Opinion | Can a Neuroscientist Fight Cancer With Mere Thought? – The New York Times
Opinion | Can a Neuroscientist Fight Cancer With Mere Thought? The New York Times
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March 18, 2023 at 05:20PM
Tampa Bay Newspapers Events – “The Timeless Wisdom of the … – Tampa Bay Newspapers
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10 Benefits of Daily Mindfulness Meditation That Will Surprise You – Country Herald
Are you constantly feeling stressed and anxious? Maybe you should consider practicing mindfulness meditation. This ancient practice has been gaining popularity in recent years, and for good reason. Here are ten surprising benefits of practicing mindfulness meditation every day:
Incorporating mindfulness meditation into your daily routine may seem daunting at first, but the benefits are worth it. By taking just a few minutes each day to practice mindfulness meditation, you can improve your physical and mental health, boost your productivity, and enhance your overall well-being.
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March 18, 2023 at 02:46PM
I’m sick of the wellness industry monetizing every aspect of my life – TechRadar
Let’s get something out of the way first: this article is going to be a little hypocritical. I review and recommend fitness and wellness tech for a living, and there are some amazing advances in the field that can help you train smarter and recover more efficiently. But seeing an ad for a new home device made me realize that the constant clamor to track and record every waking moment of our lives is beginning to wear me down.
I’m always using the best smartwatches and best running watches to log my runs and workouts, both during reviews and in my everyday life. As I’m currently training for a marathon, I’m very conscious of pace, distance, calories burned, and so on, and smartwatches help to keep me on track. They also monitor my sleep for the purposes of adequate muscle recovery, and informing me whether my body is recovered enough to take on another long run. Smartwatches also keep me connected – perhaps too connected – with Whatsapp and Slack notifications on my wrist, among other features typically used by the terminally online.
Outside of my work obligations, I’m also a subscriber to the Calm app, as it provides loads of guided meditations (a different 10-minute ‘Daily Calm’ meditation is released every morning), alongside soundscapes and sleep stories. Listening to Levar Burton read me detailed descriptions of our solar system, or Eva Green’s lilting French-tinged RP accent narrating a nighttime walk, is a great way to unwind and fall asleep. I use it a lot, and as you can imagine, the app records streaks if I use it every day, showing white circles in a monthly calendar to mark the days I’ve ‘made time for myself’.
However, sometimes I need to try the guided meditation services that live on other devices in order to review them properly, which means I don’t use Calm for a day, losing my streak. What’s more, sometimes I’ll even try a breathing exercise or meditation without using my phone (shocker!) which means, again, I don’t log Calm for the day, effectively losing my streak. When I look at my monthly calendar, the white circles aren’t there, prompting me to wonder if my unlogged mindfulness sessions really count.
Then I realize the concept of meditations not counting because they’re not recorded is absolutely ridiculous. Of course it counts. What’s more, the whole concept of mindfulness is to make space from worries like this, and unplug from the day. I say ‘unplug’ there very deliberately, because Calm, for all its soft blue tones and reminders to take time for myself, wants me to use it constantly, and gamifies the concept of mindfulness.
It’s not the only culprit, either. Removing my tech-reviewer’s blinkered visor for a moment, the entire health, fitness and wellness industry operates with similar gamification strategies. Apple, Garmin, Fitbit, Oura, Amazfit, Samsung, Huawei, Strava… they all do it. Once you’ve completed a run, or a meditation, or a yoga class, you get a nice, shiny thumbs-up from your app of choice, a dopamine hit to keep you coming back. Your attention is a commodity, and all these competing brands want you locked into their own ecosystem rather than a competitor’s, because once you’re locked in, they can sell you more stuff. Another year’s subscription perhaps, or a new premium device. There’s so much electronic noise in our lives, and even your attempts to quiet that noise through exercise, meditation and sleep is logged, quantified and monetized.
The thing is, exercise, meditation and sleep are some of the few things left in life that are free for everyone to enjoy. Sure, if you’re a runner you’ll need to buy the best running shoes to help you pound the pavements, and if you’re a lifter you’ll need a gym membership, but if you just want to start exercising, you can pull on some comfortable clothes, go to the park and do 10 squats, 10 push-ups, and hold a plank for 30 seconds. Do that three or four times, and you’ve completed a perfectly good workout and gotten a bit of fresh air. No app needed.
Mindfulness is the same. You just sit down on a cushion or a chair, set a timer, and listen to your own breathing. At its core, you don’t need a subscription to an app, or a $50 special meditation cushion from Amazon, to make time for yourself. Sure, guided meditations in your earbuds can help you, and I enjoy the content Calm puts out, but you certainly don’t need a “Good job!” notification to feed your rampant dopamine addiction. Yet somehow I keep coming back.
Of course, none of this is new information, but for me, the straw that broke the camel’s back; the piece of tech that made me angry enough to pen this rant about the state of the industry, was when I saw a review of Aro, a service consisting of an app and home device that’s making the rounds this year. Aro is designed to make sure families spend more time looking at each other instead of their phones, and its ‘home device’ is bascially a charging station with a lid.
“The Aro app gamifies the experience of being off your phone,” says the GoAro website (opens in new tab). “The app automatically connects to the Aro Home device, measures the time you spend away from your phone, reminds you to take breaks from your phone, shows you data to improve your phone habits, and even lets you connect and compete with others.”
And, of course, there’s a subscription, with membership starting at $18 a month for 12 months, or an upfront payment of $180 for the year in the US.
It’s a $200 box to put your phone in. A gamified, subscription-based way to ensure that even the time you spend away from your phone is logged and monetized. It’s completely dystopian, totally insidious, and probably a great idea from a marketing standpoint that’s going to do very well. In an industry that’s based around collecting data, and holding your attention as long as possible, Aro has found a way to encourage you to put your phone away, go outside and touch grass, all while charging you for the privilege. Thanks, I hate it.
If you want to put your phone in a box so that you can take a nap, or go for a walk, you can do it without a companion app. What’s more, I encourage you to get a small, aesthetically appealing plastic or wooden box (I’ve got one that looks like a book, so I can actually slide it into the bookcase and forget about it), and see if it makes a difference to your life. Most phones have screen time logs these days so you can track the difference if you want, and you certainly don’t need to pay $200 for something that’s basically a bread bin with a charging station inside.
For all its wellness-babble, Aro has hit on something: there’s a growing trend to move away from having too many screens in our lives. Screenless smartwatches and smart rings from Samsung and Oura are beginning to compete with notification-spewing conventional smartwatches and fitness trackers. Gen Z is also embracing the anolog aesthetic in a move away from the addictive hold of TikTok, and a search for balance. But I don’t think that trend is going to break the grip that tech companies have on our attention, or divert them from their dystopian mission to collect data on every aspect of our lives in order to better sell us things we don’t need.
I’m not going to stop reviewing wearable tech anytime soon. I love the ease with which technology has been able to help me devise a running plan for long races, access a new guided meditation whenever I want it, and tell me how well I’ve recovered from a strenuous workout. But I refuse to ever, ever pay for the privilege of turning that technology off, and enjoying a few minutes of untracked, unlogged offline life.
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March 18, 2023 at 02:46PM
Karnataka forms committee to implement moral education, meditation lessons in govt schools, PU colleges – The Indian Express
The Karnataka school education and literacy department Saturday said a committee of education experts will submit a report on introducing daily meditation and moral education lessons for students in government schools and pre-university colleges.
The government in an order issued Saturday said daily mediation in schools will improve the stamina, concentration, and mental and physical well-being of students. Further, the government stated that moral education will inculcate values like honesty, compassion, non-violence, and brotherhood among the students.
The committee comprises six members – Gururaj Karajagi, president of the Academy of Creative Teaching; Dwarkanath, member of Vidya Vardhaka Sangha; Dr VB Arathi, faculty at Vibhu Academy; Sucheta Bhat, CEO of Dream Academy; Alpana Palatty, principal of Sophia High School; and B Ameer John, lecturer of Physics at Government Girls PU College, Chikkaballapur.
The order also stated that the committee will have to submit a report to the government within one month and the commissioner of public education will take necessary steps to organise a meeting of the said committee. The department announced a separate order will be issued regarding the payment of the honorarium to the members of the said committee.
The school education department has been planning to introduce moral education and meditation in government schools for some time now. In January, the department also convened a meeting with religious leaders from multiple faiths, and education experts to discuss the implementation of value-based education in schools. The ‘consultative round table meeting’ involving religious leaders and education experts was also convened in order to create a curriculum framework for imparting value education in schools in sync with the National Education Policy, 2020.
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March 18, 2023 at 11:55AM
Govt. forms committee to give report on meditation in schools and PU colleges – The Hindu
After receiving some backlash to its order issued in November 2022 mandating 10 minutes of dhyana or meditation to be practiced in all schools and PU colleges, the government has now constituted a committee of educationists headed by Gururaj Karjagi to submit a report on the same.
In a circular issued on Saturday, the Department of School Education and Literacy said that the six-member committee will submit a report within one month. P.G. Dwarakanath, and V.B. Aarathi are amongst the members of the committee.
Primary Education Minister B.C. Nagesh had then told that the practice of meditation would help students in reducing their physical and mental stress while also helping them to improve their concentration and health.
However, some student groups and educationists had called the move as the “saffronisation of education.” Mr. Nagesh had defended the order saying that meditation was not a religious practice.
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March 18, 2023 at 11:55AM
Meditate With Urmila: Connecting to the body’s intelligence – Gulf News
The last column articulated that the mind and body aren’t separate. Take note of the fact how the body responds to certain emotions, like when you are excited or nervous or anxious.
Thoughts generate emotions. The thoughts and emotions are energy from the mental plane and are invisible, however, they are real and this can be established from the way the body responds. The body’s expression is more tangible and visible than those of thoughts and beliefs, as the physical body operates on the material/ matter plane. Thoughts, beliefs, ideas, opinions, feelings are all subtle-level invisible, real energies.
Emotional Story Held in the Body
The invisible, subtle drives the more visible, perceivable. From that perspective, the body holds the emotional/energetic story of the self, while co-existing with the body and influencing it. Any mis-alignment in the emotional aspect will have a corresponding impact on the physical body. The body’s mis-aligned postures, pains, aches, illnesses, chronic discomfort are grosser expressions of unhelpful emotions-thoughts present inside.
Some of the stories we are aware of, at the conscious level, however, most we are not as they exist in the subconscious mind, but the body expresses them. Take a cue from your body’s telling and check what emotions-feelings are being harboured in the psyche and mind.
For example, the thought and the emotion, (operating at the conscious or the subconscious level): “I’m carrying the weight of the world on my shoulders”, will generate sensation in the shoulder region, may be as pain, or body posture of droopy-shoulders, or expanded/rigid shoulders (to be able to carry the weight).
Or a thought similar to it such as , “I have to fulfill expectation/s of my parent or sibling or…”; thereby carrying that thought- energy on the shoulders. The individual may feel “weighed down” by this “burden” (drooped shoulders) or energetically will try to broaden the shoulders to be able to carry the weight of expectations.
Similarly, thoughts evoking feelings of anxiety, helplessness, worry will give sensations in the spleen or stomach region. The feelings of fear, unsupported-ness, blame will be felt in the kidneys or bladder. Similarly, harboured feelings of resentment or grudge will show up in kidneys mostly. Grief, sorrow, sadness, rejection will impact the lungs or colon.
Know that emotions can lodge anywhere in the body, especially those areas which are vulnerable (say, by injury, or nutritional deficiency or by genetic disposition).
The body doesn’t lie. It merely expresses the internalised feelings. When one continues to feel the same unhelpful emotion over and over again, regurgitate the same thought, the same unhelpful belief, the organ where the emotion is “lodged” might feel “overloaded”, and/ or work “double”, causing wear and tear to itself. It may feel obligated to produce more of that vibration, reinforcing the same cycle-pattern of thoughts.
The unhelpful emotions that get “lodged” are trapped energies within the body-system. Most emotions get trapped in early childhood and before that, at the conception stage or are carried forward from the past lives or from ancestors.
For example, the trapped emotion of betrayal, or forlorn, can be trapped in a person’s heart region. This emotion may be traced back to childhood, when an individual didn’t have a parent around while growing up, is one example. (“My parent was never available to us” or “my grandmother raised me, not my mother”).
A trapped emotion can be inherited, say of anger issues or easy disposition towards feeling fatigued. Some comments might seem casually made but can have forceful impact, as ‘you may fail this class’, may cause humiliation, or feelings of unworthiness to trap in the body causing performance anxiety.
In awareness one can notice the body signs and work backwards to the trapped emotions and let go of them.
Disclaimer: Urmila Rao is an emotional healer and a forgiveness teacher. All the ideas expressed herein are her own, and not professional advice or medical prescription. Her website is: http://www.karmicwellness.in Email: hellokarmicwellness@gmail.com
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March 18, 2023 at 11:55AM
How Mindfulness Affects the Brain and Body – Psychology Today
Neuroscientist David Vago begins each day with meditation. Like millions worldwide, Vago sees his mindfulness practice as good medicine holistically promoting health. Inspired by the staggering power of the human mind, Vago has studied the neurobiological mechanisms of mind-body practices for almost 15 years.
Mindfulness – a moment-to-moment, nonjudgmental awareness of one’s internal states and surroundings – boasts benefits ranging from stress reduction to enlightenment. However, scientific investigations of mindfulness paint a complex picture. Yes, it can boost physical and psychological well-being. But it is not a panacea and can even be counter-indicated for certain individuals. Despite significant progress over the past two decades, research on mindfulness is still riddled with various conceptual and methodological challenges. This is why, according to Vago, the question What does mindfulness really do? has no simple answer.
Scientists like Vago study the effects of mindfulness by enrolling participants in eight-week interventions. There are four core practices in a mindfulness-based intervention:
What about these practices that, moment by moment, begin to shift things for people? According to Vago, the possibilities are profound and consequential: people can get more insight into the workings of their minds; hone their ability to respond rather than to react to circumstances; gain glimpses of non-dual states; renew their understanding of the self and its place in the world; feel a deeper connection to others. “This is the Buddhist prescription for a flourishing life,” says Vago. “Everything else – the improved health and the calm – are merely side effects.”
One of the core faculties that mindfulness hinges on is attention. Attention might not have the buzzwordy flair of mindfulness. Yet, it’s one of our most precious resources. Attention, according to the father of modern psychology, William James, is somewhat of a curator of our lives (“My experience is what I agree to attend to.”) Poet Mary Oliver called paying attention “our endless and proper work.”
“Instructions for living a life:
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.”
Philosopher Simone Weil considered attention “the rarest and purest form of generosity.” “Attention, taken to its highest degree, is the same as prayer. It presupposes faith and love,” wrote Weil. Attention can even alter the perception of another limited human resource – time. As haste and demands leave many of us with the depleting feeling of weeks slipping by, attention can act as a salve to slow down the perceived passage of time (“The best way to capture moments is to pay attention,” wrote Jon Kabat-Zinn, the founder of mindfulness-based stress reduction.)
Perhaps, then, one of the gifts of mindfulness can be found in nurturing our faculty of attention – to move it more nimbly, with more ease, between the micro and macro of our circumstances. To direct its precise lens on a single cherry blossom’s pale, velvety petals and cast its vast reach beyond all boundaries. To discern content (thoughts, emotions) and context (relation to thoughts and emotions). To revel in the wonder that we are alive at this very moment, together with billions of other sentient beings near and far the blooming trees. This reminder will likely kindle a profound appreciation: for our impermanent existence and our affinity with others.
Here’s David Vago, on how mindfulness meditation affects the mind-brain-body.
MP: How does mindfulness benefit health?
DV: The most well-established health benefits of mindfulness meditation include a decrease in blood pressure and perceived stress, an increase in heart rate variability, and an improvement of inflammatory markers.
Mindfulness has also been shown to help with pain management. The experience of pain has physical and emotional components. While we can’t escape the physical effects of pain on the body, the emotional side (for example, catastrophizing pain) can be reduced through meditation. Namely, by impacting attentional biases, meditation can shift the way we attend to pain. For example, people with chronic pain conditions like fibromyalgia can begin to approach pain-related, fearful stimuli, which can help them become less hypervigilant, less avoidant, and less reactive to environmental pain-related signals.
In our lab, we are exploring the glymphatic system – a brain system associated with clearing metabolic waste. One of the ways that sleep benefits us is by eliminating toxins from our brains. Our findings show that by impacting the glymphatic system, mindfulness meditation – a low metabolic state – can act similarly to sleep and have restorative effects on brain functioning.
MP: How do mindfulness intervention outcomes compare to other treatments like therapy?
DV: Overall, mindfulness improves various outcomes related to emotion, cognition, and the self (for example, rumination and empathy) – if we compare it to doing nothing else. Compared to treatments like SSRIs, anxiety drugs, or Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), mindfulness interventions work as well as these gold-standard treatment modalities but don’t often outperform them.
MP: Does mindfulness change the brain?
DV: Meditation instigates morphological changes in the brain. The challenge is quantifying them. Because the brain responds to every learning experience, it’s always changing. You’re always learning – no matter what you’re doing – thus, your brain is always changing. While there are different neuroscience methods to investigate how the brain changes shape and size, it’s difficult to show these changes in healthy individuals. In fact, it’s controversial what actually changes. However, for brains that have significant atrophy (for example, adults over 65 or brain trauma patients), morphological changes are detected more readily. This is in part because many atrophy processes are based on inflammation and meditation improves inflammation markers.
Functionally, brain imaging shows that mindfulness can activate the brain’s insula, the dorsal anterior cingulate, and the frontal-parietal network. The frontal parietal network is a group of brain structures that are critical for flexibly switching between processing the external world and the internal world. This helps us not get stuck in our thoughts. Often, our thoughts can have the quality of “stickiness.” For many of us, our most common thought is some version of “I’m not good enough.” We spend half of our lives in our heads, repeating to ourselves the various ways how we are not enough. These thoughts have us convinced that we are failing at some unachievable standard set by ourselves and society. As we elaborate on them, they start sticking. Hence our habit of rumination.
Mindfulness meditation helps develop the capacity to toggle between our thoughts and what’s happening in the world. The frontoparietal network also helps support meta-awareness – knowing where our mind is at any point. Moreover, research shows that individuals who develop high trait mindfulness can better regulate their emotions by increasing prefrontal activity and decreasing amygdala activity.
Whether or not meditation increases brain size has to do with preventing age-related atrophy in the brain. Most of meditation’s effects on cognition – executive functioning, attention, memory – don’t necessarily improve those skills in healthy individuals. It’s not like if you practice a lot of meditation. You’ll get super memory or outstanding decision-making abilities. Instead, brain areas that show increases in size with meditation are simply not atrophying in normal age-related ways.
After age 22, everyone’s cognitive capacities begin to decrease. We can see this as atrophy in specific regions in the brains of older adults. Thus, those older than 65 show the most increased brain size from an eight-week mindfulness course since meditation helps stabilize their cognition and prevents decline. The brains of older meditators don’t atrophy like most healthy, aging individuals because they are strengthening their abilities to keep those crucial brain areas active.
Many thanks to David Vago for his time and insights. Vago is an Associate Professor and visiting faculty at the University of Virginia’s Contemplative Sciences Center, Research Lead for the well-being app RoundGlass, and Director of Neurosciences for the International Society for Contemplative Research.
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35 Restorative Meditation Activities – Teaching Expertise
Kids have got a lot going on these days- school work, sports, theater, choir, and trying to find time to hang out with their friends and family. It can get pretty overwhelming. Help your kids re-center themselves by taking time for mindful meditation. With strong breathing, guided practices, and learning about body awareness, your kids will be able to manage their emotions and take on the world!
Introduce your tech-savvy kids to the digital world of meditation! These guided exercises start small to create strong foundations for all types of meditation. Your kids will be able to find a guided practice suited to specific emotions, situations, or conflicts they’re dealing with.
Learn More: Headspace
Guided meditation scripts are a great, no-prep tool to keep students focused on their meditation exercises. The wide range of scripts appeals to students of all ages. Have them reflect on various experiences and practice their mindfulness techniques to stay present.
Learn More: Counselor Chelsey
Take a few minutes to check in with yourself! This short video is a wonderful way to take a break and reenergize during the day. Kids can learn about body sensations and how breathing can help reduce stress and tension in their bodies.
Learn More: Fablefy
Laughter is the best medicine! Studies show that laughing helps break cycles of negative thinking, improves mental health, and boosts social skills like communication and cooperation. Lead your kids in laughing meditation to brighten dreary days or to work through feelings of sadness and frustration.
Learn More: Dawn Selander
Reducing stress is vital to improving mental health. Tapping, otherwise known as the Emotional Freedom Technique, combines modern psychology with Chinese acupressure. The technique is easy to learn and studies have shown it regulates the nervous system, boosts the immune system, and lowers stress hormones!
Learn More: The Tapping Solution
Take your meditation exercises out of this world! Ask your kids to imagine their bodies floating into space and visiting new planets as they mediate. When the practice is over, ask them to share how their journey went and what their planet looked like.
Learn More: Live & Dare
Have your little ones sit in a relaxed position with their eyes closed and listen for the bell. Focus on the sound, and open your eyes when it completely fades away. Afterward, talk about how easy or difficult it was to stay focused on the sound.
Learn More: Mindfulmazing
Teach your kids about body awareness with a simple exercise. While getting some fresh air, have your kids focus on the way their feet touch the ground and what it feels like. Try walking on different surfaces to add sensory learning to your meditation exercises.
Learn More: Wildmind Meditation
Add some meditation to your next park visit! Ask your kids to count every animal or insect they see, stop to smell some flowers, or simply sit and listen to the sounds around them. These activities build observation skills for more advanced meditation techniques.
Learn More: Very Special Tales
Focus on color during your meditation walks. As you walk, find an object for each color of the rainbow. Go in order and repeat until your walk is over. When you get back, sketch something in each color and talk about the different things everyone focused on.
Learn More: Mindful Teachers
Don’t confuse these beautiful walking paths for mazes! The single, winding path guides your kids toward the center; allowing them to reflect on the events of the day and their emotions. If you can’t find one near you, create your own with chalk or sidewalk paint!
Learn More: Education’s Voices
If you don’t live near a labyrinth, you can get the same benefits through finger labyrinths! Print the templates and let your kids either color their way through or trace the path with their fingers. Be sure to find the pattern best suited for your meditation intentions.
Learn More: Relax 4 Life
Meditative coloring is a great form of art therapy that is easily adaptable to all age groups. You can choose to print coloring sheets for your kids to color or allow them to freestyle. They’ll have so much fun coloring that they won’t even know they’re practicing meditation!
Learn More: Coloring Only
During times of change and schedule disruption, this worksheet can help kids navigate their negative feelings. Encourage your kids to draw or write their worries and concerns in the balloon. Then, they can imagine them getting smaller and smaller as they float away.
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Ignite your kids’ meditation journey with a beautifully designed workbook. Geared toward middle and high schoolers, each lesson is carefully crafted to build self-confidence while learning to communicate honestly and express feelings.
Learn More: Making Mindfulness Fun
Combat stress and anxiety with grounding exercises! The 5-4-3-2-1 technique is super easy to learn and engages all 5 senses. Kids will learn to observe their surroundings and focus on the moment instead of their worries.
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Teach your little ones to anchor themselves in the here and now. Create a quiet “lily pad” for them to sit on. Then, ask them to sit still and breathe; just like a frog! Talk about the benefits of being still and how it saves energy for fun activities later.
Learn More: Teaching Kids to Thrive
Mindfulness breath boards are geared toward beginners. The boards can help your little ones visually understand what it means to control their breathing. Once they can control their breathing, you can begin to build deeper, more introspective meditation practices.
Learn More: Teachers Pay Teachers
Give your kids the resources to practice meditation on their own. These simple breathing exercise cards provide a wide range of styles and intentions for their practices. Go over them together to ensure your kids master the proper technique before trying it on their own.
Learn More: Childhood 101
No balloons are required for this form of meditation! Kids imagine that their belly is a balloon. As they breathe in and out, have them picture their balloons inflating and deflating. Learning proper breathing techniques will help kids discover ways to calm down by themselves.
Learn More: Proud to be Primary
Ease your kids into meditation. Bumblebee breathing is a simple practice that’s perfect for toddlers and preschoolers. Have them sit comfortably and place a finger in each ear before breathing in. Then, tell them to hum softly as they breathe out; buzzing calmly like a bee!
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This printable breathing worksheet is perfect for teaching proper breathing techniques. Stimulating breath practices keep kids focused on their meditation. You can easily substitute different animal noises all week long to keep the exercise interesting.
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This partner activity is a fun way for kids to calm down and focus. They can sit back to back and try to match each other’s breathing. When the partners think they’ve matched, have them point their thumbs up on their knees!
Learn More: Kumarah Yoga
String 6 beads onto a pipe cleaner and twist them into a bracelet. When your kids have finished their cute bracelets, they can use them as a guide for breathing meditations. They can move the beads one by one around the bracelet- breathing in and out with each bead.
Learn More: Raising Hooks
If you’re short on time, check out these gorgeous chakra meditation bracelets. They’re an excellent meditation tool for anxious kids. They can roll the beads between their fingers and focus on the sensations while sitting in silent meditation.
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Incorporate some art therapy into your mindfulness exercises. All you need is some polymer clay! Let your kids mix and match their favorite colors to create meditation stones. Encourage them to be mindful of what the clay feels, smells, and looks like.
Learn More: Hands-On Teaching Ideas
With some soap, water, sequins, and glitter, your kids can practice mindfulness on the go. As kids flip their bottles over, have them take deep breaths in time with the moving glitter and sequins. An awesome centering tool for kids with anxiety disorders!
Learn More: Mama Instincts
Take a break from a busy day of lessons in your very own zen garden. The simple practice of tracing lines in the sand is great for mental health. Use a shallow baking dish and a small bowl as a water feature. Decorate with rocks and greenery.
Learn More: Sunny Day Family
Relax and get your hands dirty with some gardening exercises. Whether it’s outside in a garden or inside with potted plants, kids will love exercising their green thumbs. Be sure to stop and take time to smell the roses while working in the garden.
Learn More: Confident Counselors
Turn a favorite activity into a mindfulness practice. Encourage your kids to take deep breaths and exhale slowly while blowing their bubbles. Then watch as they float away. The sensory experience is a fantastic break from more analytical styles of learning.
Learn More: Kids Activities Blog
Grab some watercolors and straws for this colorful mindfulness practice. Blowing paint across paper is an easy way to get kids to focus on their breathing instead of their worries. Have them take deep, slow breaths as they blow the paint. Then, display their awesome artwork!
Learn More: Lightly Sketched
These yoga cards are perfect for trying out different poses and sequences. Do the poses more than once, and don’t worry about perfection. Kids will have fun learning the wide range of poses before settling into their meditation practice.
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Adriene’s approach to yoga is awesome for beginners! Follow along as she guides your kids through different positions to let go of their stress. They’ll put their deep breathing techniques to good use as they get ready to settle into their meditation practice.
Learn More: Yoga With Adriene
Use this activity to transition from loud activities to meditation time. Grab a bell, chime, or sound bowl. Then, have your kids breathe in and out with the sound. For older students, add a yoga position for them to hold for the duration of the chime.
Add meditation to story hour. This beautifully illustrated book introduces kids to different types of meditation, finding the perfect spot, and how to make meditation a daily practice.
Learn More: Amazon
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March 18, 2023 at 11:55AM
What Will The Temples of Tomorrow Look Like?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EeOCRYNtg3E
In a darshan on the auspicious occasion of Thaipusam, Sadhguru speaks about the importance of ensuring that temples are managed by devotees, and how access to the Divine should not be restricted based on caste, creed, race or religion.
Official YouTube Channel of Sadhguru
Considered among India’s 50 most influential people, Sadhguru is a yogi, mystic, bestselling author, and poet. Absolute clarity of perception places him in a unique space, not only in matters spiritual but in business, environmental and international affairs, and opens a new door on all that he touches.
Inner Engineering
Inner Engineering is a comprehensive course for personal growth that brings about a shift in the way you perceive and experience your life, your work, and the world that you live in.
Save Soil Movement
Launched by Sadhguru, Save Soil is the world’s largest people’s movement, reaching 3.91 billion people to address impending soil extinction by supporting governments to create policies for soil revitalization.
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evolutionmeditation
via Sadhguru https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCcYzLCs3zrQIBVHYA1sK2sw
March 18, 2023 at 05:51AM
evolutionmeditation 