I hope you’ve had a good week. Hopefully your children or grandchildren are settling back into school or kinder. My grandson had his first day at kinder last week. So far so good. For him it’s the beginning of a big journey through our education system. I’m curious to know how this system might change over the course of his schooling. I am hoping that it will continue to be more enlightened over the next few decades.
I love the way yoga, meditation and mindfulness are starting to be included in what our young people are learning. You’ve probably heard the saying from the Dalai Lama, “If every 8 year old in the world is taught to meditate we will eliminate violence from the world within one generation.”
I have no doubt that this is true and I recommend meditation to every one of my clients regardless of the problem they come to me with. You may also have heard the other saying that, “All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.” This was said by Blaise Pascal a scientist and philosopher in 1654. Clearly we are a bit slow on the uptake and we should have been teaching meditation in schools since then. Imagine how different the world would be by now!!
A remarkably study to test just how difficult it is to sit quietly in a room alone was done at the University of Virginia. Participants were simply asked to sit and be alone with their thoughts for ten to twenty minutes. Their phones, watches and any other devices were taken from them but they did have the option of giving themselves an electric shock just in case they got bored. Prior to being left alone they had a trial shock. Everyone said it was unpleasant and they all agreed that they would pay money not to be shocked again.
During the 12 minutes they were left alone 70% of the men and 25% of the women gave themselves the electric shock! Excuse the pun but I find that shocking! Why was it so difficult to sit quietly and be with their own thoughts that they preferred to experience pain? What was going on inside their heads that they wanted to distract themselves from it with an electric shock?
How can it be so torturous to sit quietly? I must admit that I have met many people who tell me they can’t sit still. They can’t possibly meditate. They get far too restless and agitated. So they fill their lives with distractions… with work or entertainment or addictions. They might become addicted to busyness or achievement and when they stop they have withdrawal symptoms.
When you think about it, the bottom line for these people is that they are not comfortable in their own company. I find that a huge problem. Consider for a minute that you live with yourself all your entire life. Not enjoying your own company is actually like living permanently with someone that you don’t like. That inner voice that you live with may be critical or negative or just out of control and talk nonsense. It’s incredibly stressful and exhausting.
So making peace with yourself, learning to be relaxed and quiet in your own presence, listening to your own mind chatter and being entertained by your own thoughts has the potential to relieve you of an enormous amount of stress and give you back a bucket load of energy.
Time and time again I’ve witnessed the transformation in people when they discover the peacefulness of meditation and how that peacefulness has a ripple effect through their life.
Although I’ve meditated on and off for the past 40 years I’ve been meditating for 30 to 60 minutes every day for the past few months. Over the last weekend I missed a couple of days and on Monday I woke up feeling a little flat, a little negative and a little stressed. Today after meditating again yesterday I’m back in control of my thoughts and emotions. That’s a much better feeling.
So with anxiety, depression and suicide reaching epidemic rates surely teaching our children to meditate is a wise investment. Or learning meditation as an adult is just as wise but if you have a lot of emotional baggage and negative self-talk to clear before you can sit quietly and comfortably with your own thoughts then you may need some help.
Most of the clients that come to us are looking for inner peace and there are so many ways to achieve it. That’s why we offer our 60 minute free assessment, so we can point you to the right practitioner or class. You can CLICK HERE to book.
One of the beautiful practitioners who would love nothing more than to help you find your inner peace is Kara Kovacs. Kara is a Transformational Healer, Medical Intuitive and Holistic Counsellor. Kara runs our 6 Week Heart’s Desire’s Meditation, our Atlantean Temple Healing (the next one is on Feb 24th) and sees clients privately to help you heal and clear whatever is stopping you from sitting quietly in a room by yourself (without needing to give yourself an electric shock).
Kara’s goal is to help you connect with a much deeper, much purer magical aspect of yourself. In fact once you make friends with this part of yourself that mind chatter is happy, optimistic, kind and grateful. It then becomes easy, comfortable and enjoyable to be in your own company. How does that sound? I actually find that I’m often reluctant to come out of meditation because it’s such a lovely place to be.
Here’s what Kara has to say about her work:
One of the reasons I offer the work that I do is because I love to provide the support for those who want to ‘wake up’ to the realisation of their innate nature. I love to see the break throughs. I love to witness the releasing of long held emotions and the deep peace that is offered when a person realises that they are so much more than their early childhood wounding, their traumatic break-up or their grief that they carry around for a myriad of reasons.
I sit with a person and I feel what their soul is longing to express and it is always a message of love. Sometimes I try to articulate what I am sensing to a client and it is almost always impossible and all I can end up saying is something like…. “My greatest desire for you is for you to see and sense what I do when I look at you.”
Kara is available for private sessions on Saturdays and now on Thursdays. (Yey!) 60 minute sessions are $120 or you can do a 6 session program for $660 if you’re ready for real transformation.
And remember if you’re concerned about the state of the world, the very best thing you can do is learn to control your inner state so you don’t add more negativity to “The Field”. More about that next week.
That’s all for now. Have an awesome week.
And now take a look at the Right Hand column (or below if you’re on a mobile phone) to learn more about our upcoming classes, events and special offers >>>>
Warm Regards,
Warm Regards,
Alison Burton
Health and Happiness Guru