes closed, for about twenty minutes at a time.

With its roots in the same Indian body of knowledge that has given us all forms of yoga, ayurvedic healthcare, and much of Eastern philosophy, Vedic meditation uses a personalized mantra—a soft and resonant sound that is entertained silently in the mind—to trigger the mind’s descent to quieter levels. Reliable and mechanical, it works for everyone who follows the correct procedure. It involves no concentration, no effort, and no tortuous sitting positions.

It does not require an absolutely quiet environment, a fancy chair, or new-agey accoutrements. Vedic meditators are expert adapters: they learn how to meditate in the office, the airport, or their parked car while their kids rampage in the living room.

It does not require the adoption of any belief system, ideology, or crunchy lifestyle changes. Vedic meditators have been known to enjoy good wine, parties, and fashionable, non-orthopedic shoes.

Since being popularized outside of India over the last five decades, chiefly under the name transcendental meditation, millions of people around the world have learned this effortless technique. Today, all kinds of people practice it as part of their daily routine, from artists and actors to surgeons and CEOs, and from students and single moms to busy employees and retirees alike.

How Can You Learn?

2007-11-16T16:21:00.000-08:00

Learning Vedic meditation is not hard. In less than a week of ninety-minute classes, a student becomes a self-sufficient meditator, with a practice they can use for the rest of their life. It can’t be learned from a book, DVD, or late-night infomercial. The student needs an instructor in the passenger seat to guide them to the correct and subtle use of the technique. After completing the initial instruction, a student can benefit hugely from her or his teacher’s ongoing support and guidance. This helps them meet one of the challenges of meditating: getting to the point where doing it daily becomes second nature.

Those interested in learning must attend an introductory talk, to hear about the practice in full. It is free and lasts about an hour. The next talk is listed at the top of this page; please email me if you'd like to attend. Group courses can also be arranged at a place of business. Please contact me to discuss how meditation can benefit your company or organization.

Who is Amely Greeven?

2007-11-16T16:19:00.000-08:00

I have over a decade of experience working in hectic cities, meeting difficult deadlines, and accomplishing frustrating assignments, in addition to teaching Vedic meditation. Formerly a writer at Vogue magazine and a contributing editor to Harper’s Bazaar and Latina magazines, I have also worked with some of the world’s most recognizable brand names to craft their brand messaging.

After moving from New York to Los Angeles in 2003, I began to focus on the subject of conscious lifestyles by writing about wellness, mind-body balance, and sustainability. Simultaneously, I embarked on a long course of study with one of the preeminent masters of Vedic meditation, both in India and in the American Southwest, in order to bring the practice that I love most to a wider audience. While I do believe that media messages have a certain power in shifting individuals and the planet back into balance, I teach meditation because I know that true and lasting change happens when people are able to slow down, shed stress, and increase their awareness from within.

Based in Laurel Canyon in the Hollywood Hills, I teach in Los Angeles and other cities around the US on a regular basis. I teach groups, private students, and in addition, can offer courses within the workplace and retreat settings. Please contact me to request more information.

2007-11-05T16:15:00.000-08:00

Disclaimer: Amely Greeven teaches independently and is not affiliated with any proprietary organization. Amely expressly disclaims any association with Maharishi Foundation Ltd. (a corporation with limited liability), its programs, its methods, its trademark "Transcendental Meditation" (the common words "transcendental" and "meditation" as defined in Webster's Dictionary but given an initial capital) and its licensees.