January 3 – Anchoring in the present moment

Dear Friends, In the second recording from the retreat I’m using for inspiration this month, DaRa Williams guides a meditation (Guided Meditation on Anchors, 17 minutes), inviting “appreciation and gratitude for the time and the wisdom to spend, coming to know oneself. Coming to understand this nervous system, body, breath.” Many of us are inspired to meditate to… Read More »

January 2 – May the body relax

Dear Friends, In the first recording from the retreat I’m using for inspiration this month, Jill Shepherd provides some general background that can create a useful context for the rest of our month together. The style the approach to meditation that we’re doing here is insight meditation or vipassana. Just as a very simple beginning definition of what… Read More »

December 31 – Welcome!

Dear Friends, I will be participating in a New Year’s Retreat with Susie Harrington this weekend. (Not to worry – I have posts queued up for the next couple of days! But I won’t be monitoring emails or messages Friday evening through Sunday afternoon.) One of the things I love about retreats with Susie is the way she… Read More »

Finding the Heart of Wisdom in January 2022

Dear friends, I will be offering daily meditation emails again for January 2022. Are you interested in participating? Similar to previous years, I’ll send out an email each day in January, with a short bit of encouragement in the form of a practice, idea, reflection, poem, or song. I intend to keep it short-ish and light. This year,… Read More »

January 31 – Practicing gratitude

Dear Friends, In insight meditation, we often practice cultivating four specific qualities of the heart: kindness (a.k.a. metta, loving kindness, goodwill, friendliness), compassion, joy (particularly joy in the joy of others, a.k.a. mudita), and equanimity (having a balanced perspective). In some circles, my fellow practitioners and I have discussed that this list could include a fifth quality: gratitude.… Read More »

January 30 – The path ahead

Dear Friends, I think many of us come to contemplative practices like meditation and mindfulness from a place of suffering, discontent, pain, grief, disconnection. We are looking for some relief. At least that was true for me. And through practicing, I have found certain deeply ingrained patterns that contribute to painful states, and the body/heart/mind is learning different… Read More »

January 27 – Cultivating kindness

Dear Friends, with great kindness inspired by Gnossienne 2, by Erik Satie the way morning suntouches the sunflower leaf–you may say that’s not kindness,it’s just how it is. exactly.let me love like that Rosemerry Wahtola Trommerhttps://ahundredfallingveils.com/2019/08/26/with-great-kindness/ Somedays, it might feel far away, but kindness is a natural state we can access, and it’s something that we can cultivate… Read More »

January 26 – Being present

Dear Friends, As we move from a single-pointed focus (e.g. on the breathing) to a more open awareness of whatever is arising, the present moment becomes the primary object of attention. Being Present Breathe, relax and feel;take time to slow downthe pace of life. Watch therise and fall of moods, thebirth and death of dreams.Feelings and sensation seemso… Read More »