Be Your Own Advocate

The first of the Seven Principles of Mindfulness in Healing from the book, Healing with the Seven Principles of Mindfulness is to be your own advocate. Here is why. What happens when most people hear the words, “You’ve got cancer?” How would you feel if you heard these words? What would you do? What would […]

Listening Closely to the Music of Your Mind

Andrew Olendzki, Ph. D. is a Buddhist scholar, teacher, and one of my favorite writers. I read everything of his that appears in Buddhist magazines. In these words of wisdom from Tricycle.com, he writes about listening closely to the music of your mind. In this way, we learn to see life just as it is, […]

A Gratitude Practice to Increase Happiness

Robert Emmons has been investigating the psychological effects gratitude on happiness. One of his studies utilized a gratitude practice to increase happiness and health. Emmons divided the participants into three groups. The group called the gratitude condition kept a weekly journal about five things they were grateful for. The group called the hassles condition wrote […]

Meditation Changes Your Brain

Harvard neuroscientist, Sara Lazar, reveals how meditation changes your brain. In a report by the Washington Post, Brigid Schulte interviewed Sara Lazar and asked her a bunch of questions. The first question was, “Why did you start looking at meditation and mindfulness and the brain?” Sara replied the she tried yoga because of a running […]

Addicted to Ease and Comfort

On Sunday night, I attended Marin Sangha. The teacher was Lisa Dale Miller and her topic was addiction. She said that we live in a society addicted to ease and comfort. I couldn’t agree more. She also explained that what we commonly thing of addictions are usually the result of some childhood trauma. This also […]

Studies of Meditation Practices

Kelly McGonigal is one of the most brilliant young neruoscientists of our day. Her work at the Center for Compassion and Altruism Research and Education (CCARE) at Stanford University is drawing huge numbers of people to look at her studies of meditation practices. Her life-long headaches led her into yoga and meditation and now she […]

Meditation is an Exercise for Developing Willpower

In these words of wisdom from Roy Baumeister and John Tierney from their book, Willpower: Rediscovering the Greatest Human Strength we learn that meditation is an exercise for developing willpower. By participating in daily meditation, we develop our willpower in other aspects of our lives. Religious meditations often involve explicit and effortful regulation of attention. […]

The Creative Spirit Of The Self-Actualizer

This quote from Abraham Maslow describes the creative spirit of the self-actualizer. As I see it, anyone one who is doing something they love, or even something the don’t, but who does it in present time is a creative person and in those moments, he or she is self-actualized. For example, when you “wash the […]

The Value of Practice

Daniel Coyle teaches us the value of practice in this words of wisdom from his book, The Talent Code: Greatness Isn’t Born. It’s Grown. Here’s How. He writes, “Long story short: a few years ago a group of American and Norwegian researchers did a study to see what made babies improve at walking. They discovered […]

Sleeping is Good for Your Health

Last week, we learned that Napping is Good for Your Health. This week, we hear more from Sara Mednick who tells you that sleeping is good for your health. “Before Thomas Edison’s lightbulb, our great-grandparents would get as much as 10 hours’ rest during an average weeknight. Today, we’re lucky to get eight hours on […]