MINDFUL BLOG
Why practice Loving Kindness meditation?
Loving Kindness is just a special kind of meditation as it focuses on developing benevolence towards ourselves and others. The main quality is to cultivate a mind and heart which cares deeply to bring about wellness and happiness for all beings. It belongs to a family of ancient contemplative practices, which are over 2500 years old! The main outcome of the practice is being loving, connected, and kind to all beings becomes a natural response in day-to-day life.
Some of these ancient practices cultivate clear seeing and wisdom such as mindfulness. Other practices train the heart-mind to cultivate positive emotions such as kindness, benevolence, and universal friendliness. This is love and kindness meditation. This teaching is relevant today more than ever as Simon Sinek points out in his inspirational speech on how empathy is a key skill required in leadership.
When one practices both wisdom (mindfulness) and loving kindness (metta), there is a holistic balance of wisdom and benevolence. When these two work synergistically it has the potential to pull ourselves out of suffering and achieve well-being, happiness and liberation. Scientific studies have shown that we have on average 60,000 thoughts a day, most of them being repetitive, reactive and automatic. Our minds are suffering and trapped in a torrent of automatic, discursive, reactive patterns. Many of these are negative which lead us down the path of suffering. This the habitual automatic pilot mode of the mind. Versus being present.
One important purpose of meditation is move away from the automatic mode into being mode. To step into a state of being and awareness in the present moment where one can truly experience what is actually going on provides great insight and bliss.
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WHY IS IT SO GOOD TO LAUGH?
The movie Patch Adams tells the true story of how a medical student introduces levity into a clinical profession that alienates patients from their caregivers. In the same way that doctors can achieve greater success by getting to know their patients, leaders will find their teams are more creative, productive and committed when they are given the freedom to have some fun. Furthermore there’s a wealth of scientific evidence that laughter keeps us healthy.
Still not convinced? Here are 9 reasons why laughing is good for our health……
When we laugh, our heart rate and blood pressure increase, dilating our cardiovascular system. When we stop, they decrease to below normal. Laughing ultimately lowers heart rate and blood pressure.
Aside from improving our moods, laughter can reduce stress, help fight infection, and reduce pain levels. Two stress hormones, cortisol and epinephrine which suppress the body’s immune system, drop after a dose of laughter.
Laughter causes positive changes in brain chemistry by releasing endorphins. It also brings more oxygen into the body with the deeper inhalations. When we laugh, we gulp in air. Because the cardiovascular system is already dilated, the oxygen moves a lot faster to already relaxed muscles giving our internal organs a massage and stimulating circulation. This is why we feel so good afterwards.
Laughing balances the brain. During normal beta activity, the left and right sides of our brain look different under a PET (positron emission tomography) scan. When we laugh, both sides look almost identical.
Laughing releases the body’s natural opiates (beta-endorphins) and relieves pain.
Laughter releases anger, fear, guilt, anxiety and tension.
When we laugh with other people it meets our basic human need for social inclusion.
Laughter encourages us to focus on positive attitudes.
Researchers have even found that after watching an hour of slapstick comedy the “natural killer cells,” which seek out and destroy malignant cells, more actively attacked tumour cells in test tubes.
Laughter yoga provides a safe environment with exercises to laugh. The brain does not know the difference between real and fake laughter so you the above benefits are experienced regardless. Classes take place every Monday and Thursday at 5:15pm for adults and a family session on a Friday lunchtime at 12:30pm.
Why not book a session and experience it for yourself?
The lost art of breathing
After recovering from pneumonia for the third time, journalist James Nestor took decisive action to improve his lungs. He questioned why so many humans - and only humans - have to contend with stuffy noses, snoring, asthma, allergies, sinusitis and sleep apnoea, to name but a few. James hears remarkable stories of others who have changed their lives through the power of breath. His deep dive into the unconscious and oft-ignored act of human respiration offers us all a way to breathe easier. Listen to find out what he found and join a mindful breathing class on Mondays with Satori.
WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS OF YOGA FOR KIDS?
Children deal with many distractions, temptations, over stimulation and peer pressure. Schools are challenged to do more with less and be creative in how they reach even the most isolated child.
Yoga is a low-cost, helpful tool that can have a positive impact on children.
Here are some of the many benefits of teaching yoga to kids:
Yoga helps kids to:
Develop body awareness
Learn how to use their bodies in a healthy way
Manage stress through breathing, awareness, meditation and healthy movement
Build concentration
Increase their confidence and positive self-image
Feel part of a healthy, non-competitive group
Have an alternative to tuning out through constant attachment to electronic devices
Within the online live classes, kids will learn yoga poses, sounds, breathing and meditation which will calm them down. The classes are 30 minutes and delivered via zoom with a qualified children’s yoga teacher.
CHECk IN ON YOUR PERSONAL REALITY - hold off on the second arrow
We all know that there are times in our life where we suffer more and times when we suffer less. From my own experience, what I have discovered is that through being curious and kind with our own personal suffering, it is possible to lessen or stop suffering. Primary suffering is almost a universal characteristic of being human. However, there is what is called secondary suffering, which is not universal as it is optional. Through applying certain techniques this secondary suffering can be stopped and even the primary one can also be reduced.
The Buddha explained this beautifully with the concept of the two arrows in the Sallatha Sutta (Ref: Samyutta Nikaya 36.6). The Buddha uses the simile of being struck twice by two arrows – once by common circumstance and again by our habitual unskillful reactions to this primary event.
Breaking it down simply, the first arrow is the actual event that happens in our lives. The second arrow is what we make that event to mean. Often there is much more suffering from the second arrow, for example, the current crisis that we are experiencing is a lock down due to the Corona Virus outbreak, the first arrow is that there is now a virus called Covid-19 which has caused deaths within the country. This is not something that we have absolute control over.
The second arrow is what we make it to mean, it is our reaction to the first event. It could be that the outcome is that there is a loss of freedom that we were once used to, financially we may suffer as we may lose our job and there maybe scarcity. The reaction is rooted in not being able to see things as they are and the consequences of certain unskilful thinking and behaviours. For example, the panic buying mentally was the second arrow launching when the reality was that the supermarkets were still receiving deliveries and providing a continued service to householders. The second arrow is the arrow we shoot at ourselves. It is possible to see this and stop.
The more we practice mindfulness, we become aware that the second arrow is optional as we do actually have a choice on whether to launch it or not. Through wisdom and reflection, we can start to see what the second arrow brings such as anger, despair, depression and much more. We should see the extra suffering is optional. This possibility of choice can lead to a more happier and content life, ultimately reducing our suffering.
Within Buddhism, the first teaching was about the four noble truths and the first noble truth is that there is suffering. As a consequence of living on planet earth, we are subject to causality and natural laws that govern our environment. For example, things eat things to survive. The fact is that ultimately, we will age, at one point we will get sick, be separated from our loved ones and die. This is the universal characteristic of being human, do you know anyone who has lived to age of 150 years? There will be stress and unhappiness, ultimately leading to suffering. However, being human is also the vital condition needed to liberate us from suffering. For example, we are intelligent beings. We have the rational autonomy to choose between skillful and unskillful behaviours so we don’t have to shoot the second arrow. Other beings such as animals only have inborn instincts, e.g. a lion cannot choose to be a vegan, it has to kill other animals to survive.
One can view Buddhism as pessimistic as the word suffering is something most are averse to. We want things to be happy like in the movies that we watched when we grew up that end in happily ever after. However, we quickly learn in childhood that life is not like the movies. We experience greed, ignorance and desire from other children who want to be the best in the neighbourhood. Unfortunately, competition is also the default mode of our materialism focused societies that we live in.
For those who chose the path to understand the teachings of the Buddha will know that the rest of the noble truths go beyond suffering to explain the causes of suffering, that there is an end of suffering and that there is a way out. Importantly, he gives us the cure and medicine for suffering which is to practice the Eight-Fold path. Mindfulness is a core component of this cure. Therefore, the teachings are more about realism of the human condition than pessimism. Buddha provides a useful framework to apply to our lives which can increase happiness and ultimately enlightenment.
So how can we apply this knowledge practically to our lives?
The first step is to become aware of when we are launching the second arrow and in what form it takes. For example, there are many times when the second arrow can be launched upon ourselves through lack of self-awareness and self-compassion.
The wisdom de-centering from self can enable us to be more responsible and accountable from our feelings, thoughts and behaviours. of ‘it’s not my fault’ can enable us to be more responsible and accountable for our feelings. De-centering is the ability to see all events objectivity and realistically as an ever-changing process, instead of seeing those things as self, me and mine. When this happens, we become entangles in the ego driven personal narrative. You can become an observer to solving a problem as opposed to the person who is the problem. For example, instead of being the self who is identified with anxiety, you see the presence of anxiety as its true nature, then you can start to work on dealing with the process.
There is no doubt that there are forces beyond our control such as someone passing away or how another person responds to your speech or behaviour. However, if we blame ourselves and take 100% responsibility for other people’s feelings then this can lock ourselves into repetitive old patterns and validate old beliefs that do not serve us. Just by realising that the first arrow is out of our control can bring forth awareness that can free us from the pain of the second arrow. It is also about letting go of a particular entrenched view that we hold or believe. A common one for many of us is that we are not good enough. The reality is that we are good enough and each person can make a difference in this world.
To summarise, if we can learn to respond mindfully rather than react automatically, then we can create a space for true intimacy and deep inner freedom with yourself and others around you. As Buddha said, we create the world we live in through our thoughts and actions. What will you create for your world?
