Our Mindful Nature: Meditation Inspired by Nature to Soothe the Overwhelmed Mind and Ease Anxiety

This week I am sharing a discussion with my business partner and all around favorite person, Octavia Raheem. Octavia & I have been friends, colleagues & partners for many years, and now, Octavia has published her first book - Gather.

I had the distinct good fortune to read Gather in advance, and I have used it as part of my personal meditation practice everyday since. It is a collection of essays, prayers and poems written from the deep knowledge sourced in Octavia’s personal meditative practices. Each entry is followed with beautiful and thoughtful journal prompts inviting introspection and reflection. Join Octavia and me for today’s discussion as we talk about yoga nidra, meditation, ancestors, courage and rest.

Perhaps most importantly, be sure you stay for Octavia’s guided meditation on courage at the end of today’s episode. It is a practice we all need right now!

You can learn more about Octavia Raheem here: http://octaviaraheem.com/gather/ 

Or follow her on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/octaviaraheem/

Thank you to today’s sponsor, Manta Sleep {mantasleep.com}. Manta sleep believes quality sleep is the foundation for everything good that happens in life, and they make the world’s most comfortable sleep mask to help us get that better sleep. Mindful Minute listeners save 10% on all orders with code ‘Mindful10’.

Connect with me on Instagram {@merylarnett} to get bonus meditation tips, mini-meditations, and the occasional baby spam: https://www.instagram.com/merylarnett/ and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please consider leaving me a review wherever you get your podcasts. Reviews help others to find this podcast!

***Did you know I have a FREE Meditation Starter Kit on my website merylarnett.com? It is full of my favorite tips, stories and ideas for starting and maintaining a daily meditation practice. Grab your copy today! --> http://bit.ly/meditationstarterkit ***

This podcast episode is offered humbly as a practice to support and uplift in times of crisis. This is recorded as America experiences widespread protests and riots in response to the deep, and too-long-ignored racism prevalent in every layer of our culture. This talk and this practice, I hope, are useful for all beings everywhere as we bravely and unflinchingly face the oppressions, discriminations, forced exoduses and genocides that occur anytime we create the label “other”. 

I encourage you to listen to a myriad of voices alongside my own:

Reverend Angel Kyodo Williams, Sebene Selassie, Spring Washam and Joanna Hardy are a few of the teachers I follow.

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I can’t remember who said it or where I read it, but I remember reading somewhere in my studies that meditation eventually asks you to feel The Great Heartbreak of the World.

At the time, I remember thinking, “ummmmm. No thanks.” Who wants to feel heartbreak?!

What I wanted was to feel better: less stress, more happiness. So, I meditated. Sometimes regularly; sometimes not. Usually not for more than 10 minutes, and I did start to feel better. So, I meditated with more consistency for longer time frames. I read some books and studied with teachers I respected, and the more I practiced, the more I found myself moving from my head to my heart.

I was feeling MORE. I was more aware of my own feelings in everyday situations, and I was more aware of when I was purposely NOT feeling or numbing out to world events as if they didn’t affect me. Eventually, there was a moment when “The Great Heartbreak of the World” finally resonated - I understood what that teacher meant. He/she meant we have to feel it all. We can’t ignore the pains of any being’s suffering if we are truly awake.

In this moment, as cities across America experience the rage of oppression and racism gone on for far too long, we meditate. We meditate not to feel better but to feel. As Pema Chodron says, 

“To stay with that shakiness—to stay with a broken heart, with a rumbling stomach, with the feeling of hopelessness and wanting to get revenge—that is the path of true awakening. Sticking with that uncertainty, getting the knack of relaxing in the midst of chaos, learning not to panic—this is the spiritual path.” 

Today’s meditation practice is a compassion practice that can apply to any person or group of people that you choose to practice for - it can be practiced for yourself, if you are the one who needs that loving support today. When we practice, we are deeply connecting to the thread of humanity we all share. Let us stand {and sit} together in solidarity and in love.

Reverend Angel Kyodo Williams: https://www.instagram.com/zenchangeangel/

Sebene Selassie: https://www.instagram.com/sebeneselassie/

Spring Washam: https://www.instagram.com/springwasham/

Joanna Hardy: https://www.instagram.com/joannahardy65/

Connect with me on Instagram {@merylarnett} to get bonus meditation tips, mini-meditations, and the occasional baby spam: https://www.instagram.com/merylarnett/ and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please consider leaving me a review wherever you get your podcasts. Reviews help others to find this podcast!

***Did you know I have a FREE Meditation Starter Kit on my website merylarnett.com? It is full of my favorite tips, stories and ideas for starting and maintaining a daily meditation prac...

This mini meditation is led by visionary artist Kim Krans. For the full story, I encourage you to listen to the full length episode released on 5/28/20. For now, enjoy this six minute mini meditation designed to give you a taste of timelessness. This practice helps to pull us out of the moment when we are feeling stuck or lost and gives us access to something larger. 

You can learn more about Kim by visiting kimkrans.com

Thank you to today’s sponsor, Manta Sleep {mantasleep.com}. Manta sleep believes quality sleep is the foundation for everything good that happens in life, and they make the world’s most comfortable sleep mask to help us get that better sleep. Mindful Minute listeners save 10% on all orders with code ‘Mindful10’.

These mini meditations are meant to support a daily home practice. Tune in every Monday to find your practice for the week! Full episodes are released every Thursday for a longer, deeper practice.

Connect with me on Instagram {@merylarnett} to get bonus meditation tips, mini-meditations, and the occasional baby spam: https://www.instagram.com/merylarnett/ and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please consider leaving me a review wherever you get your podcasts. Reviews help others to find this podcast!

***Did you know I have a FREE Meditation Starter Kit on my website merylarnett.com? It is full of my favorite tips, stories and ideas for starting and maintaining a daily meditation practice. Grab your copy today! --> http://bit.ly/meditationstarterkit ***

#meditatewithmeryl

I couldn’t be more excited to share today’s episode with you. Today, I am sharing a conversation with my favorite artist, Kim Krans, about the intersection of meditation and creativity. Kim is a visionary artist, author, and creator of The New York Times bestseller The Wild Unknown Tarot. Kim and I share some yoga teachers in our backgrounds, and I’ve found her art to be incredibly inspiring in my own practice.

I had the opportunity to interview Kim exactly one year to the day of when she started drawing her new graphic memoir, Blossoms & Bones. In this episode, we talk about how to practice when there are so many practices out there calling our names, about drawing the feeling, archetypes, and the practice of exploring timelessness.

Do not miss the six minute meditation Kim guides us through at the end. It is a brief taste of how to take something as esoteric as timelessness and invite it into our meditation practice. And, lastly, if you are struggling with the right/wrong duality of this moment, listen out for her suggestion on working with the infinity symbol as a way to balance that energy. Seriously, mind blown.

You can learn more about Kim by visiting kimkrans.com

Thank you to today’s sponsor, Manta Sleep {mantasleep.com}. Manta sleep believes quality sleep is the foundation for everything good that happens in life, and they make the world’s most comfortable sleep mask to help us get that better sleep. Mindful Minute listeners save 10% on all orders with code ‘Mindful10’.

Connect with me on Instagram {@merylarnett} to get bonus meditation tips, mini-meditations, and the occasional baby spam: https://www.instagram.com/merylarnett/ and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please consider leaving me a review wherever you get your podcasts. Reviews help others to find this podcast!

***Did you know I have a FREE Meditation Starter Kit on my website merylarnett.com? It is full of my favorite tips, stories and ideas for starting and maintaining a daily meditation practice. Grab your copy today! --> http://bit.ly/meditationstarterkit ***

#meditatewithmeryl

“You set out to find God, but keep stopping at mean-spirited roadhouses.” ~Rumi

In today’s mini meditation, our practice reminds us to continue even on the days when we want to give up. We meditate, and we do it because we know every itch we don’t scratch, every thought we don’t chase, every minute we stay seated rather than pursuing the next to-do, these are all the training ground to help us stay awake during our lives. These moments prepare us to hold the tensions that are part of our human existence and to continue on the path even when the mean-spirited roadhouses call our names. Join me for today’s practice; even if you feel like skipping it!

Thank you to today’s sponsor, Manta Sleep {mantasleep.com}. Manta sleep believes quality sleep is the foundation for everything good that happens in life, and they make the world’s most comfortable sleep mask to help us get that better sleep. Mindful Minute listeners save 10% on all orders with code ‘Mindful10’.

These mini meditations are meant to support a daily home practice. Tune in every Monday to find your practice for the week! Full episodes are released every Thursday for a longer, deeper practice.

Connect with me on Instagram {@merylarnett} to get bonus meditation tips, mini-meditations, and the occasional baby spam: https://www.instagram.com/merylarnett/ and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please consider leaving me a review wherever you get your podcasts. Reviews help others to find this podcast!

***Did you know I have a FREE Meditation Starter Kit on my website merylarnett.com? It is full of my favorite tips, stories and ideas for starting and maintaining a daily meditation practice. Grab your copy today! --> http://bit.ly/meditationstarterkit ***

#meditatewithmeryl

“You set out to find God, but keep stopping at mean-spirited roadhouses.” ~Rumi

This week brings the final installment of my Responding Creatively to Fear meditation series, and in this week's episode we talk about how to continue when you want to give up.

One of the truest statements I think I ever heard was from another Atlanta yoga teacher who said, “best not to start this path because once you do… you can’t get off.”

It can be so tempting sometimes to go back to sleep…

Isn’t it easier to watch TV for 4 hours and skip that meditation?

Isn’t it easier to just have the glass of wine or eat the chocolate cake?

Isn’t it easier to mindless scroll on Facebook throughout the day?

Fortunately and unfortunately, once you begin to awaken you have begun. You can try to go back to sleep. We almost all do at least once, but some part of your subconscious continues to nudge you…

“This isn’t the way. This isn’t what you want. There is something truer. Keep going.”

We must stop visiting the mean-spirited roadhouses and aspire to make these practices our way of life. So, we will practice, and we will do it because we know every itch we don’t scratch, every thought we don’t chase, every minute we stay seated rather than pursuing the next to-do, these are all the training ground to help us stay awake during our lives. These moments prepare us to hold the tensions that are part of our human existence and to continue on the path even when the mean-spirited roadhouses call our names. Let’s practice. 

Thank you to today’s sponsor, Manta Sleep {mantasleep.com}. Manta sleep believes quality sleep is the foundation for everything good that happens in life, and they make the world’s most comfortable sleep mask to help us get that better sleep. Mindful Minute listeners save 10% on all orders with code ‘Mindful10’.

Connect with me on Instagram {@merylarnett} to get bonus meditation tips, mini-meditations, and the occasional baby spam: https://www.instagram.com/merylarnett/ and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please consider leaving me a review wherever you get your podcasts. Reviews help others to find this podcast!

***Did you know I have a FREE Meditation Starter Kit on my website merylarnett.com? It is full of my favorite tips, stories and ideas for starting and maintaining a daily meditation practice. Grab your copy today! --> http://bit.ly/meditationstarterkit ***

#meditatewithmeryl

When we feel lost in the struggle of all the things we don’t want:

We don’t want to feel this way.

We don’t want the day to go like this.

We don’t want the world to look like this.

Then, it is time to imagine a new way. Often, we can’t easily picture something different than our lived reality, but it is there, just waiting to be envisioned and ushered into a life more true, more beautiful.

Join me for today’s episode of The Mindful Minute for a practice to engage our imaginations and to challenge the status quo of our thoughts. 

Thank you to today’s sponsor, Manta Sleep {mantasleep.com}. Manta sleep believes quality sleep is the foundation for everything good that happens in life, and they make the world’s most comfortable sleep mask to help us get that better sleep. Mindful Minute listeners save 10% on all orders with code ‘Mindful10’.

These mini meditations are meant to support a daily home practice. Tune in every Monday to find your practice for the week! Full episodes are released every Thursday for a longer, deeper practice.

Connect with me on Instagram {@merylarnett} to get bonus meditation tips, mini-meditations, and the occasional baby spam: https://www.instagram.com/merylarnett/ and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please consider leaving me a review wherever you get your podcasts. Reviews help others to find this podcast!

***Did you know I have a FREE Meditation Starter Kit on my website merylarnett.com? It is full of my favorite tips, stories and ideas for starting and maintaining a daily meditation practice. Grab your copy today! --> http://bit.ly/meditationstarterkit ***

#meditatewithmeryl

A different view. A different thought. A different action.⁠

In our meditation series this month, we are exploring how to respond creatively to fear. Part of that creative response has to be to do something different than we normally do -⁠⁠

If you catch yourself responding the same way to a particular stimulus frequently; it is time to try a different way.⁠

Is it easy? No. Does it take imagination and creativity to invite a response previously unknown to you? Yes. ⁠⁠

Is it possible? Absolutely.⁠

So how? How do we do something different?

Often our thought-habits are likened to well-worn, dirt roads with deep ruts down the middle because we’ve driven down the road so many times. It is REALLY hard to get your car out of those ruts, but it is possible.

What if we were able to let go of all things we “don’t want,” and instead we start to picture in detail what we DO want. Some of it will feel very far-fetched. Some will feel completely out of our control. Some of it will feel like pie-in-the-sky dreaming.

Yet, as Gloria Steinem said, “Dreaming, after all, is a form of planning.”

Join me for today’s episode of The Mindful Minute for a practice to engage our imaginations and to challenge the status quo of our thoughts. You up for it?

Connect with me on Instagram {@merylarnett} to get bonus meditation tips, mini-meditations, and the occasional baby spam: https://www.instagram.com/merylarnett/ and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please consider leaving me a review wherever you get your podcasts. Reviews help others to find this podcast!

***Did you know I have a FREE Meditation Starter Kit on my website merylarnett.com? It is full of my favorite tips, stories and ideas for starting and maintaining a daily meditation practice. Grab your copy today! --> http://bit.ly/meditationstarterkit ***

#meditatewithmeryl

Meditation reminds us that freedom doesn’t come from resisting our fears but from getting to know them well. In this time of deep uncertainty, learning to enter the cave of mystery and uncertainty is akin to discovering the pathway to freedom. Join me for today’s short meditation to explore your own responses to fear and unknown.

These mini meditations are meant to support a daily home practice. Tune in every Monday to find your practice for the week! Full episodes are released every Thursday for a longer, deeper practice.

Connect with me on Instagram {@merylarnett} to get bonus meditation tips, mini-meditations, and the occasional baby spam: https://www.instagram.com/merylarnett/ and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please consider leaving me a review wherever you get your podcasts. Reviews help others to find this podcast!

***Did you know I have a FREE Meditation Starter Kit on my website merylarnett.com? It is full of my favorite tips, stories and ideas for starting and maintaining a daily meditation practice. Grab your copy today! --> http://bit.ly/meditationstarterkit ***

#meditatewithmeryl

This month’s meditation series is based upon one question - 

“What do I do when I feel I can’t handle what is going on?”

We all have our coping mechanisms, and likely, we’ve all been using them A LOT lately.

The problem with these mechanisms is that we use them as tools to avoid the discomfort of feeling out of control, and this pseudo-control becomes like a prison boxing us into our own neurosis.

We CAN’T let go of the beliefs or the actions or the escapes because what is left is far too scary. 

We become increasingly terrified of the possibility of freedom.

Meditation tells us there is another way. Meditation reminds us that freedom doesn’t come from resisting our fears but from getting to know them well.

In today’s episode, we explore three ways we protect ourselves from fear and how we can bring a sense of creative curiosity to that fear. Within this exploration, we can hear the whispers of compassion and self-understanding calling…

Big thanks to our sponsor, MOON Organics {https://moonorganics.com}. Mindful Minute listeners can save 10% on products and services {like virtual facials!} with code “MINDFUL10”.

Connect with me on Instagram {@merylarnett} to get bonus meditation tips, mini-meditations, and the occasional baby spam: https://www.instagram.com/merylarnett/ and if you enjoyed today’s episode, please consider leaving me a review wherever you get your podcasts. Reviews help others to find this podcast!

***Did you know I have a FREE Meditation Starter Kit on my website merylarnett.com? It is full of my favorite tips, stories and ideas for starting and maintaining a daily meditation practice. Grab your copy today! --> http://bit.ly/meditationstarterkit ***

#meditatewithmeryl