Dec 2
Mindful journaling can be a powerful tool for growth, especially for those times when meditation doesn't feel like an accessible practice. It builds not only awareness, but also self-compassion. In my own practice, I value my journaling space just as much as my time spent in meditation.
In meditation, I've certainly had the experience of dithering for so long about which recording to listen to that I lose the motivation completely (or the time slot), and end up not practising at all. Here's a menu of meditations for those moments.
There's a lot of buzz about Slow Living at the moment, and it would seem natural to look to meditation to support this. But I'm wondering how many of us fall into practising what I think of as 'fast meditation'. I'm not sure I've totally slowed it down yet, but I've definitely eased a lot of the pressure I'd been inadvertently bringing into my practice.
Mindfulness doesn't remove discomfort so that we're 'fixed' and never feel it again. In this human life, we're going to keep on experiencing the unpleasant, the difficult and the challenging - alongside what's beautiful, moving and enjoyable.
Research on hunter-gatherer people suggest that they are more 'whole-brained', or I might say 'whole-bodied'. People who've lived with and studied the few remaining hunter-gatherer cultures have shared some fascinating insights into a way of life that appears to support better wellbeing than we enjoy in contemporary western culture. So what might happen if we were more connected to our right brain/body?
