Virtual Pause

Virtual Pause

By Angie WinnHealth & FitnessMental Health
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Virtual Pause episodes

  • Episode 24: Resisting Great Love and Sorrow
    Why do we tend to resist great love, joy or sorrow? When the emotions begin to well up in us, we walk away, we make ourselves busy, we numb, we scroll, we indulge. We find a way to escape the moment because it just too intense.
    Maybe we are afraid the emotion will take us over. Maybe we think it won’t last, and it easier to end it before it ends on its own. Maybe we don’t think we can handle the intensity of the suffering, or we don’t deserve the immense love.
    Yet, as Richard Rohr tells us along with so many others, transformation occurs through great love and suffering. We just have to be present to it.
    In our pause today we will identify the mechanism we use to resist these feeling of intense love, joy, and sorrow. We will determine if this mechanism serves us, and then let it go. For our Listen portion of the pause, we will be using a practice called Imago Divina – or divine image. Finding an image in our present surroundings that represents glimpses of great love and joy.
    For more information on this podcast: angiewinn.com/pause
    29 min
  • Episode 23: Self-Emptying
    Episode 23: Self-Emptying
    Kenosis is the practice of self-emptying – releasing our attachments to what we possess, both intangible and tangible – so that what we possess can be used for the movement of God – love, healing, wholeness of the world.
    In today’s episode, we will reflect on something we possess, how we react when it is threatened, what attachments of control, approval or security are tethered to it, and then let it go. And then we can see glimpses of God’s movement in it and with it – in it and with us.
    “When you take something you possess – your bread and power, abilities and identities, your comfort and control, your treasured structures and even life itself – and release your attachment to it and make it useful to God’s movement, that is when you are practicing kenosis.” -Stephanie Spellers, The Church Cracked Open: Disruption, Decline, and New Hope for Beloved Community (Church Publishing Incorporated: 2021)
    Support this podcast anchor.fm/angie-winn
    28 min
  • Episode 22: Meeting Chaos with Chaos
    Meeting Chaos with Chaos
    Often we can find ourselves interacting with other people’s chaos - or their sense of striving to control, to be accepted, or to be secure – through our own sense of chaos. We meet other’s chaos with our own. When we feel depleted physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually, we can absorb other people’s chaos and allow it to dictate our emotions and decisions and spin us even faster out of control.
    In this episode, we will identify situations where we have encountered chaos and tried to control it, listened to it as our validation or rejection, or looked to it for our security. We will let go of our control through surrender, let go of our needing acceptance through receiving acceptance of our true self, and let go of looking for security by trusting our connection with the divine. We need to clear out the decay and debris of our hearts to be able to see a clear path moving forward.
    Our Listening portion of the Pause is from Psalm 23, the message version.
    “God, my shepherd!
    I don’t need a thing.
    You have bedded me down in lush meadows,
    you find me quiet pools to drink from.
    True to your word,
    you let me catch my breath
    and send me in the right direction.”
    Support this podcast https://anchor.fm/angie-winn
    For more information on the Pause: www.angiewinn.com/pause
    30 min
  • Episode 21: Attachments from Scarcity

    Attachments from Scarcity

    (previously recorded July 5th in front of virtual audience)

    It is so easy to allow people and circumstances to take up a tremendous amount of mental and emotional space. These people and circumstances can cloud our view of our present moments and our view of our path. They become inordinate attachments, take such a priority in our space that everything else is pushed out.

    Why does this happen? When we experience a sense of scarcity, desperation, fear, and disbelief, we connect ourselves to that which we believe will be the solution for this feeling. We create attachments during moments of scarcity. Yet when we are living abundantly from our true selves, we can see clearly and are able to discern what place they have in our lives.

    When we let go of our need to substitute false attachments for our real soul’s connections, we move from grasping in scarcity to sitting and seeing in abundance.

    “Only when we are able to “let go” of everything within us, all desire to see, to know, to taste and to experience the presence of God, do we truly become able to experience that presence with the overwhelming conviction and reality that revolutionize our entire inner life.”

    Thomas Merton, Contemplative Prayer (Image Books: 1996, ©1969), 67.

    30 min
  • Episode 20: Over-Identifying with What We Do
    What we do or what roles we play are often essential and life-giving to us and to others. But often we over-identify with these things we are doing it in order to cover up some sense of unworthiness, wounds of our past, or shame. These layers are layers of false self, and block our ability to see and live out of our true selves. 
    In this episode, we will notice something in our lives that we have over-identified with and let it go, so it can be put back in its proper place and not allow it to define who we are. We will use an image of a drop of water found in our artwork on this podcast to symbolize us coming back to our true selves - settling, resting. Contemplata in Latin means to see, and the Pause process is a collection of contemplative practices helping us to shed the layers that are blocking our ability to see our true self. 
    In our listen section of the Pause, I will read a poem by Derek Wolcott called "Love After Love"
    The time will come
    when, with elation,
    you will greet yourself arriving 
    at your own door, in your own mirror,
    and each will smile at the other's welcome,
    and say, sit here. Eat.
    You will love again the stranger who was your self.
    Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
    to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
    all your life, whom you ignored
    for another, who knows you by heart.
    Take down the love letters from the bookshelf, 
    the photographs, the desperate notes,
    peel your own image form the mirror.
    Sit. Feast on your life.
    Support this podcast https://anchor.fm/angie-winn
    28 min
  • Episode 19: The Violence of Needing to Perform
    We can become imbalanced - physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually - when we are striving to perform and to be productive. This striving is usually undergirded with a desire to be perfect, to be significant, to be needed, or whatever our inner motivation is to fulfill our self-worth. 
    In this episode we will identify something that we are putting much of our time, energy, mental capacity, and resources toward and determine if it is making us become out of balance, and determine if there is an inner motivation driving us. We will go through the be STILL process and release it by Settling our body, Tuning into our minds, Inhaling and exhaling it to release it from our thoughts, Letting go of the inner motivation in our hearts, and Listening to our soul as it connects to the divine. 
    The passage for Listen...
    There is a pervasive form of contemporary violence to which the idealist most easily succumbs: activism and overwork. The rush and pressure of modern life are a form, perhaps the most common form, of its innate violence. To allow oneself to be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns, to surrender to too many demands, to commit oneself to too many projects, to want to help everyone in everything, is to succumb to violence. The frenzy of our activism neutralizes our work for peace. It destroys our own inner capacity for peace. It destroys the fruitfulness of our own work, because it kills the root of inner wisdom which makes work fruitful.  Thomas Merton
    29 min
  • Episode 18: Finding Stability when we Can't Name our Chaos

    We can’t always analyze why we are experiencing anxiety, melancholy, sadness, or other emotions. Memories and experiences can be trapped within our bodies and our subconscious, and sometimes it is difficult to name them. But we can still tend to our whole beings and help ourselves get back to a state of stability and balance in our inner selves. In this episode we will walk through the be STILL pause process and I will invite you to think of ways that you uniquely settle your body, quiet your mind, open your heart and listen to your soul as it connects with the divine, your creator. I will read a passage by Etty Hillesum, a Dutch author who was killed in concentration camp during the Holocaust. One must also accept that one has “uncreative” moments. The more honestly one can accept that, the quicker these moments will pass. One must have the courage to call a halt, to feel empty and discouraged. -Etty Hillesum

    Support this podcast https://anchor.fm/angie-winn

    29 min
  • Episode 17: Resilience - The Space Between

    I define resilience as “shortening the space between chaos and stability”, or the space between living from our false selves and our true selves. We can’t get away from experiencing moments in our lives when we think or behave in ways that aren’t aligned with who we were really created to be. But in cultivating resilience, we can recognize more quickly when we are in that chaotic state and move towards our true self. In today’s episode on Resilience, we will identify a time when we felt a sense of chaos or fragmentation and go through the be STILL process to integrate and let go of our layers and get ourselves back to our true core, back to stability. After settling our bodies, tuning in, inhaling and exhaling, and letting go, we will listen to this passage by author Glennon Doyle: 

    "The word humility derives from the Latin word humilitas, which means “of the earth.” To be humble is to be grounded in knowing who you are. It implies the responsibility to become what you were meant to become—to grow, to reach, to fully bloom as high and strong and grand as you were created to. It is not honorable for a tree to wilt and shrink and disappear. It’s not honorable for a woman to, either"

    Glennon Doyle, Untamed


    Support this podcast https://anchor.fm/angie-winn

    31 min
  • Episode 16: A Walking Pause

    Take a walk! If you can. Take a moment or 20 minutes to take a walk during this pause. If not, just sit back and follow along. I am excited to read a poem by Jonathon Stalls, and then guide us through the be STILL process, becoming aware of the sounds and sights around us, and identifying a particular burden or problem we are carrying around, and then letting go of the grip it has on us. I recorded this episode outside so you will hear lots of noises! Including my dog’s toenails on the dock and a fish jumping around in the water. Jonathon Stalls spent 242 days walking across the United States in 2010 and has continued to walk alongside thousands of people for thousands of miles. He is an artist, social entrepreneur, advocate for social, economic and racial justice, LGBTQIA+, Creator of Intrinsic Paths, and Founder of Walk2Connect. Jonathon finished his studies at the Living School for Action and Contemplation in 2017 and has committed much of his life to inspire a connection-focused walking movement to help people deepen and heal relationship to one another, to the natural world, and to themselves. Learn more about Jonathon on his Intrinsic Path website. www.instrinsicpaths.com Most of his income comes through supporters. Please consider supporting his good work. Find out more info here. www.patreon.com/home. Take More Time Take more time. Take more time for trust, weary friend. The animals know. The running stream knows. The trees know. Your deep heart knows. Letting go isn’t just walking away. ...it’s walking forward ...into the big field ...the one that wants all of you. No more walls. No more secrets. No more hiding. Take more time. Take more time for love, weary friend. Be here. Be still. The glow on the grasses ...as the sun rises and sets ...calls your full name. You are loved ...just as you are ...more than you will ever know. The animals know. The running stream knows. The trees know. Your deep heart knows. Take more time. Take more time to walk ...into the vastness of the unknown. Freedom. Freedom. Freedom. Yes, ...sweet water ...sweet sky ...sweet spirit of mine Freedom. -by Jonathon Stalls

    Support this podcast https://anchor.fm/angie-winn

    20 min
  • Episode 15: Faking Rest

    There comes a time in our lives when what our bones need is deep rest. What our hearts need is an open field to play and roam and be. Yet our minds keep us grinding at the wheel of productivity and cage in our hearts, so that we look acceptable to the world and to ourselves.

    We must do, we can’t just be.

    But if we don’t stop and be, we are going to break.

    It is difficult to stop and rest because of the millions of things going on in our life. So we tend to find imitations for rest, like drinking alcohol to calm down so we can push through our schedule. In this episode, we will go through the be STILL process, and identify a way we may choose to fake rest, let it go (if we desire), and then listen to our souls as I read this passage:


    Heaven does nothing: its non-doing is its serenity.

    Earth does nothing: its non-doing is its rest.

    From the union of these two non-doings

    All actions proceed,

    All things are made....

    All beings in their perfection

    Are born of non-doing.

    Hence it is said:

    "Heaven and earth do nothing

    Yet there is nothing they do not do."

    -Excerpt from "Perfect Joy", by Chuang Tzu


    Support this podcast https://anchor.fm/angie-winn

    30 min

About Virtual Pause

From the publisher's feed

Virtual Pause Podcast - A brief guided meditation intended to integrate your body, mind, heart, and spirit so that you can live with resilience and stability in everyday chaos. Different topic each…