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"Meditation!" #78
8 Plays6 months ago
In this episode of Stay Sparked, we dive into the often misunderstood world of meditation. If the word itself makes you feel like you’re “not doing it right,” you’re not alone. We’re breaking it down and lifting the pressure, exploring how meditation isn’t about silencing your mind — it’s about creating space to notice, feel, and reconnect.
We share personal stories, unexpected approaches, and ways to bring mindfulness into everyday life (even if you can’t sit still). Whether you’re brand new to meditation or looking to deepen your practice, this conversation offers gentle encouragement and a spark of inspiration.
HOSTS
BETSY FINKLEHOO is a healer of massage therapy, CranioSacral and Dharma Coaching. She is an 8 year burner and has spent the last several years seeped in the personal development world, cultivating her passion for transformation and growth. Her recent project, The Power Affirmation Journal and virtual group empowers women to cultivate self awareness and healthy habits so they can live in greater freedom, mind body and spirit.
http://poweraffirmation.com/
Click here to get a FREE affirmation for Stay Sparked Listeners!
HALCYON is full-time Love Ambassador. He is the founder of Hug Nation YouTube channel and daily zoom gratitude circles. He is co-founder of the Pink Heart Burning Man camp and the 1st Saturdays project for people experiencing homelessness. In his free time he coaches individuals on how to live joyfully and authentically. His other podcast is "Hard on the 80's."
http://LifeStudent.com
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Transcript
Introduction & Personal Journeys
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On today's episode, we talk about meditation.
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We share our personal journey from our struggles to our trainings and how meditation can really help us on a day-to-day basis.
00:00:14
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Enjoy the episode.
00:00:16
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Hello and welcome to Stay Sparked.
00:00:19
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I am Betsy Finkelhoo, the creator of the Power Affirmation Project and Somatic Bodyworker.
00:00:25
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I am John Halcyon Stinn, host of the Hug Nation YouTube channel.
00:00:30
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We are longtime friends, and one day at a gathering, we decided maybe we should start recording our conversations because every time we would see each other, we felt so inspired and so sparked.
00:00:42
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So here we are in service to
Gratitude & Family Connections
00:00:44
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sharing the sparks with you, and we always love starting with gratitude.
00:00:48
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So what are you grateful for today, Healthian?
00:00:52
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Today I'm feeling grateful for my brother.
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His birthday was this week and just feeling so blessed to have such an awesome relationship with him and be so inspired by his role as a father, brother, son.
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Just a great guy.
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So grateful for my brother.
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Jimmy.
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Yay, Jimmy.
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And happy belated birthday, Jimmy.
00:01:12
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Awesome.
00:01:14
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Well, you sparked my gratitude.
00:01:16
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I'm going to give my gratitude to my sister, Jamie.
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You got Jimmy.
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I got Jamie.
00:01:21
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Love it.
00:01:22
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I love my sister, Jamie.
00:01:24
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We get together weekly on Zoom calls to share our intentions and our goals and things that we're working on.
00:01:31
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And it's such a great way to stay connected.
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And I'm just so grateful that we've been doing that for years.
00:01:36
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on and off for over five years.
00:01:38
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That's a pretty amazing way to get to stay connected to my blood sister.
00:01:42
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Beautiful.
Meditation & Live Practice
00:01:44
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Much love to you, Jamie.
00:01:48
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And I also am so grateful for today's conversation because we haven't had an opportunity to focus on the topic of meditation yet.
00:01:58
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And I'm really excited to dive into this conversation with you and get to see what wants to come through our conversation.
00:02:07
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journey of sharing what our personal experience of meditation has been and anything else that might come up.
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And so I love actually to get us started with a short meditation because it is one of my favorite ways to start anything.
00:02:24
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And for those of you out there that are listening, just a little behind the scenes of Stay Sparked episodes, we always start with a meditation before we record as a way to center ourselves and ground ourselves.
00:02:36
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And so what do you think if we share a meditation live today?
00:02:40
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Yeah, lead us.
00:02:41
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Okay.
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If you're driving, keep your eyes open.
00:02:44
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And if you are listening to this while you are multitasking or if you are doing something else, you're welcome to just pause whatever it is you're doing and just settle in.
00:02:55
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This is going to be a very short, simple practice.
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So welcome to just start with a deep, full inhale.
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And a deep, long exhale.
00:03:14
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If you are in a place where you can close your eyes, you can soften your eyelids and begin to soften your shoulders down onto your back.
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You can just align your spine so that way your head is over your shoulders and your shoulders are over your hips.
00:03:39
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You can bring your focus to the center of your eyebrows.
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And very simply and mindfully, just being aware of your breath in this moment.
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Are you breathing in your nose or your mouth?
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Are you feeling the air come in your chest or into your belly?
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Is your breath short or long?
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And now you can just simply come back.
00:04:31
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Just opening your eyes, maybe rolling out your shoulders, your neck, stretching out your arms.
00:04:42
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Knowing that it can
Struggles & Benefits of Guided Meditation
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be as simple as one minute of mindful awareness to your posture, your breath, to the awareness of the space, whatever it might be.
00:04:56
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Ah, okay.
00:04:58
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So how are you feeling?
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I got distracted.
00:05:02
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I had a little tech issues that kind of brought me out of it, which kind of made me felt so apropos of my often struggles of meditation, of being pulled out of it by some thought or crisis of, in my mind, this one happened to be tech, but...
00:05:22
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But I'm glad we have an opportunity to talk about that, of the challenges.
00:05:27
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I know that for me, well, one, acknowledging that I get pulled back, I will say I don't normally do guided meditations.
00:05:38
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And it is, I don't know what, I think I have this feeling that
00:05:46
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I know I need to, my mind needs to get better at not thinking.
00:05:55
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And I feel like if I'm led on a meditation,
00:05:59
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It's not as good of practice.
00:06:02
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It's like those machines that you can put on your abs that flex your abs for you.
00:06:09
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Yes, you will get abs, but it's not the same as if you do sit-ups.
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And I feel like silent meditation is doing sit-ups, whereas a guided meditation is flexing abs.
00:06:20
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So as someone who leads awesome meditations, will you help me understand why a guided meditation is so good?
00:06:28
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Yeah, absolutely.
00:06:29
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I think that's a really common thing.
00:06:32
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From what I remember when I first started doing meditation many years ago, I thought that it was all about just trying to get my mind to stop.
00:06:42
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And after I started learning about meditation and going to meditation trainings and understanding that it was much more than that, it was more about getting into a relationship with the moment and witnessing it always changing, I
00:06:58
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Then I was able to start to soften into this place of not trying so hard to just stop thinking.
00:07:06
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And I think that's what you're saying is like when you can access this place of no one's guiding you, then you're able to just quiet your mind more fully.
00:07:14
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And from my experience, the guided meditations are are kind of like the in bowling where you have like the bumpers in the it just kind of helps keep you on track from trailing too far because, you know, how our thoughts go.
00:07:29
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We have 26000 thoughts a day or something like that.
00:07:33
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So if you think one thought, then all of a sudden it leads to another thought, then it leads to another thought, then it leads to another thought.
00:07:39
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Before you know it, you're 50 steps beyond through association with that first thought was.
00:07:45
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And so a guided meditation can just help you stay a little closer to the onset.
00:07:51
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You start trailing and then you hear the person that's guiding you say, just stay with your breath.
00:07:56
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Oh, right.
00:07:57
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Oh, yeah, yeah.
00:07:57
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That's right.
00:07:58
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Okay.
00:07:59
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I remember my purpose here is to stay focused.
00:08:03
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Does that make sense?
00:08:05
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I think that like, like I'm going to change my metaphor from the, the ab machine to like an assisted pull-up machine.
00:08:16
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Like right now I can't do a pull-up all by myself.
00:08:19
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And so I'm trying and just, it's very difficult, but a guided meditation is like one of those machines that gives some of your body weight so that you can actually do some pull-ups.
00:08:28
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So it's still, it's an exercise in the same direction.
00:08:33
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And it's not cheating.
00:08:36
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It's safely helping you to strengthen those muscles.
00:08:42
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Absolutely.
00:08:43
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And meditation is a focus muscle.
00:08:45
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Whether we're focusing on the breath, we're focusing on a burning candle, we're focusing on the point between our eyebrows, we're focusing on a mantra, maybe it is focusing on sensations in the body, maybe it is more of a visualization.
00:09:03
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There's so many different ways that we can focus our mind and it is so much so a practice.
00:09:11
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And just like building strength in our bodies, it is the same thing, building the cultivated practice and strength within our minds and our brains to focus on something specific like the moment.
Meditation Techniques & Insights
00:09:25
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Vipassana teaches focusing on respiration, the breath, and sensation.
00:09:32
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Very simple.
00:09:33
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That brings us into the present moment.
00:09:37
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And that's what is meditation, is really bringing us into this moment.
00:09:43
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I think one of the things that has helped me to... I want to be careful I phrase my things as I am a frequently trying to be better at meditating person.
00:09:59
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So I'm about 10 days into my current practice.
00:10:03
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But what used to really frustrate me was the inability to still my mind.
00:10:09
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And when I changed the goal from stilling my mind to becoming aware of when my mind wanders, you know, so just noticing, oh, it's doing it again.
00:10:21
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And that being successful, like if I can notice when I wander,
00:10:27
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And then return that that is a successful meditation practice instead of the old thing like, oh, I wandered again.
00:10:33
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Like, oh, I messed up.
00:10:36
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Like that.
00:10:36
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Oh, I'm not a good meditator.
00:10:38
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I suck at this.
00:10:38
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Yeah.
00:10:40
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I keep wondering.
00:10:42
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Yeah.
00:10:43
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And it really I think that that's that plagued me for a long time.
00:10:46
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And I know a lot of people where it's it's that feeling of like I suck at this.
00:10:52
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But when you go back to what you said, a practice, and that the sucking is actually succeeding because meditation is not stillness.
00:11:04
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Meditation is the getting off track and returning.
00:11:09
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Mm-hmm.
00:11:10
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Two of my favorite meditation teachers say, start again.
00:11:15
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Goinka, he was the man responsible for bringing Vipassana to the West from Burma and continues to uphold the more pristine tradition of Vipassana, the 10-day seventh meditation.
00:11:31
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He keeps coming back to that in the guidance throughout that experience is start again, start again, just start again, because we're going to keep trailing off.
00:11:41
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We just got to keep coming back.
00:11:43
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And then the second teacher I love that says that also is Joe Dispenza.
00:11:47
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And he says, I don't care if you stop.
00:11:49
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I care if you start again.
00:11:52
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So the way that I see that is within the meditation practice and then also off your cushion.
Vipassana Meditation Experience
00:11:59
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So if you stop the practice, you don't do the habit of coming to your meditation.
00:12:05
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I don't care if you stop, just start again.
00:12:08
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And then when you're on your cushion, whether it's in stillness or walking meditation or movement meditation, you trail off.
00:12:15
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We'll just start again.
00:12:17
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Keep coming back.
00:12:18
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And I feel like that that is such a powerful practice to cultivate within ourselves because then that ripples out into the rest of our lives.
00:12:26
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And we can keep coming back again and again and again to what is in alignment to how we're choosing to be, the healthy habits that we're choosing.
00:12:36
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You know, okay, start again.
00:12:37
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I ate junk food, you know, instead of like just going, oh, oh, well, I guess I'm off my diet.
00:12:43
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I'm just going to keep eating sugar.
00:12:44
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They're like, you know what?
00:12:45
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Just start again.
00:12:47
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Just come back.
00:12:48
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Start again.
00:12:49
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And that, for me personally, has really helped me to feel a sense of self-compassion as well and not be so hard on myself if I mess up or if my mind goes in a million directions or if I haven't meditated for a couple of weeks.
00:13:05
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Just keep coming back.
00:13:06
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Keep coming back.
00:13:08
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Start again.
00:13:09
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Start again.
00:13:11
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What a huge...
00:13:13
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gift that is.
00:13:13
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And I think also another one of the things about meditation that I did not understand for a long time of like be present.
00:13:23
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Be present is sometimes it's the act of only being aware of the present moment, but it's also being present, meaning start again.
00:13:32
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Like you get a fresh start right now, right now, fresh start.
00:13:35
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So you can let go of all of those
00:13:39
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the attachments of guilt or shouldas or I didn't start, you know, I'm behind or all that.
00:13:46
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You can just start fresh.
00:13:48
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Like what a gift that can be always.
00:13:51
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Yeah, and there's a word for that actually that's called sankhara.
00:13:56
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The sankharas of the mind, they're like grooves in our consciousness or like fossils.
00:14:03
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They can also be known as agitations of the mind.
00:14:06
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Those things that kind of nag us.
00:14:09
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And again, my training is in the Vipassana lineage.
00:14:12
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And so they talk about the two pathways to suffering is...
00:14:18
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is aversion and cravings which then contribute to your sankaras right and so if we are constantly wanting things to be different that's craving you know it's raining outside i wish it was sunny then that's creating suffering uh flip side right you know just whatever you're averse to uh agitation of the body a sensation um
00:14:41
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pain, when we can get into a place of pure presence and awareness from the place of equanimity, which is balanced mind, knowing that this too is going to change, then we can start to become liberated of those sankharas.
00:14:57
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Those agitations of the mind start to get less and less and less.
00:15:02
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And then we can get to a place of samadhi, which is peace and enlightenment.
00:15:08
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And it's a continuous practice because we have so many agitations of the mind that have been build up, build up, build up, build up.
00:15:15
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And that's why in the 10-day practice, you sit for 8 to 10 hours a day for 10 days in a row.
00:15:24
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Some of the first and the last day are a few hours less, but they call it like a spiritual surgery.
00:15:31
Speaker
And the first few days, it's like the incision.
00:15:35
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And it is really uncomfortable to sit with yourself and with your thoughts.
00:15:41
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And then after day three, four, you start to have even deeper a process.
00:15:47
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with your consciousness and with your mind and with your body and the practice can really help you access deep deep places of that agitation and come to places of release and of presence and then by day seven eight you start to have the real transformations day nine and ten are the salve and the stitches in the salve and it's a pretty profound experience and
00:16:13
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If you have done Vipassana, you know.
00:16:15
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If you have not, I'm sure you've heard of this practice.
00:16:19
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It is a very deep boot camp.
00:16:22
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I call it meditation boot camp because there's no writing, there's no reading, there's no phones, there's no eye contact.
00:16:29
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There's no gesturing to people.
00:16:31
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You're not allowed to work out or really do much except go to your meditations.
00:16:38
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They're hour-long sits and then you have your food.
00:16:40
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And it is like being in a boot camp.
00:16:44
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And it's so deep and so hard.
00:16:47
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And not everyone makes it through.
00:16:51
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And for me personally, I've done two and they were absolutely life changing.
00:16:56
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And it was very, very difficult.
00:16:58
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And I'm so glad that I did it and that I was able to stay through it.
00:17:01
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And I wanted to leave multiple times, but I'm glad I stayed because it was that metaphor of being able to go through something so deep and so painful and come out the other side.
00:17:14
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feeling so much more clear and so much more grounded and aware and present.
Commitment to Spiritual Growth
00:17:19
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And then watch how that created a ripple effect into my daily life, into my thinking, into the cultivated practice of equanimity to be able to see when things are challenging.
00:17:31
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to know that this too will change.
00:17:34
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Less agitation, right?
00:17:35
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I use the example of if you hear loud noises outside, you know, the gardener's going by and it's really loud and the old me would have been like, that's so annoying.
00:17:48
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Oh, loud noise.
00:17:49
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But with this practice, I know that that gardener is going to be done soon and that I don't need to get tight and tense about it because it's going to change.
00:17:59
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And so I can access that place of equanimity and balance mind knowing this too will change.
00:18:06
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Same thing with the pain in the body.
00:18:08
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Okay, my tummy hurts.
00:18:09
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Okay, I know this will change.
00:18:10
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Let me just feel into it.
00:18:13
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Get in touch with the sensation.
00:18:14
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Meditate with it.
00:18:15
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And then there can be so much more insight around what my body is trying to say rather than just trying to push away the feeling and have that aversion.
00:18:27
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I'm realizing that exactly two years ago, I was signed up for a 10-day Vipassana, partially based on talking to you.
00:18:37
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And I backed out because I realized it was too much.
00:18:43
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I was doing it because I felt like I should do it.
00:18:47
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Like I wanted to be a person who would do it as opposed to wanting to do it.
00:18:52
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And knowing how difficult it is, I realized that I don't think that I had my motivation was coming from the right place.
00:19:00
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And you caught that.
00:19:02
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And hearing you speak, you know, I'm having some feelings of not sure if.
00:19:09
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maybe shame is not the right word, but like maybe disappointment or... There's definitely some self-judgment of knowing that I've never done that and recognizing how hard it sounds.
00:19:21
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But also knowing that...
00:19:24
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knowing that's what it takes, that kind of commitment.
00:19:29
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A few, a month ago, I spent some time with a group of people that were really dedicated in their spiritual practices and talking with a woman who every night or every morning wakes up at 4 a.m.
00:19:39
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and then meditates for two hours every morning.
00:19:42
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And she was expressing that that's just recognizing that that's what's required.
00:19:48
Speaker
Like if she wants to experience the potential of
00:19:52
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of her spiritual growth in this lifetime, there's no shortcut.
00:19:57
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I mean, there are shortcuts.
00:19:58
Speaker
There are chemical shortcuts, but they're not lasting.
00:20:01
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Like if you really want to reach the places that are accessible by anyone, the great mystics are there, but those places are not accessible.
00:20:10
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It just requires work.
00:20:13
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And that work is meditation.
00:20:15
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And it was hard to hear that.
00:20:18
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You know, like part of me was like, oh, I don't want this to be true.
00:20:21
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And a deep part of me going, you know, this is true.
00:20:24
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I'm feeling that right now in this moment of like, John, shut up and let Betsy talk because you know this is true.
00:20:34
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Yeah, I love it.
00:20:35
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You called it work because it is.
00:20:37
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It's effort to be still.
00:20:40
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How often do we find stillness if you're not a meditator, besides when you're sleeping?
00:20:46
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But when we look in nature, this is what I always just geek out on, how many animals practice stillness.
00:20:54
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You can look at so many different species, like a dragonfly, for example.
00:20:59
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It can move in all
Stillness & Mindfulness Practices
00:21:00
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different directions.
00:21:00
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It moves quite rapid.
00:21:02
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But then when it lands on a branch, it's so still, still.
00:21:06
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Same with squirrels and birds and snakes and other animals find such deep and profound stillness.
00:21:15
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Even just that as a practice, that is so healing and so challenging and so good for us to be able to just pause and get to a place where we can really just not move our bodies.
00:21:29
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with intent for an extended amount of time, whether that is 30 seconds, five minutes, two hours.
00:21:36
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You know, what is that discipline to sit in stillness?
00:21:39
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That's a powerful place to focus too.
00:21:42
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And it's not just about fighting the mind.
00:21:44
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It's about focusing on being still.
00:21:47
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pretty simple but it can also be very difficult and I know personally how I implement I'll just share one last thing how I implement that into my daily life is if I need to make a decision or I'm uncertain about something and I need to figure something out or maybe I have a lot of static going on around certain things happening in my life then I go to stillness and
00:22:13
Speaker
Because that is always so helpful for me to just get everything to just get quiet.
00:22:19
Speaker
And I like to think of it as ripples on the top of a pond.
00:22:22
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I've heard this metaphor many times where the thoughts of those are ripples.
00:22:27
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And when we can find stillness and the stillness on the top of the pond, the reflection becomes clear.
00:22:34
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And then we can start to see the reflection of the world.
00:22:38
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And so when I can find stillness within my body, then my mind starts to follow that.
00:22:44
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And then I'm able to start to see things with more clarity.
00:22:47
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Yeah.
00:22:49
Speaker
And I think it's, we've talked about this in many ways in many episodes about just the culture that we're living in and the impact on us to be, you know, submerged in a screen-filled world where stillness is...
00:23:08
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unavailable unless you force it to be a part of your life.
00:23:12
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You know, like I remember when I traveled through Europe in college, there was no internet, you know, and so I would get to a town and the bus would be in six hours.
00:23:22
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So I would sit on a bench for hours, you know, or read a book, you know, but
00:23:31
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those circumstances don't exist in the modern world unless you overtly push against all the pressures.
00:23:40
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And not just pushing the pressures, but recognizing that our minds become more and more addicted to constant, you know, stimulation.
00:23:50
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And so this work and this practice, you know, it's, I'm saying this for my own benefit.
00:23:56
Speaker
I'm not saying you should do, I'm saying like, I
00:24:00
Speaker
as a part of this culture where this is pulling at us, we are losing any awareness that that stillness is even possible.
00:24:09
Speaker
That stillness on the lake that you're talking about, for many of us, it is never there.
00:24:17
Speaker
We wake up with scrambled thoughts and we go through our entire day.
00:24:22
Speaker
And the minute we have a break, our phone fills every bit of stillness with more and more and more and more static.
00:24:29
Speaker
I've been finding lately that the practice that gets me most in touch with stillness is cuddling.
00:24:37
Speaker
and being embraced with my beloved and sinking into awareness of every place that our bodies are touching and every movement of her breath and my breath.
00:24:50
Speaker
And when my mind wanders, that's when I'm like, okay, practice.
00:24:54
Speaker
Like this is it.
00:24:56
Speaker
This is the most important thing and moment of your life is right now and it's happening.
00:25:01
Speaker
And if you can't be present here, like...
00:25:04
Speaker
pay attention, you know, pay attention.
00:25:08
Speaker
And it's like, I think one of the reasons for meditation is that when you are in the cuddle, when you are witnessing the sunset, that you can be there.
00:25:20
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:22
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely.
00:25:23
Speaker
So beautiful.
00:25:24
Speaker
I felt that co-regulation when you spoke about it.
00:25:28
Speaker
It's so true.
00:25:29
Speaker
It's such a beautiful way to be able to access just presence and breath through another person, through touch.
00:25:36
Speaker
Yeah, nature also is just so powerful to bring us into the moment, to be witness to the colors and the light and the sounds.
00:25:45
Speaker
I find sounds, especially, I'm very audible.
00:25:49
Speaker
And so sometimes what I like to do for little micro meditations throughout the day, especially in nature, is to just pause and focus on whatever sounds I can hear.
00:26:03
Speaker
and listen with more expansive awareness, start paying attention to the subtleties of what I might not have been able to hear if I was talking, or if I was looking at my phone, or if I was just in space thinking about my to-do list or whatever it might be.
00:26:20
Speaker
The sounds are such a catalyst to the moment and to this ever-changing landscape of sounds that makes up this moment, and I love it.
00:26:31
Speaker
I think
Meditation's Impact on Thoughts & Emotions
00:26:32
Speaker
that sounds a good one, too, because you naturally tune out things, you know, but it's just a natural part of the way our minds work.
00:26:41
Speaker
And so if you really decide to pay attention, it's so wild when you're like, have those birds been singing all morning?
00:26:48
Speaker
You're like, they have, and I didn't even hear them.
00:26:51
Speaker
Like, oh, my gosh.
00:26:51
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:52
Speaker
What else is happening?
00:26:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:54
Speaker
Yeah.
00:26:55
Speaker
And another part of that, I feel like when we sit on our cushion or when we find whatever meditation works for us, whether that is Vipassana or transcendental meditation or mindfulness, whatever the meditation is, I feel like that that contributes to
00:27:12
Speaker
through the rest of our day to be able to have more awareness of our environment and our experiences.
00:27:20
Speaker
And then also, I find it can strengthen intuition because our intuition is inherent.
00:27:27
Speaker
But when we have a lot of static, a lot of noise, then it's very difficult to be able to understand what is my intuition saying because I can't hear it.
00:27:38
Speaker
So when I practice on a regular basis, then I start to be able to attune to the magic of our intuition and the knowing that is available.
00:27:53
Speaker
I appreciate your relationship to intuition.
00:28:03
Speaker
I think one thing that I, even in my limited practice, when I start the day, even that process of my mind wandering and pulling it back and just noticing how many thoughts are flying in, you know,
00:28:22
Speaker
is just that noticing changes the way, changes my relationship to thoughts for the rest of the day.
00:28:29
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:31
Speaker
So that later in the day, when a thought flows in, you just like, wait, remember how many crazy thoughts flowed in during that five-minute meditation this morning?
00:28:39
Speaker
So maybe all these things that are happening right now are just as hectic and crazy, and you don't have to actually listen to them quite so adherently.
00:28:51
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:51
Speaker
You kind of disidentify with them.
00:28:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:28:54
Speaker
They become they can't become like clouds.
00:28:57
Speaker
They just pass through.
00:28:58
Speaker
I had I sat with a meditation teacher recently.
00:29:01
Speaker
Shout out to Wu Ji.
00:29:03
Speaker
He shared this saying that really stuck with me is have your mind like the sky.
00:29:09
Speaker
Minds like the sky.
00:29:12
Speaker
And when I think of the mind like the sky, it is just always changing.
00:29:16
Speaker
Clouds going by, storms coming in, open spaciousness.
00:29:21
Speaker
It's gray, it's blue, it's purple.
00:29:23
Speaker
It's always changing.
00:29:24
Speaker
And I've really appreciated that so much because then you can just watch the clouds.
00:29:30
Speaker
It's not like there's a lot of clouds in the sky.
00:29:32
Speaker
I don't look up and be like,
00:29:34
Speaker
oh, God, these clouds.
00:29:37
Speaker
There's so many clouds.
00:29:40
Speaker
Like, oh, no.
00:29:41
Speaker
Oh, there's so many clouds from a balanced mind, right?
00:29:44
Speaker
And then the other metaphor that I really love that I read somewhere that was...
00:29:50
Speaker
the thoughts can be like a rushing river.
00:29:54
Speaker
And it's up to us to either sit beside on the riverbank and watch the river go by, or we can get sucked into the river, the river of thoughts that just take us down.
00:30:07
Speaker
And so I think meditation really is just that, being able to learn how to sit on the riverbed and watch the thoughts go by.
00:30:14
Speaker
That's good.
00:30:18
Speaker
Yeah, the more we can...
00:30:20
Speaker
be aware that thoughts can happen without it being us and without it being, you know, having an allegiance or a requirement to act on them or react to them.
00:30:39
Speaker
I think that the better our relationships can be, the healthier we can be, the more at peace we can be.
00:30:45
Speaker
And clearly meditation is...
00:30:48
Speaker
the best tool for that.
00:30:50
Speaker
Not the only tool, I think just self-observation in general and on an all-day-long basis of being aware of your thoughts is a, maybe that's a part of it, but setting aside some time to sit and really make that the only thing you do is clearly important.
00:31:10
Speaker
And you only have to look at every single spiritual tradition in history to know that it's important.
00:31:16
Speaker
Exactly.
00:31:18
Speaker
I know.
00:31:18
Speaker
Exactly.
00:31:19
Speaker
And I love what you shared around just having it now these days because it is kind of a crazy world.
00:31:30
Speaker
not kind of a very crazy world.
00:31:32
Speaker
And there's a lot of big things up and a lot of feelings that come along with so many things that are changing and a lot of things that are out of our control that bring up all kinds of grief and sadness and anger and frustration and, you know, and just process.
00:31:50
Speaker
And so meditation, I feel like is a really helpful tool to be able to move through
00:31:57
Speaker
the range of emotions and also the practice of surrendering
00:32:03
Speaker
because that's such an important thing.
00:32:06
Speaker
Surrendering isn't not doing something, but it is a cultivated practice, again, to surrender into what is.
00:32:14
Speaker
And the meditation can really support that and help to soften the meditation, the pain, the struggle.
00:32:22
Speaker
You know, when our dear soul brother and co-host here, Yonis, passed, it was so shocking to my system
00:32:30
Speaker
Same thing with my dad when he passed.
00:32:32
Speaker
You know, it was just a lot of feelings of grief and anger and sadness and all of it.
00:32:38
Speaker
And I found a lot of refuge and solace in finding stillness and meditation to not try and push away the feelings.
00:32:47
Speaker
but to sit with them, to be with them, and to watch what thoughts come in during that time.
00:32:54
Speaker
And then my whole nervous system would start to soften.
00:32:58
Speaker
I could get into more of a parasympathetic response rather than sympathetic, the fight or flight.
00:33:04
Speaker
I was able to be into more of the
00:33:09
Speaker
And it's like the polyvagal theory, you know, whereas I was able to just be regulated.
00:33:14
Speaker
And so without meditation, it can turn into chaos.
00:33:19
Speaker
And then and
Global Benefits of Meditation
00:33:20
Speaker
I had multiple experiences where my emotions would come out sideways.
00:33:26
Speaker
and it always happens to be the closest people to me right where those those emotions start getting thrown out in all different sorts of ways because I don't really even know what's going on but I know that I'm grieving or I'm upset or I'm feeling something and the meditation helped me just come back to myself so that way I'm not just dumping my shit on everyone else laughing
00:33:57
Speaker
Well, I am glad we started with a meditation and I've been looking forward to listening to this recording so I can listen to it when I'm not going through tech trouble.
00:34:07
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, totally.
00:34:10
Speaker
Well, and I'm always here as well to do meditations with you, as well as if you are on the Insight Timer app.
00:34:19
Speaker
There's a really, really great meditation app that started as a timer for your meditation.
00:34:26
Speaker
That's why it's called Insight Timer.
00:34:29
Speaker
But since it started, it has grown and it has thousands and thousands of people on there recording guided meditations.
00:34:36
Speaker
from yoga nidra, which is a very deep sort of hypnosis type of meditation.
00:34:43
Speaker
There's mantra meditation.
00:34:45
Speaker
There's affirmation meditation, which I have a whole library of meditations on there.
00:34:49
Speaker
There is even just music to help with your meditations.
00:34:53
Speaker
There's these really lovely bells that can help you just set yourself up so that if you want to do a five-minute meditation or 20-minute meditation and
00:35:02
Speaker
It's so lovely.
00:35:03
Speaker
It's free.
00:35:04
Speaker
I highly, highly recommend it.
00:35:06
Speaker
And also, of course, a little self-promo plug.
00:35:09
Speaker
Find me on there.
00:35:10
Speaker
All of mine are really for specific things like manifesting your home, your dream home, an affirmation for that, a meditation for gratitude, a meditation for grief, getting through hard times, for prosperity, and
00:35:27
Speaker
It's really lovely place to be able to also see a global connection of meditators.
00:35:33
Speaker
It'll show you there's thousands of people meditating with this app right now.
00:35:37
Speaker
And there's something that feels really nice knowing that there's people all over the world that are finding their place of stillness or their meditation, their center, their peace, the equanimity together because studies and science have shown the power of mass meditation.
00:35:56
Speaker
It can reduce crime.
00:35:57
Speaker
They were doing these, I'm sure you've probably heard that, yeah?
00:36:01
Speaker
It's like there's, crime went way down when they were bringing monks to come in and meditate in certain inner city places.
00:36:09
Speaker
And so when we meditate for ourselves, it's not just for our own personal benefit, but it can actually contribute to a better world too.
00:36:19
Speaker
So beautiful.
Wisdom & Starting a Practice
00:36:21
Speaker
Well, can I share a closing spark?
00:36:24
Speaker
Yeah.
00:36:25
Speaker
My closing spark is that before we recorded, I was sharing, just kind of struggling with stuff in the world and processing thoughts around that and thinking
00:36:42
Speaker
you reminded me of the serenity prayer, which is, God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.
00:36:53
Speaker
And I said, I could use a little bit more wisdom.
00:36:57
Speaker
And you said, well, good thing we're going to be talking about meditation.
00:36:59
Speaker
And I was like, right.
00:37:02
Speaker
What a great tool for finding that wisdom.
00:37:05
Speaker
So my clothing spark is in the pathway to wisdom through meditation.
00:37:16
Speaker
Yes, beautiful.
00:37:20
Speaker
I think my closing spark is just...
00:37:24
Speaker
about starting again.
00:37:28
Speaker
And it can look different every day.
00:37:30
Speaker
It doesn't have to be the same thing.
00:37:31
Speaker
You know, there's so many different pathways, so many different spokes of the wheel that lead to the same place.
00:37:38
Speaker
And to just keep coming back again and again.
00:37:41
Speaker
I know I have fallen off my cushion.
00:37:44
Speaker
I have fallen off my practice and I keep coming back and I am so grateful to be able to just have that compassion to just keep starting again, keep returning, also trying different pathways of meditation, whether that is the guided meditation or different styles.
00:38:05
Speaker
And so I hope for those of you out there listening that you are sparked today.
00:38:10
Speaker
to connect to your meditation practice, whatever it might be, a walking meditation or stillness.
00:38:18
Speaker
And we'd love to hear from you.
Connecting with Listeners & Closing
00:38:20
Speaker
And so feel free to reach out to us.
00:38:23
Speaker
Many of you are friends and have sent us messages that you are listening.
00:38:27
Speaker
We always love hearing from you.
00:38:29
Speaker
Some of you we've never met and we still love hearing from you.
00:38:34
Speaker
it's a pretty amazing thing to get to connect globally through this podcast and, and through meditation.
00:38:41
Speaker
So feel free to reach out.
00:38:42
Speaker
We'll podcast, you can leave a review.
00:38:44
Speaker
That's always super helpful.
00:38:46
Speaker
Um, DMS on our Instagram, stay sparked.
00:38:50
Speaker
Um, and then also just, yeah, just giving this little, little sparkles on our social media posts is always really wonderful too.
00:38:58
Speaker
So yeah,
00:38:59
Speaker
Thank you all for listening.
00:39:02
Speaker
And in the spirit of our closing, I would love to offer us a meditation affirmation.
00:39:09
Speaker
Before you do that meditation affirmation, could you tell us more places online we can find all these delightful tools of yours?
00:39:18
Speaker
Yes, and yours too, our plugs.
00:39:21
Speaker
Yes, of course.
00:39:22
Speaker
Feel free to reach out to me and find more of my work on poweraffirmation.com.
00:39:27
Speaker
That has a variety of tools in my shop that help you get in touch with your thinking.
00:39:32
Speaker
through journaling and through inspirational affirmation cards, as well as some other ritual cards.
00:39:39
Speaker
I also love working with people one-on-one in person and virtually in person.
00:39:44
Speaker
I do body work and I do a really unique modality called aerial somatics, where I put you in a
00:39:50
Speaker
a silk hammock and we do fascial unwinding and deep restorative cranial sacral it's just wonderful and virtually i really love helping people to cleanse clear and purify any shadows anything that's getting in the way of really stepping into your power through journaling and meditation and affirmation so yeah feel free to reach out if you want to have some support
00:40:16
Speaker
but valuable, important resources, please, please reach out to Betsy.
00:40:24
Speaker
And you can find my goodies and stuff at lifestudent.com.
00:40:31
Speaker
There's links to my morning broadcasts and gratitude circles and YouTube channel, as well as an upcoming men's group.
00:40:38
Speaker
I'm hosting a day-long men's event in June.
00:40:42
Speaker
So reach out if you or someone you love could be
00:40:45
Speaker
benefited by spending time with open-hearted men.
00:40:50
Speaker
Also very, very important work.
00:40:52
Speaker
Beautiful service that you're doing.
00:40:54
Speaker
Yay, awesome.
00:40:58
Speaker
Now I think we deserve a closing.
00:41:00
Speaker
Okay, you're right.
00:41:01
Speaker
Thank you.
00:41:03
Speaker
All right.
00:41:04
Speaker
Well, then, in the spirit of our conversation, let this affirmation support us in getting present and taking the reins of our thoughts.
00:41:13
Speaker
This is one of my favorite affirmations that can help to focus the mind.
00:41:19
Speaker
And it's just as simple as I am present.
00:41:23
Speaker
I am present.
00:41:25
Speaker
I am present.
00:41:26
Speaker
And you're welcome to repeat this in your mind or out loud a few more times.
00:41:31
Speaker
I am present.
00:41:33
Speaker
I am present.
00:41:35
Speaker
I am present.
00:41:37
Speaker
I am aware of my thoughts.
00:41:40
Speaker
I am aware of my thoughts.
00:41:44
Speaker
I am aware of my thoughts.
00:41:47
Speaker
I am aware of this moment.
00:41:50
Speaker
I am aware of this moment.
00:41:54
Speaker
I am aware of this moment.
00:42:01
Speaker
Feeling our breath.
00:42:03
Speaker
Feeling our bodies.
00:42:07
Speaker
Feeling the space around us.
00:42:13
Speaker
Opening the eyes.
00:42:16
Speaker
Thank you so much.
00:42:21
Speaker
Love you.
00:42:21
Speaker
Thank you.
00:42:22
Speaker
Love you.
00:42:23
Speaker
Stay sparked, people.
00:42:26
Speaker
Stay sparked, friends.
00:42:28
Speaker
Find us on Instagram at stay sparked and leave us a five-star review on Apple Podcasts.
00:42:34
Speaker
Thanks so much for helping us spread these sparks.