photo: brooke lark

Use Habits to Revive Your Love

By developing or strengthening some of the relationship habits that came so naturally years ago, you can reignite old feelings and build a healthier, happier, sexier, and more mindful relationship with your partner. Even if things have grown difficult between you, and there are challenging issues to deal with, it’s possible to learn how to have a healthy relationship. Just adopting a few new positive behaviors or dropping some negative habits can change

the entire tenor of your relationship. Because you are now paying attention with intention to your partner and the quality of your connection, you will see a positive shift in the way you interact with one another. These habits will help you be more present with one another, communicate better, avoid divisive arguments, and understand and respond to one another’s needs in a more loving, empathic, and conscious way. We know the idea of “developing habits” to improve your relationship might not seem sexy or appealing. Most of us think of hard work when we think about adopting new habits and dropping bad ones. We’ve all been through the struggles of trying to lose weight, start an exercise routine, or declutter our homes—only to give up too soon and feel like failures. However, there are three reasons why developing mindful relationship habits or simply knowing how to build a healthy relationship can be a positive and successful experience for you and your partner. First, unlike with other habits that can take weeks or months to see results, most of these mindful relationship habits will improve your connection and closeness right away. Even when you create a very small, positive change in your behavior, you will see immediate results with your partner. A little attention, love, kindness, respect, tenderness, compassion, and thoughtfulness go a long way. Second, we teach you how to develop new habits and release bad ones in a way that isn’t overwhelming or difficult. Steve and Barrie are habit creation authors and experts, and they provide a template for developing habits in a way that ensures they stick for the long term. You won’t have to deal with the feelings of regret and failure that come with giving up too soon. We teach you how to start small and build on your habits to ensure success. Finally, we firmly believe that your intimate relationship is the most important relationship in your life—the centerpiece of your family life, around which all other people and life endeavors revolve. A mindful, evolved relationship translates to a happy, healthy life. Knowing this, you should feel highly motivated to take care of your relationship. This motivation will keep you energized as you work on embracing new behaviors with your partner.

Healthy Relationship Habit #1: Embrace Your Love Languages

It’s natural to assume that what makes you feel loved and happy is what will make your partner feel loved and happy. But the truth is, if you are making a special effort to express your love in ways that feel good for you, you may be missing the mark with your partner. Do you really know what makes your partner feel loved, cherished, and happy in your relationship? If you haven’t asked directly (or been told directly), your genuine efforts in building a healthy relationship might not be having the desired effect. One of the most fundamental aspects of a mindful, intimate connection with one another is expressing and offering what author and relationship expert Dr. Gary Chapman calls your “love languages.” You and your partner should be aware of your own love languages, and you should be willing to show love in the way your partner receives it. Without this understanding, you might end up feeling resentful that your needs aren’t being met or frustrated that your loving efforts with your partner are unappreciated. In his bestselling book, The 5 Love Languages: The Secret to Love that Lasts, Gary Chapman outlines five ways that people express and experience love. Over his 30 plus years of counseling couples, Dr. Chapman has noticed specific patterns in the way partners communicate—and it turns out that most of us express and interpret love in the same five ways according to his observations. These include:

+ words of affirmation + quality time + gift giving + acts of service + physical touch

Chapman asserts that each of us has a primary and secondary love language that is revealed in the way we show love to others. By offering our own love language to our partner, we are actually revealing our deepest needs within the relationship—but not necessarily our partner’s. Observe how your partner shows love to you, and analyze what he or she complains about within the relationship, and you will better understand what your partner needs from you. If your partner is especially affectionate with you, it reveals that he or she craves physical affection from you. Or if she complains about how bored and lonely she feels, your partner might need more quality time with you. Since we all don’t have the same love languages as our partners, we can easily misinterpret or neglect to understand how to give our partners what they most need. Asking your partner directly what he or she most wants and needs to feel loved and cherished is the best way to be clear. By asking and then offering words and actions to support your partner’s love languages, you tear down many of the barriers that undermine the closeness you both want to share. Let’s review each one of these five love languages and what they mean: 1. Words of affirmation According to Dr. Chapman, one way to express love emotionally is to use words that affirm, validate, and build up your partner. Verbal compliments, or words of appreciation, are extremely powerful communicators of your love. They should be expressed in simple, straightforward statements of affirmation, like:

+ You look so beautiful tonight. + I’m always so happy to see you when you come home. + I am amazed by your integrity. + You are the most important person in the world to me.

One of the best ways you can offer words of affirmation is by expressing your respect and admiration for your partner. It shows how much you love the unique individual that your partner is. This, too, is one of the primary keys to a healthy relationship. Positive, loving words hold real value for those who prioritize this love language. So remember that negative or insulting comments cut deep—and won’t be easily forgotten. 2. Quality time This love language is all about giving your partner your undivided attention, which makes him or her feel loved and comforted. But sitting together watching television or surfing the net doesn’t count as quality time. Says Dr. Chapman, “What I mean is sitting on the couch with the TV off, looking at each other and talking, devices put away, giving each other your undivided attention. It means taking a walk, just the two of you, or going out to eat and looking at each other and talking.” We are all pulled in different directions by competing forces and responsibilities, and our time is so valuable. Be sure you prioritize your quality-time-loving spouse in your busy life by setting apart some daily hours just for him or her. 3. Gift giving For some people, receiving gifts, visible symbols of love, makes them feel deeply appreciated and cherished. A physical gift is something you can hold in your hand. It represents that your partner was thinking of you and made an effort for you. The gift itself is a symbol of that thought, but it doesn’t have to be expensive or elaborate. What is most important is the thought behind the gift and the feelings of love it represents. 4. Acts of service With this love language, you do things you know your partner would like you to do; you seek to please him or her through serving. Actions like doing your partner’s laundry, setting the table, getting the tires rotated, cleaning the house, and running errands are all acts of service that show you care for your partner. These actions require thought, planning, time, effort, and energy. If done with a generous spirit, they are true expressions of love. This particular love language also requires a willingness to overcome stereotypes so you can express your feelings more effectively through acts of service. There is no reason a man can’t prepare a meal or a woman can’t mow the grass. If your spouse’s love language is acts of service, then remember, what you do for him or her says “I love you” louder than words. 5. Physical touch If this is your love language, nothing feels more loving and affirming than your partner’s touch. These expressions through touch aren’t just meant for the bedroom—nonsexual physical connections, like handholding, kissing, or cuddling are a big part of this love language. Someone whose love language is physical touch will feel empty and disconnected without enough touching. Touch makes them feel secure in the love of their partner. If you didn’t grow up in an affectionate family, you may find it difficult to express your love this way. But if this is your partner’s love language, you will need to learn exactly the kind of touch he or she desires and offer it more often. Once you and your partner are aware of each other’s love languages, your goal is to offer your partner more of what he or she needs to feel adored and cherished, which makes for a good relationship. You may need to develop some new habits during your day to offer your partner what he or she needs. One thing to remember—because you or your partner favor a particular love language, you shouldn’t stop expressing the other love languages. According to Chapman, even though we tend to favor one language more than the others, we still enjoy expressions of the other languages as well.

How to Develop This Habit

To learn your own love language and your partner’s, take Dr. Chapman’s assessment at www.5lovelanguages.com to find out your primary and secondary love languages. This could be of great help if you are looking for answers on how to build healthy relationships. Your highest score will be your primary love language. Your second highest score will be your secondary love language. Once you know your own primary and secondary love languages, discuss them with your partner and learn what your partner’s love languages are. 1. Discuss how you want your love languages expressed. Now that you know your own love languages, write down a list of specific actions, words, and behaviors you would like your partner to use to express your love language. For example, if physical touch is your love language, you might write down that you want more cuddling in bed, a back rub at night, or more hand-holding. If you are an acts of service person, you might want your partner to surprise you by handling a certain chore or bringing you breakfast in bed once a week. 2. Select one love language behavior for your partner. Once you’ve completed your lists, choose just one love language action or behavior to begin with that you want your partner to offer. Decide how often you want the action to be expressed and the time of day you want it. You might choose behavior that can be offered daily for this first habit. Practicing a consistent, daily action helps your partner develop the habit of offering it to you. For example, you might request a back rub from your partner for ten minutes just before turning out the light, or you could ask your partner to handle making the bed every day before he or she goes to work. These are behaviors that can be offered daily at the same time with a regular trigger. Ultimately, you want to meet your partner’s love language needs spontaneously and creatively, without relying on a habit trigger or planning it for a certain time of day. But for now, just begin with one new love language behavior to get the ball rolling. 3. Offer the love language habit with love. It won’t feel like you are sincere in your efforts if you offer the requested behavior with resentment or passivity. The love language action should be offered graciously and wholeheartedly, showing your partner that you are truly pleased to be pleasing him or her. Reflect on the person you were when you and your partner were first dating. Back in those early days, you would have been thrilled to offer this act of love to your partner. Draw from these memories and try to re-create the feelings you had then. Make sure your trigger for this action is strong enough that you remember to act on it. You may need other reminders in the beginning to help you follow through. For this habit, it’s better if you don’t rely on your partner to remind you, as your forgetfulness can make your partner feel you aren’t truly invested in meeting his or her needs. 4. Add more love language actions to your day. As this first habit becomes more cemented, add another love language habit to your day. Look at your partner’s list of desired love language behaviors and choose another one that you can perform regularly with a daily trigger. However, you might decide to go for a more organic approach and look for opportunities throughout the day to express your partner’s love language. Too many scheduled love habits might begin to feel rote and rehearsed for both you and your partner. Relying on the element of surprise in meeting your partner’s needs can feel more genuine and caring. Performing “variable” habits is harder because there is no daily consistency or set trigger built into the habit. But there are some habits that just don’t work as well on a scheduled routine, and love language habits fit this bill. The trick is remembering to look for natural opportunities to offer the love language behaviors and to act on them. You might put small and cryptic reminders around your house to trigger you to do something loving that you know your partner will like. You don’t need a big sign on the refrigerator that says, “Do something nice for Sue.” Your partner doesn’t need to see what you’re up to. A rubber band on a doorknob or an item put in an unusual place can trigger you without alerting your spouse. 5. Make a game of it. To keep this habit fun, brainstorm creative ways you can express your partner’s love language. Rather than offering the traditional back rub to your physical touch-loving spouse, offer to wash her hair with a luxurious shampoo and dry it for her. Instead of telling your words-of-affirmation partner how much you love and appreciate him, write him a poem and read it in front of the entire family. Look for new ways every day to surprise and delight your partner so that he or she is charmed and thrilled by your loving behavior. What better way to spark your creativity and personal joy than to come up with endless ways to show love to your lover.

Healthy Relationship Habit #2: Initiate Productive Conflict

One of the best relationship tips to prevent a conflict from turning into a full-blown fight is by initiating productive conflict from the outset. We often initiate a conversation with our partner, knowing that the topic has the potential to start an argument. Yet we forge on anyway, arming ourselves to convince or coerce our partner into accepting our “rightness” about the situation. Generally, this tactic backfires. Rather than mindfully working out a problem as a team, we end up seething in our separate corners, assured that the other person is unreasonable and selfish. Empathy, negotiation, and compromise are essential to solving your solvable problems with your partner. As much as we might feel we have the right answer and want things to go our own way, we must put the health and strength of the relationship ahead of our own individual needs. Initiating a conflict or potentially acrimonious discussion with some productive communication skills makes it a whole lot easier to navigate conflict with a lot less pain. Unfortunately, research suggests that most of us are conflict averse, biting our tongue or actively taking steps to avoid conflict even when we long for a specific outcome. When we do engage, we may give in too quickly or compromise, failing to meet our own needs or devise useful solutions. Or if we dig in our heels, trying to persuade our spouse that our belief is the right one, we miss the chance to learn more and to problem solve. To improve communication as couples, we need to get better at initiating a productive conflict. What does that mean? It means understanding how to approach and resolve conflicts in ways that generate helpful solutions while protecting the relationship. A productive conflict doesn’t mean just being “nicer” about fighting. Rather, it means, having an intentional and healthy process for working through differences. And this is where negotiation becomes so important. Negotiating well, which is a part of healthy relationships,  means using a process for creating better solutions—one that meets each partner’s most important needs and preferences. There are specific negotiation habits that make up this process, and these habits will save you a lot of angst and frustration if you practice and learn them before the next conflict arises. Remember, it’s the way we handle conflict that matters—and avoiding conflict is extremely costly in the long run because we get worse outcomes and fail to seize opportunities to deepen our mutual understanding and intimacy. These strategies on how to have a good relationship can help you and your partner create the best conditions for coming up with good solutions while protecting the harmony of your romance.

How to Develop This Habit

Again, this is a habit you can’t practice until the next conflict situation arises. So you will need to be vigilant about remembering and practicing these steps when the situation calls for them. That’s why we believe it’s valuable to set up a system for remembering the steps for a productive conflict and to write down that system so you commit to it. One part of the system could be to post a reminder in a few places around your house so you remember to review and use the productive conflict skills we outline here. Of course, not all of your conflicts occur in your home, so putting a reminder on your phone that pops up every day can help you be prepared when a potential conflict arises. If this is a habit you want to focus on for the next few weeks, put a rubber band on your wrist as a reminder to use these skills and agree to remind each other tactfully if necessary. Before you begin the conversation, be sure to review the nine ways outlined here to keep you on track. 1. Choose the right time for a discussion. We often decide to start up a serious conversation in the evening, when we’re tired. After a long day of work or dealing with the kids, this can be the worst time to discuss a touchy topic. Instead, schedule a time to bring up a potentially difficult conversation when you are both rested and in a good frame of mind. Be sure it’s a time when you won’t be interrupted or distracted. 2. Start with constructive language. If you begin with something like, “I’d like to discuss the way you manage our money,” it sounds like a criticism, as the problem appears to be with your partner. Instead, try something like, “I’d like to see if we can agree on some rules for our budget and money management.” This is a more constructive way of opening the conversation by naming a positive goal rather than implying a problem with your partner. 3. Create mutual ground rules. There are things you or your partner can say or do that will immediately get the conversation off to a bad start. For example, using the words “always” and “never” can make your partner bristle. Talking early in the morning before you’ve had your coffee might not work for you. Starting a conversation with, “You do this” rather than “I need this,” can put your partner on the defensive. These are just some ideas, but you and your partner should come up with your own ground rules together. 4. Listen and validate first. This is an important factor to consider when building a healthy relationship. Remember that letting your partner feel heard and understood is a powerful way to help him or her feel safe and willing to be more generous and flexible in negotiation and compromise. You don’t have to agree with your partner to acknowledge what he or she is saying and feeling. Listening mindfully and attentively, nodding, and making affirmative noises or remarks can be enough. Also, summarizing what you are hearing without judgment and asking your partner if you got it right is a powerfully constructive strategy. 5. Brainstorm several options. When discussing a difficult or controversial topic, you may tend to rush quickly to a possible solution only to argue about whether the idea is good or bad. Before you propose a solution, engage in a short period of brainstorming, where you both present several solutions without criticizing one another. Once you have many possibilities on the table, you may find that combining several of them is easily agreeable to both of you. 6. Seek outside support from others. Often we stew for days or weeks about things that are bothering us, only to let loose with a flood of criticisms that make healthy communication with your partner impossible. Once you feel resentments brewing, find a confidant you can talk to about what is bothering you before you blow up, and ask them to help you. A trusted friend or family member can help you clarify and articulate what is really bothering you and what your goals are. They can help you brainstorm a constructive way to open the conversation as well as think of questions to ask and ways to talk about your fears. As new research on relationships has shown, this kind of support is highly effective in helping us better process information and create solutions. 7. Reframe criticism as a complaint. As relationship expert John Gottman has discovered, there is an important difference between a complaint and criticism. The complaint points to behavior as the problem, where criticism implies a quality or trait of your partner is the problem. However, if your partner opens with criticism like, “You are so sloppy and disorganized,” try not to wrangle about whether this is true. Instead, focus on specifics of the complaint and the behaviors your partner views as a problem. Conversations that begin with criticism tend to degrade into defensiveness and counter-criticism; this makes reaching a solution all the more difficult. Conversations that begin with a specific complaint, like, “I feel frustrated and overwhelmed when you forget to pick up your dirty clothes,” tend to lead to more concrete solutions.  8. Use the phrase, “Is there anything else?” At the beginning of the conversation, invite your partner to completely “empty their pockets” related to their issues with you. For example, if your partner says, “I want to talk about your parents visiting for the holidays,” instead of starting in with your thoughts, ask the question, “Is there anything else?” There might be a deeper concern behind your partner’s comment like perhaps she feels left out when your parents visit. Allowing the real issue to emerge at the beginning of a discussion can save a lot of time and emotional energy.  9. Learn and practice repair moves. Repair moves are words or actions that can lessen the tension if things begin to get heated in your conversation. Four powerful repair moves include:

1. Using lighthearted humor that you know will make your partner smile. 2. Reminiscing about past happy or fun time together. 3. Apologizing for your part in creating a problem or causing your partner pain. 4. Using loving touch and affection.

These moves help defuse the tension so you can move on constructively with the conversation.

Healthy Relationship Habit #3: Use “I Feel” Instead of “You”

+“You are so lazy. You never clean up after yourself.” + “You never pay attention to what I say.” + “You are self-centered, and you clearly don’t care about my feelings.”

Have you and your partner fallen into the habit of pointing the finger of blame or shame at one another when you feel wounded or angry? Have you tried looking for the best healthy relationship tips but none of them helped? If you find yourself telling your partner what he is doing wrong or defining her by the behaviors that are bothering you, you’re not alone. Most couples fall into this pattern after the initial infatuation phase begins to wane. As a couple, you don’t want to get stuck in this phase of deflecting blame and hurling criticism. In a mindful relationship, you need to focus less on criticizing your partner and more on communicating how the behavior makes you feel. Dr. Harville Hendrix is the author of the New York Times bestselling book Getting the Love You Want and the founder of Imago Relationship Therapy. Hendrix sees a connection between the frustrations experienced in adult relationships and our early childhood experiences. Through his work with thousands of couples, Dr. Hendrix has learned that when you understand each other’s feelings and “childhood wounds” more empathically, you can begin to heal yourself and move toward a more conscious relationship. He believes there are three stages in a committed relationship; when our relationship gets in trouble, we get stuck in the second stage and can’t move on to the third. The first stage is romantic love, which begins when you first fall in love with your partner. You feel a sense of oneness or completion that seems like it will last forever. The second phase is the power struggle. During this phase, we begin to get more defensive, blame our partners, and focus more on protecting ourselves rather than engaging in the relationship. We start to dislike many of the things that made us fall in love in the first place. Why does this happen? Because we are subconsciously looking for a partner who can make us more whole and complete—someone who will stimulate our growth. Our partners push our buttons and trigger some of our deepest wounds, usually from childhood. But if we work through these issues, we can achieve enormous personal growth. Unfortunately, many couples get stuck in the power struggle phase—one of the most common relationship problems—and can’t get off the cycle of defensiveness and repeat conflict. For a relationship to reach its potential, couples need to become conscious of their power struggle and begin the journey to the third stage of relationships called real or conscious love. In a conscious and good relationship, you are willing to explore your own issues, so you feel safe enough to meet your partner’s needs. In a conscious relationship, you recognize your own unresolved childhood issues and how these issues are showing up in your current relationship. When you find fault with your partner, you can shine a light on your own dark experiences to see how you are projecting your baggage onto your partner. Just taking a moment each time you have frustration to consider where this upset is coming from can do wonders for easing the conflict in your marriage. Also, as you work toward a conscious relationship, you begin to let go of illusions about your partner and see him or her not as your savior but as another wounded person like you who is struggling to be healed and to grow. You also begin to take responsibility for communicating your needs to your partner without expecting him or her to instinctively know them. You become more intentional in your communication so that you keep the channels of mutual understanding open. Through this process, you learn how to value one another’s needs and wishes as much as you value your own—because this contributes to the health of the relationship and your own happiness. One way to encourage a more conscious relationship is by changing a few simple words in your communication with one another and being more intentional in expressing your frustrations and hurt feelings without divisive criticism or defensiveness. When you express how you feel and what triggered your feelings, rather than blaming your partner, you change the entire dynamic of your conflict from divisive to collaborative.

How to Develop This Habit

Aside from executing all the relationship tips you’ve learned through the years, it’s useful to practice this habit before a real conflict arises that requires the skills involved. You can do this in a role-play situation that doesn’t feel too awkward or stilted. Consider working on it a few times a week for about ten to fifteen minutes so you get the hang of the language involved. As with all your habit work, find a suitable time and trigger to help you remember to work on it. You and your partner will take turns sharing a complaint or concern with one another, focusing on your own feelings and personal history rather than on your partner’s perceived flaws. 1. Focus on your feelings. In preparation for your habit work, think about an issue with your partner in which you might want to criticize your partner’s behaviors or decisions. This could be something he or she said or did recently that is bothering you or making you feel wounded. However, rather than dwelling on your partner’s shortcomings, think about what his or her behavior triggered in you. Was it anger? Embarrassment? Disrespect? Feeling unloved? Anger is often a surface emotion, covering up deeper insecurity or wound triggered by your partner’s words or actions. There may be more than one emotion that was triggered, so dig deep to consider the layers of feelings that might be involved. 2. Consider related past wounds. As Dr. Hendrix’s relationship advice reminds us, many of our triggered feelings relate to childhood wounds or past negative experiences. Your wife’s nagging may remind you of your harsh and critical mother. Your husband’s aloofness may trigger your pain related to a cold and emotionally unavailable father. When your partner better understands how his or her behavior triggers these old wounds and how it makes you feel, he or she will have more empathy and motivation to change the behavior. Not all frustrations are related to your childhood or past experiences, but many are. When you isolate these situations, you have a real opportunity for healing and growth, especially with a compassionate partner. 3. Use an “I feel” statement. If you are sharing an issue, focus on your own feelings in a succinct way without too many words. Start with the words, “When you,” to describe the bothersome behavior, followed by the words, “I feel,” to describe your feelings, rather than assigning blame to your partner. For example, you might say, “When you talk down to me, I feel shamed and disrespected,” rather than, “You are such a know-it-all. Stop telling me what to do!” 4. Use “It reminds me of ” to communicate past wounds. After you communicate the issue and how it makes you feel, share the childhood or past wound that your partner’s behavior has triggered for you (if this applies). Try to share a specific example rather than a general issue. For example, you might say: “When you talk down to me, I feel shamed and disrespected. It reminds me of the times when my dad would criticize me and call me stupid for not making straight A’s.” 5. Ask for the support you need. Receiving support from your partner is, undoubtedly, one of the keys to a healthy relationship. If your partner said to you out of the blue, “Can you please help me heal from a painful experience in my past?” you would likely say, “Of course, I am here for you. What can I do?” When your partner expresses that your behavior has triggered pain, he or she is also reaching out for your help, even though it may not seem like it. Of course, it’s hard to offer that help when your partner strikes back with wounding, critical words. That’s why it’s important for the partner who is sharing the problem to ask directly for what he or she needs in order to facilitate healing and reconnection. After you communicate the issue, how it made you feel, and the past wound it triggered, tell your partner directly how he or she can help you. “I need you to speak more respectfully and kindly to me. This will bring me closer to you and help me feel safe that you won’t treat me like my dad did. Will you do that?” 6. Practice in writing first. It might help to first write out your thoughts about the issue you will communicate to your spouse during your practice sessions using the following template: When my partner _____ then I feel _____. It reminds me of _____. I need my partner to _____. 7. Add active listening to your practice. Listening is, no doubt, one of the best things to do to address all of your relationship problems. Once you both get the hang of communicating your complaints or hurts using the language outlined here, add active listening as part of the dialogue practice. This will give you the opportunity to practice a conscious dialogue in which one partner presents an issue using conscious language and the other listens empathically. Remember these healthy relationship tips for couples:

+ Use “I” words when describing your feelings as the speaker.

+ Describe what past pain the issue triggered for you (if any).

+ The listener should validate the partner with words like, “That makes sense,” or “I can see that.”

+ The listener should mirror the partner’s words, then ask, “Is that right?”

+ The listener should ask, “Is there more?” to give the speaker the chance to say everything needed.

+ The listener should empathize with the partner’s feelings with “I imagine you must feel …”

+ The speaker should ask for what he or she needs to help resolve or heal the situation.

These practice sessions are to help you learn how to communicate more mindfully and empathically, but you may not be able to completely resolve your issue during these sessions. You may need to revisit the second habit about initiating productive conflict for ideas on resolving issues and reaching compromise once you have had a conscious dialogue about a problem or area of conflict. Excerpted with permission from Mindful Relationship Habits: 25 Practices for Couples to Enhance Intimacy, Nurture Closeness, and Grow a Deeper Connection by S.J. Scott with Barrie Davenport.

About The Authors Barrie Davenport is the founder of the award-winning personal development site, Live Bold and Bloom. She is a certified personal coach and online course creator, helping people apply practical, evidence-based solutions and strategies to create happier, richer, more successful lives. She is also the author of a series of self-improvement books on positive habits, life passion, confidence building, mindfulness, and simplicity. Learn more at liveboldandbloom.com Steve “S.J.” Scott is a Wall Street Journal bestselling author with 70 books in his catalog. He also blogs about habit development on his site Develop Good Habits, which provides daily action plans for every area of your life, from health and fitness to personal relationships. When not working, S.J. likes to read, exercise, travel, and spend time with his family. Learn more at developgoodhabits.com

photo: nicolasberlin photocase.com

Understanding Dreams: Core Techniques

The saying goes that “eyes are the window to the soul.” The same thing can be said of dreams. There are many types of dreams and they reveal to us the state of our soul; they mirror our feelings and preoccupations by painting a cinematic picture of how we are experiencing life at that moment. Dreams don’t lie. They are not concerned with pulling the wool over our eyes and going along with our preferred version of the truth. Dreams are honest mirrors. We just need to work out what they are reflecting. An ancient Jewish proverb says, “An unexamined dream is like an unopened letter.” Although our emotional response to a dream may be immediate and obvious, until we work with a dream and unravel its symbolic imagery, its deeper message may be lost to us. Dreams speak in a fabulous mixture of images, metaphors, and emotions that can be felt in the body. Have you ever woken up in the morning feeling sad, anxious, or insecure? Chances are you had a bad dream. And maybe you sometimes wake up laughing, or feeling unimaginably good? Dreams can powerfully influence our waking moods. There is only one universal language in the world, and that’s the language of dreams. When we understand dream symbolism, we open the door to our inner life. All over the world, dreams express themselves in rich, emotional imagery. This imagery may differ due to cultural context, but the symbolic meaning is conveyed in the same way. This article shows how to decipher the symbolic language of dreams, to give you an idea of how images can reflect specific feelings, events, and attitudes. We’ll look at five different types of dreams and you’ll learn core dreamwork techniques for what different dreams mean.

Cracking the Code: How to Understand the Symbolic Language of Dreams

We use metaphoric, symbolic language all the time in daily life. Every culture has its own collection of wise sayings, or idioms, which paint a picture of a situation: she has too many eggs in one basket; he let the cat out of the bag; every cloud has a silver lining; she got a taste of her own medicine; he’s missed the boat; we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. Different dreams may have different meanings but they all love this picture-language and it is one of their preferred ways of communicating with us. But when we first look at a dream and what it means, it can seem completely mystifying. It’s actually good to approach the dream from a standpoint of not-knowing. This keeps us on our toes. It helps us to be flexible and open to the dream’s possible meaning. When we slap an instant interpretation onto a dream and cling stubbornly to this interpretation, we risk suffocating the dream. Dreams need to breathe, just as we do. This is why dreamwork is a process: there are often questions to be asked; associations to be made. The dream can be unwrapped, revealing its heart as we peel back the layers. Getting to know the language of dreams and what they mean is so exciting. It’s exhilarating to crack the code of a dream that’s been troubling you and experience that rush of recognition that dream therapists call the “Aha” moment. If you’re tempted to rush out and buy a dream dictionary, remember that although they can offer interesting perspectives, many give a simplistic, blanket meaning for each image. Yet every dream image will have different associations for different dreamers, and it’s vital to remain open to possible meanings. A cow will have a hugely different personal meaning for a butcher than for a Hindu, for whom cows are sacred animals. To understand our dreams, we need to speak their dense symbolic language. How do you know what certain dreams mean? In dream language, a tidal wave often relates to feelings of being overwhelmed, and a dream of taking an exam with no idea of the answers often connects to feeling unprepared in a waking life situation. A dream of being naked in public may relate to having revealed too much of ourselves. Only the dreamer can know the true meaning of their own dream, as associations are so personal, but familiarity with the language of dreams is key to understanding their possible meaning. The good news is that learning the language of dreams and what they mean is much easier than you may think, and you’ll quickly get the hang of it. Sometimes it gives clarity to a dream to see which category (or categories) it falls into. Let’s take a quick look at five types of dreams.

Five Types of Dream

Dreams can be roughly divided into five categories: physical, emotional, archetypal, lucid, and soul dreams. Many dreams will contain elements of more than one of these categories. 1. Physical Dreams These relate to your body: are you cold, hot, or exhausted? Do you need to pee? (We’ve all had those maddening dreams of hunting for a bathroom.) Are you ill or in pain? Physical sensations, pain, and illness that we are currently experiencing in our body can be woven into our inner movie in the form of unpleasant imagery, but if we manage to change any negative imagery while we’re in the dream, this may help to relieve the pain. A friend of mine went to sleep with a headache that she’d had for two days. She dreamed she was wearing a tight metal band on her head. In the dream, she managed to take it off, and when she woke up, her headache was gone. In a far more serious case, journalist Marc Barasch dreamed he was being tortured with hot coals beneath his chin, and it turned out he had thyroid cancer. 2. Emotional Dreams We are bound to dream about what concerns us, frightens us, or makes us happy. This is among the many important reasons why studying the types of dreams and what they mean can be of great help. Emotional dreams tend to have a psychological and personal focus. They involve clearly identifiable feelings such as sadness, happiness, loss, disbelief, surprise, horror, fear, and so on. For example, a friend of mine dreamed she was furiously smashing plate after plate in the kitchen while her husband watched helplessly. In such dreams, the setting and the action serve to illuminate the emotion that is hidden in our unconscious. The dream shows us how we really feel. When dream emotions are this extreme, they are calling out to be worked with. 3. Archetypal Dreams Dreams can contain archetypal symbols—universal images, characters, and themes that appear in all cultures throughout time in anything from legends and myths to cartoons and comic books. Archetypes are universally present in individual psyches. The “psyche” is the soul, mind, or spirit. Carl Jung believed that archetypes embody basic human experiences and universal meanings. They are the heart and soul of many of our favorite stories, from fairy tales to blockbuster movies: we all recognize the archetype of the Mentor (for example, Obi-Wan Kenobi in Star Wars) who trains the Hero for a quest, or the archetypal Old Hag (the witch in Hansel and Gretel), or the Trickster (Rumpelstiltskin). Archetypes can be both positive and negative, and they embody energies that are deeply familiar to us. In dreams, they often transcend the mundane level of our waking life to reveal something deeper. 4. Lucid Dreams  This is one of the most popular types of dreams. These dreams may fall into any of the other categories shown here, but the difference is that lucid dreamers know that they are dreaming while they are dreaming. Lucid dreams are often especially vivid and memorable. The lucid dreamer can also guide the dream and choose to respond to the dream scenario in a particular way: to face a fear, for example, or to realize impossible fantasies, like flying to the stars. 5. Soul Dreams  These are dreams of the higher; of spirit and soul. They often involve light, beautiful nature, or luminous beings, and have a spiritual quality. A woman I know dreamed of a glowing, energized female Buddha floating above her bed. I once dreamed of columns of blue light that seemed wise beyond belief. Such dreams connect us with a deep source of light and knowledge that we all have somewhere within.

Examples of Dream Interpretation

The following are simplified examples of dream interpretation, to give you an idea of the way how different dreams can communicate, and the importance of context and analysis in what do dreams really mean. Only the dreamer can truly know what his dream is about, and it’s important to be respectful of this at all times: never impose your interpretation of somebody’s dream onto them. The dream belongs to the dreamer! The radiator cap explodes off my car. Could this mean that the dreamer will have car trouble this week? Does it indicate that something is wrong in his body? This dream is a riddle until the dreamer tells us that he lost his temper badly the day before. Now it makes much more sense! We even have an idiom very close to this that expresses someone losing their temper, “He blew a gasket.” This dream is likely to reflect the man processing his out-of-control behavior from the previous day. A dying dolphin is out of the water and is completely drying up. Why would anyone dream of a dying, drying-up dolphin? To discover more about the dream, we need to find out the dreamer’s associations, life situation, and insights. This is why “the dream belongs to the dreamer”: only the dreamer can really know what the dream is about. This dreamer was a blocked artist who felt that his creative inspiration (aka the dolphin) was completely drying up. Dreams are deep, but they’re indirect. This indirectness is exactly what can make them so opaque sometimes, even to their co-creator, the dreamer. Each of the dreams we’ve just looked at addresses deep issues and concerns, holding up a mirror to show the dreamer how he or she experiences life events.

How to Unwrap a Dream: Core Techniques

Dreams are like onions; their heart is hidden under many layers. Some dreams can be unwrapped over weeks, months, or even years, continuing to reveal rich new layers of meaning. Here are some quick and easy ways of reaching the heart of a dream and what they mean. Practice # 1: Re-enter the Dream  Carl Jung developed a technique called “active imagination” to focus on any inner imagery, such as memories or daydreams, or even a mood or emotion, in order to discover more about it. In terms of dreams, active imagination means that a dreamer imaginatively re-enters a dream while awake.

1. Find a quiet space where you can relax and close your eyes.

2. Bring the memory of your dream vividly into your mind. See the colors, feel the emotions again, notice the details. Take a moment to conjure up the dream scene and relive it. This is applicable to all types of dreams.

3. Now you are ready to engage with your dream; for example, by focusing on the imagery and watching it move and transform.

Practice # 2: Ten Key Questions for Unwrapping a Dream

1. Who are you in this dream? (A younger self, an observer, an animal, a different person, or yourself as you are today?)

2. How do you feel in your dream? What are the strongest emotions?

3. Do these emotions resonate with any situation in your life, past or present?

4. What is the core image or scene in this dream? (“Core” means the central, most arresting, most energized or emotional image.) This is considered as one of the most important elements in understanding one’s dreams and what they mean.

5. What are your associations with this core image or scene? Note down keywords or phrases.

6. If every dream figure and symbol represents a part of you, which part would the core image represent? Use your keywords to make it easier to connect with the core image.

7. If you were to ask the most negative or scary part of your dream if it has a message for you, what might it say?

8. Is there any light or beauty in your dream? This might be moonlight on water or a vibrant animal or person. Close your eyes and focus on it. Ask it, “What do you want me to know?” It might respond, or change into something else.

9. What does the dream want? Different dreams have different meanings but what is your dream really about? Consider the actions and emotions within it, along with any surprise events or unexpected feelings. Sometimes stepping back from your dream and viewing it as if it were a movie can help you to pinpoint what the dream is attempting to convey to you.

10. If you could go back into your dream and change the ending, what would happen?

May these 10 key questions help you uncover what certain dreams mean. Excerpted from Mindful Dreaming: Harness the Power of Lucid Dreaming for Happiness, Health, and Positive Change by Clare Johnson, Ph.D. Reprinted with permission from Conari Press, an imprint of Red Wheel/Weiser

About The Author Clare R. Johnson, Ph.D., is a world-leading expert on lucid dreaming. She is Vice President and Board Director of the largest dream organization in the world, the International Association for the Study of Dreams. Her work on lucid dreaming has been featured in documentaries, magazines, radio shows, and television. She is a regular speaker at international dream conferences, and she leads lucid dream workshops and courses on how to unlock the creative and healing potential of dreams. Learn more at deepluciddreaming.com

photo: ian stauffer

The Mindful Open Awareness Meditation: What Is It? Open Awareness Meditation, also known as “open attention,” “open monitoring,” or “soft focus,” is a form of mindfulness meditation in which you allow the many things present in your consciousness (sounds and other sensory input, as well as your thoughts and emotions) to arise in your awareness and then naturally fall away as they are replaced by different sounds, thoughts, etc. This kind of meditation is considered a “yin” practice. The ancient concept of yin and yang refers to the two fundamental sides of nature—both spiritual and physical, both feminine and masculine. This does not refer exclusively to male or female, but to the masculine and feminine in all aspects of life. Yin is the feminine aspect of all things and is associated with that which is expansive, open, and receptive, while yang is the masculine aspect of all things and is associated with that which is precise, active, and specific. Every person has both yin qualities and yang qualities, and the same is true of meditation practices. Attention is the yin to concentration’s yang. Attention (mindfulness) and concentration (focus) work together to provide a full, rounded experience of being both focused on the task at hand (whatever it may be), as well as having complete awareness of, and an open mind to, the many aspects of the moment you are in. In most meditation practices, you will be exercising some level of both concentration and open attention. The Mindfulness Sutras (or the Satipatthana Suttas, as they are known in their original language, Pali) are the primary foundational texts for what we know today as mindfulness and mindfulness meditation. Mindfulness refers to the experience of being totally aware of all the information your senses are processing. In the Eastern traditions, there are six natural senses that all humans are born with. This includes the five conventional senses—sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch—and the sixth sense, thought. This sixth sense of thought often comes to the foreground in mindfulness practices and in meditation generally. Our brains are built to think—thoughts are their natural product—and you will find that your brain goes on producing all kinds of thoughts even as you are meditating and trying to focus your attention on other things. What mindfulness meditation does for us is beginning to change our relationship to the thoughts occurring, especially as we gradually learn to consider them as sensory input rather than facts or events we need to respond to. Thoughts provide important information, but they are not fundamentally different from or more important than, say, the taste of pear or hearing a Mozart symphony. This can be a difficult lesson to learn because thoughts present themselves as reflections of reality. In other words, they present themselves as true. But just because you think something doesn’t mean it’s true, or even particularly important. Let’s consider an example of the tricky ways thoughts can make us believe things that aren’t necessarily true. Imagine you send a text to a friend, inviting him to your birthday dinner. Hours later, you still haven’t heard back, even though this friend usually responds right away. By the time you go to bed that night, you’ve decided that he doesn’t want to come and is trying to think of a good excuse; your feelings are hurt. Then the next day, you wake up to a text from him: “Sorry for the delay. Phone died, was out all day without my charger. I’d love to come!” Just because you think something doesn’t mean it’s true. Mindfulness practice can teach us about the nature of thinking, and perhaps even more importantly, it can teach us that we are not our thoughts. This might seem like an obvious or even silly point to make, but consider for a moment the negative thoughts you have about yourself—about your weight, your intelligence, or your career success. If you’re like most of us, you probably have a set of negative thoughts about yourself that you’ve been thinking for years and which you find yourself returning to regularly. In her book Says Who?, mindfulness teacher Ora Nadrich explains how our thoughts can hold us captive and how using mindfulness can help reframe our attitude toward negative and fear-based thoughts, mindfully replacing them with productive, supportive thoughts. We often allow—and rarely question the validity of—certain negative thoughts (for example, “I need to lose ten pounds,” “I’m not talented enough to make VP,” or “My spouse is too good for me”). If you’ve been thinking negative thoughts for long enough, you have probably come to believe in and identify with them. You think you are overweight or not good enough instead of recognizing that these are simply thoughts that you have about yourself that may not even be objectively accurate. You are not your thoughts; you are the thinker of the thoughts. We could never act on all of our thoughts, and there are many thoughts we shouldn’t act on or believe in if we want to live a healthy, well-balanced life. So, this mindfulness meditation practice will help you discern which thoughts support your goals and well-being and which thoughts are destructive or unhealthy and should be discarded. In mindfulness meditation, you practice checking in with all of the sensations and thoughts you are experiencing, as you experience them. Gradually, you will practice opening your awareness to the simulta­neous observation of the various aspects of the moment—without any expectation, without any judgment, allowing them to fluidly change. The key to getting the most out of an Open Awareness Meditation is to allow everything to be as it already is. It is in our nature to want to change or improve things, especially if there is discomfort on any level. To the extent possible, you should try not to do that during your meditation practice and simply allow things to be as they are. For example, you decide to meditate outdoors because it’s a peaceful, quiet day with comfortable weather. As your meditation begins, you hear a car drive by, your neighbor’s dog barking, and the gentle breeze of the wind. The mental perspective to hold here is that you accept and allow the dog to bark and the car to drive by, without entertaining the desire for things to be any different than they are. The thought may arise “Will that dog be quiet?” but your practice will be to let yourself have that thought without following it or dwelling on it. The sound of the car and the barking of the dog need not interrupt the meditation; rather, they can become a part of it. Of course, you should always try to meditate in a place where you will be safe and as undisturbed as possible, but keep in mind that in any meditation practice, a crucial component is to allow—even welcome—changes to the outside environment without interrupting the meditation. Simply observe, experience, and allow things to be as they are. This Open Awareness Meditation will make you more aware of the thoughts passing through your mind. Studies show that the average individual thinks anywhere from 30,000 to 70,000 thoughts every single day. By holding an open-focus awareness, you create a larger mental “container” for your thoughts to pass through. Gradually, with regular practice, mindfulness will give you the opportunity to more clearly see and experience the many layers of your thinking process.

What You’ll Get Out of It

Today you will open your awareness to include the fullness of the moment you are in. We can compare our attention to light: If we focus our concentration on something, we might say that we are “shining a spotlight” on it. When we practice open awareness, rather than shining a spotlight on one particular thing, we might say that we allow our awareness to “shine” in all directions around us, like the glow of a candle flame. We will refer to this “glow” of awareness around us as our field of awareness. Your field of awareness is the sum total of all of your sensory input. The practice of open awareness is an exercise in allowing your senses to experience the fullness of the present moment, becoming aware even of the subtleties that you may normally overlook, ignore, or miss altogether, like the temperature of the air around you or the faint creaking of floorboards. When we simply notice and allow things to be as they are, we naturally disengage from the impulses that would try to control or change things. This is not a practice in passivity or ignorance—quite the opposite. This is a practice in opening your mind and allowing yourself to receive all the information you possibly can before making any moves or taking any action. Notice the word allow. We do not force ourselves to pick up on sensory input; the awareness expands naturally from a practice of calm, relaxed allowing. When we are resistant to something that is happening, we have a biological tendency to “brace for impact,” which means we withdraw and tighten the muscles in our body. The mind then immediately begins thinking of all the way things could or should be different than they are. When we are open to something, we tend to be more curious about, and even more willing to embrace, the unknown, which leaves the body more at ease. This allows us to be more open to understanding and learning about what we are experiencing. With an open mind, we tend to see more possibilities and multiple perspectives on things. Open Awareness Meditation will strengthen your ability to really see things as they are and accept them for what they are. By practicing Open Awareness Meditation, you will cultivate:

1. Discernment

Open Awareness Meditation allows us to understand more about the moment we are in. The more we know in any circumstance, the more informed our decisions can be. Through practicing mindful awareness, we cultivate discernment by being more sensitive to the bigger picture and how the present moment relates to it. This increased understanding allows us to discern which thoughts we want to entertain, which thoughts we need to release, and what might be the right decision for us to make given the circumstances.

2. Decreased Depression and Increased Happiness

In studies published by Scientific American, Science Daily, and more, mindfulness meditation practices have been successfully applied as a treatment for depression and proven to ameliorate depression symptoms such as lethargy and lack of quality sleep. Other studies show increased happiness and joy. There are also reports of increased laughter after going through mindfulness training.

3. Core Creativity

In Dr. Ronald Alexander’s book Wise Mind, Open Mind, he maps out the different ways that a mindfulness meditation practice can help you tap into your core creativity and the mental perspective of limitless possibilities.

4. Self-Awareness and Better Decision-Making

We all have many sides to our personalities. As you practice observing your thoughts, you will become more aware of the tone of your internal voice and the kinds of thoughts you are having and develop the ability to intervene before saying or doing something you might regret.

5. Reduced Stress

Mindfulness practices are proven to have significant effects on reducing the physical symptoms of stress. It is well known throughout the medical community that stress aggravates just about every single health problem and illness. By reducing the symptoms of stress (like tension in the muscles and concentrated amounts of stress hormones in the bloodstream), we reduce their negative effect on our overall health.

6. Perspective

By developing mindful awareness of the various aspects of your environment through Open Awareness Meditation, that same skill naturally transitions into other areas of your life, providing a sense of proportion, big-picture perspective, and being present within a larger context.

7. Improvement in Your Life

Through the practice of witnessing things as they are, you will become more aware of your ability to change things that are not working for you. By becoming more attentive and aware of the thoughts arising in your mind, you will create the opportunity to question and reframe them.

The Open Awareness Meditation Practice: How to Do It

Meditation Length: 5 Minutes What You’ll Need

+ A comfortable chair or cushion where you can sit with your spine comfortably erect.

+ A quiet place to sit where you won’t be easily disturbed (by someone walking in on you, for example).

+ A timer (if you decide to use the timer on your smartphone, it is best to put the phone on airplane mode or silent to prevent distractions from incoming alerts).

+ Your meditation notebook and a pen or pencil.

Get Started Please read through this entire meditation before beginning. Ideally, you will remember the instructions and not have to interrupt the awareness meditation to check the next step. For this meditation, you should be sitting up—or even standing. Try to have your weight comfortably balanced between your left and right sides. If you are sitting, I recommend allowing your hands to rest comfortably in your lap or on your knees. If you choose to stand, have your arms resting comfortably at your sides. The key points for posture are:

1. Sit comfortably. 2. Not so comfortably that you’ll fall asleep. 3. Sit or stand with your back comfortably erect.

I attended a lecture by Harvard Medical School professor of psychology and Buddhist scholar Daniel P. Brown in which he explained that the popular notion of meditation solely as a relaxation technique is inaccurate and actually detrimental to the powerful mind-training effects of meditation. In a state of deep relaxation, the mind tends to wander. Sitting up straight or standing with an erect spine will support your mental alertness, making for effective meditation. As you sit, you will notice micro changes in the body. These can be any number of things, such as tension rising in your shoulders as you hear an unpleasant sound, subtle changes in the breath as you settle deeper into a relaxed state or chills on your skin as the temperature in the room changes. The exercise is to practice holding a soft focus, open to experiencing all of these things at once. Please read through this entire meditation before beginning. Ideally, you will remember the instructions and not have to interrupt the open awareness experience to check the next step. Before Meditating

1. Find a place to sit or stand where you won’t be disturbed.

2. Take a moment to get into a comfortable position that you will be able to maintain for the duration of the practice with as little movement or adjustment as possible.

3. Set your intention: “I will meditate for five minutes, opening my awareness to the various sounds, sensations, thoughts, and emotions that may arise and allowing everything to be as it is, just for these five minutes.”

Begin Meditating

1. Set your timer for five minutes.

2. Allow your eyes to gently close.

3. Feel your breath as your lungs expand and contract.

4. Notice the sensations along the surface of your skin, feeling the air in the room.

5. Bring your awareness to space above your head, noticing any sounds or movement in the space above you.

6. Move your awareness to the space below you, noticing where your body touches the cushion or floor. Notice any subtle vibrations from the floor.

7. Keeping your body in a restful stillness, bring your awareness to space in front of you, as far as your senses can reach.

8. Next, notice any sounds or movement to your right.

9. Move your awareness to space behind you, filling the room, even expanding beyond the room. (Any sounds on the other side of the walls?)

10. Move your awareness to your left.

11. Envision your awareness as a glow in all directions around you, mentally scanning all directions at once—simply witnessing the moment as it is.

12. If the mind wanders, bring your awareness back to the breath as it expands and contracts, and expand your awareness in all directions around you from there.

Wrap Up It is always recommended to end a meditation gently and mindfully. For some people, this means slowly beginning to move and stretch the body before opening their eyes; for others, this means saying a brief prayer or setting an intention for their day, such as “And now, I am going to have an efficient, effective, positive workday.” Whatever way is most natural for you to wrap up, go for it. What matters is that you give yourself a moment to exit the meditation without a sense of rushing. Transitioning mindfully out of meditation helps you keep the relaxed state developed during your practice, thus extending the “shelf life” of the benefits of calmness, clarity, and openness. Take a moment to record the details of your awareness meditation. If you end up meditating for longer than the suggested five minutes, please be sure to note this. If you have time, take a few minutes to write down your answers to the following in your meditation notebook:

+ Did any particular thoughts or memories come to mind that stood out?

+ Were there any sensations that surprised you? A sound or feeling that was unexpected?

Go Deeper: Ten Minute Meditation (or Longer) Begin with the above open awareness practice, but set your timer for ten minutes instead of five. If after ten minutes you feel you want to keep going, continue the meditation for as long as you wish. I typically recommend 20 to 40 minutes for regular practice. Go Deeper throughout Your Day: Mindful Check-In

+ Do a mindful check-in at work: Take a brief moment to mindfully experience the workplace from your usual spot. Mentally scan in all directions around you.

+ Do a mindful check-in during your meals: Notice the fragrances, the sounds, and the thoughts arising in your mind.

+ Do a mindful check-in at the market: When visiting one of the places you usually do your shopping, take a moment to notice the temperature, the smells, the music, and the conversations happening in the background.

+ Anywhere you find yourself, do a mindful awareness check-in: Whenever appropriate, take a moment to close your eyes and listen in all directions around you. Be present with wherever you are, whenever you are actually there. Take it all in!

Excerpted from Practical Meditation for Beginners: 10 Days to a Happier, Calmer You by Benjamin W. Decker, published by Althea Press. Copyright © 2018

About The Author Benjamin W. Decker is a meditation teacher and social activist in Los Angeles. He is the Director of Education at The Institute for Transformational Thinking and a founding teacher at Unplug Meditation, The DEN Meditation, and Wanderlust Hollywood. He is also the former Director of Partnerships at the humanitarian aid organization Generosity.org and former Director of Partnerships at the anti-human trafficking organization Unlikely Heroes. Learn more at bendeckermeditation.com

photo: maiwind photocase.com

Defining Happiness

What does the word “happiness” mean to you? What emotions does it evoke, and what images spring to mind when you reflect on it? In your experience, what would you say are the key ingredients of meaningful, true happiness? Take a moment, close your eyes if you’d like, and consider what this concept means for you. One of the many challenges of happiness research is the fact that the very notion of happiness can be quite difficult to define, making it equally difficult to understand how to be happy. Indeed, happiness is a topic that garners a great deal of attention; yet pinning down exactly what it is can prove elusive. There have been many different opinions over the years on what comprises true happiness. Mahatma Gandhi, for example, considered happiness to be something that occurred “when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.” In contrast, the French physician and philosopher Albert Schweitzer once jokingly declared that happiness is “nothing more than good health and a bad memory.” Though these definitions may be interesting, they do little in terms of helping us understand happiness in life from a scientific perspective. An important contribution of the positive psychology movement in recent years has been helping us gain a common understanding on how to live a happy life. For example, one of the world’s foremost experts in the psychology of happiness, Martin Seligman, initially defined happiness as being comprised of three separate yet interconnected elements:

+ Positive emotions + Engagement + Meaning

For Seligman, “positive emotions” refers to experiencing pleasant emotions regarding our past, present, and future, and is marked by the experience of generally positive mood-states across these domains. “Engagement” denotes the idea of flow, a state of mind in which we are so engrossed in the task at hand that time seemingly stops. Finally, “meaning” refers to the idea of being connected to a cause greater than oneself. According to this viewpoint of happiness, true well-being consists of a combination of each of these three components, with a sense of meaning or purpose serving as one of the most important keys to being happy. Seligman has since expanded this definition of happiness to include two additional components to the three outlined above: relationships and accomplishments. Reflecting these, Seligman’s updated conceptualization of well-being can be remembered by the acronym PERMA, which denotes the following five elements:

+ Positive emotions + Engagement + Relationships + Meaning + Accomplishments

Another prominent researcher in the field of positive psychology, Sonja Lyubomirsky, has described happiness as “the experience of joy, contentment, or positive well-being, combined with a sense that one’s life is good, meaningful, or worthwhile.” As with Seligman’s definition of happiness, this one too emphasizes the multiple layers of true happiness and well-being. Rather than consisting merely of pleasant, fleeting emotions, real happiness in life also includes a deeper sense of meaning, satisfaction with one’s life, and purpose. Throughout this article, in order to help us remain on the same page and have a common understanding of how to find happiness, we will consider well-being and happiness to similarly consist of:

+ A strong presence of pleasant and positive emotional states, both in the present moment as well as towards the past and future;

+ A sense of connection to those around us, as well as to our pursuits, vocations, and activities;

+ A deep, underlying feeling of life satisfaction; and

+ A sense of meaning and purpose that can anchor us even when fleeting positive emotions may not be present.

As you can see, the sort of happiness that’s being described above is a much deeper and richer phenomenon than what we might expect. Whereas the “Hollywood” depiction of happiness focuses primarily on intense positive emotions such as joy, ebullience, or pleasure, happiness, as considered by positive psychologists, is a bit of a different experience. Positive emotions are certainly a part of the picture, but equally (perhaps even more so) important are those deeper experiences of meaning and purpose, satisfaction with our lives, and connection to both people and causes in our lives.

Happiness: A Timeless Pursuit

Although much of the research on happiness is recent—having emerged since the early 2000s since the birth of positive psychology—it should be pointed out that interest in the secrets of happiness dates back centuries. Indeed, the topic on how to be happy has been a concern of philosophers, theologians, and scholars for thousands of years. From Greek and Roman philosophers in the West to Buddhist and Confucian thinkers in the East, questions related to the “good life” have certainly been prominent throughout the years. Within the field of psychology, the lion’s share of the focus has historically been centered on the reduction of misery and the management of illness. Nonetheless, there have been a handful of pioneers over the years who have attempted to investigate issues such as contentment, thriving, happiness, and flourishing. These individuals include luminaries such as Abraham Maslow, Carl Rogers, and Marie Jahoda, among others. For them, questions related to fulfillment, happiness, and optimal functioning were considered critical to understanding the human condition. Despite a longstanding interest in the topic, the emergence of positive psychology has proven to be a remarkable turning point in the field of happiness research, and has led to a tremendous boom within both the mainstream and academia. For the first time in history, researchers have begun to approach our timeless interest in happiness by utilizing rigorous methods of scientific inquiry. Today, we know more about how to find happiness and boost well-being than at any other point in history. Best of all, rather than having to rely on testimonials or theory, we can rely on science and research to guide us in our search for ways to be happy. Recent research has helped us to understand which strategies do and do not boost our well-being in the long term. Above all, the aim of this article is to present these findings to you and to teach you the necessary skills for a happier life.

The Benefits of Being Happy

If you’re like most people, perhaps you considered starting a new exercise regimen, changing your diet, or reducing your substance use. Each of these would undoubtedly be a great place to start, and there’s research to support each of these ideas when it comes to our health. But it just so happens that there’s another way to improve our health, increase our life expectancy, strengthen our relationships, and even improve our job performance: Namely, becoming a happier person. By doing so, we have the opportunity to vastly improve our mental and emotional well-being, strengthen our physical health, and transform our lives. Best of all, the latest happiness studies suggest that it’s not a case in which people become happier because of these benefits; rather, the reverse appears to be true—people who are happier tend to be healthier and more fulfilled in life. We all know from personal experience that being happy is a good thing in and of itself. Indeed, for most of us, personal happiness (or the happiness of those we love most) factors heavily into many of our major life decisions. But though it undoubtedly feels good on an emotional level to be happy, it turns out that this is just the tip of the iceberg. In fact, as more research comes out related to the psychology of happiness and well-being, the more we understand just how critical it is across a large number of areas in our life. One of the most exciting findings to emerge from the happiness literature is that happiness doesn’t just feel good—it’s good for us as well. Although happier people perform better than less happy individuals across a number of domains, four areas, in particular, stand out: improved psychological health, better physical health, stronger social relationships, and enhanced cognitive performance.

+ Better Psychological Health

Negative emotional states, such as anger, sadness, or fear, prompt very narrow, survival-oriented behaviors. As an example, think of the “fight or flight” response that we experience when we feel acutely anxious or fearful. Our focus narrows, we perceive threats more intensely, and our mind and body go on high alert. This deeply ingrained tendency is wonderful when it comes to things like survival and spreading our gene pool. Unfortunately, it’s pretty lousy when it comes to our own happiness. Whereas negative emotions prompt the type of responses outlined above, positive and pleasant emotions have the opposite function in our lives. As psychologist Barbara Fredrickson has shown, positive emotional states serve to “broaden and build” our personal resources. We seek out novel experiences, connect with others interpersonally, and think more creatively. Psychologically, positive emotional states help buffer against negative experiences, increase our resilience, and can actually help to “undo” the effects of negative emotions on both a psychological and even physiological level. Moreover, this cycle has a way of feeding on itself, such that Fredrickson has dubbed it the “upward spiral” of well-being. In recent years, there has been a groundswell of research emerging on the psychological benefits of becoming a happier person. By fostering the skills in the pages to come (such as gratitude, compassion, and interpersonal connection), happiness studies show that doing so can buffer against a wide range of psychological problems including depression, anxiety, stress, and more. These skills can be utilized not only to treat these sorts of problems but to buffer against their recurrence as well. Overall, from a psychological standpoint, it certainly pays to become a happier person. But although this is a worthy goal in and of itself, some of the most impressive benefits to boosting one’s happiness lie in other parts of our lives.

+ Better Physical Health

Reflect for a moment on the last time you visited your doctor for a health check-up. You probably remember being asked a number of questions about your health habits, such as how often you exercise, what your diet consists of, how much alcohol you consume, and so forth. This makes good sense because these sorts of behavioral choices can have a tremendous impact on your physical health. But do you know what else makes a huge difference when it comes to your health? You guessed it—becoming a happier person! There have been a large number of studies to suggest that happiness and well-being not only feel good—they’re good for us as well. Research suggests that happier individuals live longer lives, have stronger immune system functioning, and get sick less frequently than less happy people. In one longitudinal study, it was found that happier people were less likely to fall prey to chronic health conditions like high blood pressure and diabetes, and were even less likely to struggle with substance use problems. By actively learning how to be happy and attending to it with the importance it deserves, it appears that we can become healthier too.

+ More Fulfilling Social Relationships

Renowned psychiatrist George Vaillant once famously stated, “happiness is love—full stop.” The sort of “love” Vaillant was describing was essentially close interpersonal connection and the impact that it has on a person’s psychological well-being. In recent years, numerous studies have supported this notion—that our own happiness is inextricably connected to our interpersonal relationships. Moreover, there appears to be a bidirectional relationship between these two variables. In other words, happier people tend to have stronger, more meaningful relationships with those around them; but by also consciously fostering these relationships, we can have a powerful effect on our own happiness in life.

+ Better Cognitive Performance

You may be wondering about whether happiness might have a negative effect on things like job performance and achievement. Indeed, we sometimes run into the stereotype of happy people lacking the “edge” they need to succeed in these realms. But do “happy people finish last,” to borrow an old phrase? Actually, a happiness study suggests that the exact opposite is true: Happier people perform better across a range of cognitive tasks and tend to be more flexible in their thinking as well as being more creative. These benefits are reflected in studies of both students and adults in the workplace, with findings suggesting that happier individuals perform significantly better than their less happy counterparts. Indeed, happier individuals are more likely to obtain jobs, succeed in those jobs, gain promotions, and earn more money. So it pays to be happy, not just figuratively, but literally as well!

Roadblocks to Happiness and How to Overcome Them

Have you ever daydreamed about owning a bigger home, purchasing a shiny new car, or getting a long-awaited promotion at work? If so, you’ve probably done this for a very specific reason: you believed that these supposed “secrets of happiness” would make you a happier person. We all fall into this pattern of thinking and acting, and many of our major life choices are made with the goal of happiness in mind. Indeed, everything from our relationship choices to where we decide to live is influenced by an internal (often unconscious) decision about whether it will make us happier. The idea that if something good happens to us, then we’ll be happy, is a very common belief that most of us fall prey to from time to time. I call it the “if/then” style of happiness seeking, and it tends to promote the idea that if we achieve some desirable outcome in our lives, then we’ll be happy. For example, we might tell ourselves that if we were to purchase a beautiful new home, or if we were to move to a new city, then we would be happy. Although the “if/then” style of thinking is certainly seductive when it comes to our happiness, we all know from personal experience that these sorts of external changes rarely lead to lasting and true well-being. It’s not that good things happening to us don’t make us happy, because they do. It’s just that positive changes like those outlined above make us less happy than we expect, and the gains that we achieve last a much shorter time than we expect. A classic example of this phenomenon can be seen in studies conducted on lottery winners. Just as we might expect, winning the lottery typically leads to an immediate and sizable boost in terms of a person’s happiness. The problem is that these gains are quite fleeting, almost akin to a happiness “sugar high.” Indeed, within a handful of months, most lottery winners return to their original baseline level of happiness and life-satisfaction. As it turns out there are many examples like this, of positive changes in our lives that we expect to lead to lasting increases in happiness but don’t. Some common examples of things that many people expect to make them happier but don’t, in the long run, include (but are not limited to):

+ Money and Income: Most, if not all, people think that money is one of the essential keys to being happy. Once basic needs are met, additional money makes very little, if any, difference in terms of a person’s happiness level. Some estimates suggest that once an annual income of roughly $75,000 is met, additional money makes no difference when it comes to making a person happier.

+ Geography: Studies show that with the exception of people suffering from Seasonal Affective Disorder, the average person’s happiness is not affected by where they live geographically. Differences do exist when comparing countries, but that is more related to systems of government and/or oppression. Climate and geography, however, do not appear to play a role in happiness.

+ Getting Married: Research suggests that following an initial boost in happiness (roughly 18 months on average), married individuals tend to revert back to their previous happiness baseline levels.

+ Having Children: Although there is conflicting research on this topic, numerous studies suggest that day-to-day levels of happiness and life satisfaction fall among parents following the birth of a child, and are particularly low during the teenage years. Only once a child moves off to college or leaves the home do happiness scores tend to revert back to their original baseline among parents.

+ Physical Attractiveness: Studies show that the people who score the lowest of any profession for happiness are models.

But why do all these seemingly wonderful things have such little (if any) benefit to our long-term happiness? The answer lies in a few key areas, which we will now briefly turn our attention to. As it turns out, there are a handful of factors on how to be happy, making it hard for us to feel lastingly buoyant; three of which we will briefly discuss below.

– Hedonic Adaptation

Human beings have a remarkable ability to adapt to changes in their environment. For example, think of the last time you entered a dark movie theater—at first it was probably quite difficult to see, but shortly thereafter your eyes adjusted and you could make your way to your seat. Or consider the way that a rather unpleasant odor stops being so noticeable after a short while. These examples demonstrate a process called physiological adaptation—in other words, our ability to adapt to physiological changes in our environment. A similar process occurs when it comes to our happiness and is known as hedonic adaptation. This refers to the idea that we tend to “adjust” to so-called hedonic (pleasant) changes in our environment, and find ourselves back to our baseline level of happiness rather quickly. It helps explain, for example, why lottery winners revert to their previous levels of happiness only a few months after they win an enormous sum of money. But it also helps explain why, for example, accident victims who lose the use of their legs return to their prior level of happiness in a somewhat similar time frame. A key take-home message regarding the psychology of happiness is that hedonic adaptation is neither good nor bad. In fact, the same process that drags us down after something wonderful happens helps bring us back up following tragedy. So just as financial windfalls and strokes of good fortune fade over time, so too do the painful emotions associated with loss and setbacks. But due to its tendency to “undo” the benefits of positive changes in our lives, hedonic adaptation serves as a powerful barrier to lastingly increasing our happiness. And it helps explain why so many of the factors that we normally think will make us lastingly happier (such as more money, a change in appearance, entering a new relationship, and so forth) lose their luster after a short while.

– The Genetic Lottery

Our genes play a powerful role in many areas of our lives, from our personalities and our appearance to our risk of certain illnesses and diseases. As it turns out, our genes also play a powerful role when it comes to our happiness levels. Through researching both fraternal and identical twins, as well as non-twin siblings, scientists have come to find that a large portion of our happiness is genetically influenced. How much of an influence do genes have in this area? Estimates vary, but most studies seem to suggest that our genes account for as much as 40-50% of our level of happiness in life. If you’ve ever known someone, for example, who seems to take setbacks in stride, or always seems to see the glass as “half full,” there’s a strong likelihood that that individual may have hit the genetic lottery when it comes to happiness. Conversely, we all know people for whom being happy seems to be an uphill struggle, and those individuals may have been less fortunate when it comes to a “genetic” predisposition to happiness. Although our genes play an important role in determining our happiness baseline or “set point,” it’s crucial that we don’t take this message too far. Indeed, it’s better to think of it being akin to weight: Some of us may be naturally heavy or thin, and in the absence of proper diet or exercise we may drift towards where our genes predispose us. However, this does not mean that we’re doomed to be mere reflections of our genetic “set point,” and we are all able to transform ourselves based on the choices and behaviors we engage in, whether in terms of weight or happiness.

– Our “Negative” Brain

Have you ever felt as if a dozen good things can happen to you in a day, but a single bad experience is all you can think about when you get home that night? If you are having a hard time figuring out how to become happy in a difficult situation, you’re not alone, and in fact, we can thank another key barrier to happiness for this sort of experience: our very own brain. When it comes to our happiness, it’s worth remembering that our brains developed over the millennia not to be happy, but rather to survive. And sometimes the very things that helped us to survive as a species also make it hard to feel lastingly content, peaceful, and happy. Life was quite difficult for our early ancestors, with constant threats of famine, warfare, and natural disaster surrounding them at all times. In order to help us to survive, we became highly attuned to threats and danger, and to focus on the negative aspects of our environment rather than the positive ones. And although our world has changed in many ways since that time period, it’s a drop in the bucket from an evolutionary standpoint. As a result, we are still operating with much of the same basic “machinery” that our ancestors did hundreds of thousands of years ago. Our brain has a built-in “negativity bias” in order to help us survive. This means we remember bad outcomes much more easily than good ones, and negative events impact us much more strongly than positive ones. This negativity bias has been shown to be so strong, that some studies suggest we need to experience several positive events during our day to overcome just a single negative one. The neuropsychologist Rick Hanson has described our brain thusly as being like “Teflon for good, and Velcro for bad.” This negativity bias leads us to feel unhappy and stressed much of the time, especially if we are not actively working on shifting out mindset towards the positive.

What’s Really Under Our Control?

Although the barriers to true happiness listed previously are formidable, they are not insurmountable. And despite all the factors that make it difficult to become happier (such as hedonic adaptation, our genes, and the negativity bias), it is absolutely possible to become lastingly happier. We just need to look in the right place and foster the right kinds of habits. If the bad news (for some) is that genes account for up to 40-50% of a person’s happiness level, the good news (for all of us) is that our circumstances around us account for only a small portion of our happiness—as little as 10%. Keep in mind, these sorts of external circumstances (how much money we earn, whether we are married or not, where we live, etc.) are where we tend to look to become happier. Yet these things (which can be very difficult to change in the first place), account for only a small portion of our happiness level. The best news of all is that we are left with an entire 40-50% entirely in our control, and determined by the choices we make, the mindset we cultivate, and the habits we engage in. There are 10 core principles that have been shown to create lasting increases in our happiness levels. Each has been researched extensively, backed by numerous scientific studies, and each has been linked to meaningful changes in a person’s happiness over time and with practice. Best of all, none of these principles are fixed; rather, they are all learnable, and changeable, with effort.

 What Are the 10 Keys to Lasting Happiness?

If you need more tips on how to become happy in life, these practices have been strongly linked in many research papers to lasting well-being:

1. Gratitude

Studies show that fostering a sense of gratitude and appreciation for the positive aspects of our lives has a powerful impact on our own happiness level, making it one of the major keys to happiness. By shifting our focus towards the good in our lives, research suggests we can become much happier.

2. Kindness and Compassion

Another crucial element of well-being comes through expressions of kindness and caring towards others. Indeed, numerous studies show that giving to others, whether through formal volunteer work or other means, is one of the most powerful ways to be happy.

3. Self-Compassion

Around 80% of people tend to be harder on themselves than they are on others. Unfortunately, this sort of self-criticism takes a tremendous toll on our well-being. Self-Compassion—learning to treat ourselves with kindness and caring—has been shown to have powerful benefits on our mental and physical health.

4. Mindfulness

Some studies suggest that we spend roughly half of our waking hours mentally detached from the present moment; in other words, we may be physically in one place, but mentally we are somewhere else. This same research suggests that the more our mind wanders, the less happy we tend to be. Mindfulness—the ability to be non-judgmentally aware in the present moment—has been shown to have immense benefits to our happiness and well-being, along with our physical health.

5. Optimism

We’ve all heard it said that it’s best to see the glass as “half full,” but recent research underscores the importance of optimism to both our mental and physical well-being. Indeed, optimists tend to be both happier and healthier than pessimists across many different areas.

6. Interpersonal Connection

We live in a world of infinite connection these days thanks to technology and social media. Unfortunately, some studies suggest that the quality of our interpersonal connections has deteriorated as the quantity has gone up. This is unfortunate because much research shows that one of the best ways to finding happiness is to enhance the quality of our closest interpersonal relationships.

7. Forgiveness

When we are hurt, anger is a natural response. But holding onto anger for months, or even years can have a toxic effect on our mental and physical health. One of the secrets on how to live a happy life is learning to let go of this anger can free us, and the practice of forgiveness has been linked to a number of powerful benefits to our health and happiness.

8. Using Our Strengths

Learning to identify and harness our own personal strengths is one of the many ways to be happy. In fact, it has been shown to have a number of benefits when it comes to boosting our own level of happiness and achieving a greater sense of meaning and purpose in our lives.

9. Savoring Positive Experiences

Sometimes good things can happen in our lives but we quickly move onto the next thing. Similarly, because negative experiences have a much more powerful effect on us, it’s easy to lose sight of the good experiences that might occur each day. The skill of savoring is one of the main keys to happiness as it helps us to amplify and draw out positive and pleasant experiences, to better allow them to “sink in” from a happiness standpoint.

10. Caring For Our Bodies and Health

Among the many ways to be happy is by taking good care of yourself. During times of stress, it’s particularly easy to lose sight of self-care, and our health is one of the first areas to suffer. By attending to our sleep, exercise patterns, and even the food that we eat, we can lay the groundwork for increased happiness and well-being. This piece is excerpted with permission from The Happiness Toolbox: 56 Practices to Find Happiness, Purpose and Productivity in Love, Work and Life by Jonah Paquette.

About The Author Jonah Paquette, Psy.D., is a licensed clinical psychologist, speaker, and author. He is the author of Real Happiness: Proven Paths for Contentment, Peace, and Well-Being and The Happiness Toolbox. Dr. Paquette is a psychologist for Kaiser Permanente in the San Francisco Bay Area. In addition to his clinical work and writing, Jonah offers training and consultation to therapists and organizations on the promotion of happiness and conducts professional workshops both nationally and internationally. He is also a frequent media contributor, having been featured in print, online, and radio outlets. Visit his website: jonahpaquette.com

It’s everybody’s dream to earn a living doing something they love that has a positive impact on the world, and we can think of few better ways to do that then by helping children learn proven practices for long-term health, happiness, and holistic success like yoga and mindfulness. In the last few years, there has been an incredible amount of research showing just how profound yoga and mindfulness practices are for improving pretty much every area of a person’s life—and the earlier we learn them, the better. Children’s brains are shaped by their experiences in their formative years and learning yoga and mindfulness at these young ages has been shown to have a number of benefits from measurably lowering stress levels, to significantly increasing happiness and academic performance to building healthy social skills and increasing the likelihood of positive contribution throughout the child’s life. This is truly how we can build a better future for us all—by equipping the next generation with the skills they need to develop high levels of emotional intelligence and tools to live happy, healthy, fulfilling lives.

How to Help Bring Yoga and Mindfulness into Schools

The positive aspects that yoga can have on a child’s life is something the team at Bent on Learning realized many years ago and has been working tirelessly to achieve ever since. Bent On Learning is a nonprofit organization committed to teaching yoga and mindfulness to public school children, aiming to touch the lives of as many students as possible—not after school, but right there, in the classroom, where the learning happens. They have an incredible track record of success: they currently facilitate 61 classes per week, touching the lives of 1,140 kids every week, with over 22,356 children served to date. And they are growing—they have 50 schools on their waiting list, with new requests for their program coming in every month… With a vision to bring yoga and mindfulness skills to children everywhere, they are seeking to expand their experienced team of yoga educators through their Yoga Alliance Certified Children’s Yoga Teacher Training. This training shares Bent On Learning’s highly effective, real-world proven methodology with school teachers, yoga teachers, and those who feel called to this path either as a part-time addition to their existing career or something that they would like to pursue full-time. Designed to prepare participants to teach yoga to diverse populations of children in a school environment, their training is a sure path to learning the core skills needed to kick off a career helping future generations to thrive. It is an extremely comprehensive training that covers a wide range of topics from understanding the needs of students and schools, to learning classroom management techniques and writing lesson plans. Participants have the option to receive hands-on teaching experience in New York City schools, under the guidance of a senior Bent On Learning teacher. If you are interested in participating, you can learn more and apply here: bentonlearning.org/tt2018/ Each module of the training features special guest experts in education and youth development who share the fruits of their many years of experience working with children in the classroom, both with yoga and other synergistic skills to help you to be able to navigate any experience that arises and have the greatest impact.

Already a School Teacher? It Gets Even Better…

Bent On Learning’s Children’s Yoga Teacher Training Program is a great way to add depth and impact to your existing curriculum, and it does not require any previous yoga certifications or teaching experience. It’s also highly specialized to serve and accommodate a diverse, inclusive range of ages, body types, ethnicities, and learning styles, making it accessible and impactful for each and every student. Imagine walking into your classroom every day to kids that feel confident in themselves, their bodies, and their abilities. Here’s what a few of the students have experienced this in their classrooms had to say…

“Yoga makes me feel like I’m important.” – Diamond, 6^th Grade, Robert Wagner Middle School

“Yoga has taught me the importance of taking a minute to be still, listen to my thoughts and relax.  I also have a more positive attitude about my body.  Now I know that if I want my body to be able to do more, I just need to practice.  Before I would just say I can’t, now I try…” – Bobbi, Senior, Williamsburg Prep High School

Bent on Learning has been closely monitoring the effects of their in-school programs and yoga teacher curriculum. Thus far, they’ve found that 83% of Bent On Learning high school students showed statistically significant gains on the following youth development outcomes, which have been linked to improved overall health, happiness, academic performance and positive behavior.

1. Self-Management 2. Positive Identity 3. Contribution 4. Social Skills 5. Social Capital 6. Academic Self-Efficacy

And in fact, when it comes to academic self-efficacy, the results of their research show that the students with the lowest confidence in their ability to attain academic success improved the most!

“Our students saw significant gains in their ability to self-regulate through the Bent On Learning program. They learned how to use a simple yet important tool like their breath to instill focus and manage their emotions. The BOL yoga program is particularly vital to supporting our at-risk and special needs student population. It is our vision to become a flagship school and bring the benefit of these practices school wide from Pre-K through 8th grade”. – David Cintron, Principal, PS214

To learn more about how this is possible in your classroom and to find out more about Bent on Learning mission and training, visit: bentonlearning.org/tt2018/ This article is a sponsored post written in collaboration with the non-profit Bent On Learning, whose trainings and ethos comply with Conscious Lifestyle Magazine’s stringent quality and integrity guidelines.

About The Author Meghan McDonald is the Co-founder and Editor-in-Chief of Conscious Lifestyle Magazine. She holds a master’s degree in social psychology from San Diego State University where she conducted award-winning research into the nature of human social behavior. She is an advocate for many environmental and social justice causes and a champion of social impact-focused brands and products that adhere to high sustainability and ethical standards. As a regular travel and lifestyle contributor to Conscious Lifestyle Magazine, Meghan funnels her extensive knowledge of natural products, organic living, and consumer behavior into researching and reviewing brands and products that promote health, wellbeing, sustainability, equality, and positive social change. She has traveled to over 25 countries and loves exploring diverse destinations worldwide while documenting the local artisans and businesses offering conscious, healthy alternatives.

photo: michal lomza

Transforming Your Relationship with Money

Mney is one of the most emotional subjects on the planet. In fact, many people feel more comfortable sharing the intimate details of their sex lives with friends than sharing the intimate details of their finances. Yet the purpose of money is simply to allow the smooth exchange of goods and services. So why is it that so many people have an emotional relationship with money? And what is it that gives money its emotional power? One answer is that we do. And one way we do it is by giving those pieces of metal or paper, or even numbers on a piece of paper, meaning. Sometimes we do this literally, as in “This paycheck = my phone bill” or “This $5 bill = lunch,” so if we lose the $5 bill, in our minds, we’ve just lost our lunch. Often, the meaning is even more metaphoric. “Money is freedom of choice” or “Money is love made visible” or even “Money is the root of all evil.” Here’s why this is so important: Whatever meaning you are attaching to money is either drawing it closer or pushing it away. Trying to live a rich, wealthy life when you have a poor relationship with money is like trying to drive a car with one foot on the accelerator and the other one on the brakes. You may occasionally make some progress, but in the end no matter how hard you try you never seem to really get anywhere. So in order to begin letting go of all the things you’ve been attributing to money that make it more difficult to have, we’ll take a closer look at where all these money beliefs and ideas came from in the first place. Let’s begin a few thousand years ago when conch shells were exchanged in a primitive form of barter. People literally “shelled out” in exchange for food or labor. Then, in the mines of Mesopotamia, workers were paid in salt, or “salarium,” which they could then exchange for goods and services. This is the origin of the idea of working for a “salary.” But as trade became more and more complex, the use of commodities like shells and salt was replaced by the use of precious metals. And once trade became more centralized, the direct exchange of precious metals was replaced by the use of IOUs. Coins were the first officially sanctioned IOUs, followed fairly quickly by pieces of paper that could be exchanged for precious metal. In fact, the British pound got its name because, until a few hundred years ago, it could be exchanged for a pound-weight of sterling silver. In the late 19th century, an international system was set up called “the gold standard” that allowed for a universal and stable unit of valuation. Finally, in the 1940s, the governments of the world decided to abandon the gold standard system. Promises of exchange were replaced by articles of faith—the marketplace’s faith that the government that printed it will continue to back it, with or without reserves of gold. In this sense, money no longer has any inherent or intrinsic value. The value of money, whether in the form of euro, yen, dollar, or pound, is now based entirely on the value we and others place upon it. So what is money really? It’s whatever we make it up to be.

The Meaning of Money

1. Complete these 12 sentences about money, wealth, and riches to uncover the key elements of your current unconscious programming and your relationship with money.

+ People with money are… + Money makes people… + I’d have more money if… + My parents always thought money would… + Money causes… + I’m afraid that if I had more money I would… + Money is… + In order to have more money, I would need to… + I think money… + If I were really rich, I would… + My biggest fear about money… + Money is…

2. Circle any of your unconscious money beliefs that might be holding you back, even if they seem unquestionably “true” to you.

3. Repeat this exercise daily for at least the next week. You may find some of the deeper programs take a bit longer to come up to the surface.

4. What did you discover? Are your beliefs and associations with money those of someone who is programmed for poverty or for riches?

By heightening our awareness of our beliefs about money, we can begin to make sense of many of our emotions and behaviors when dealing with it, and by changing them, we can transform the emotional impact of money in our lives. After all, would you rather work half your life for freedom of choice or for the root of all evil? Here are some of the most common beliefs people hold that keep them from creating an abundance of money in their lives: Money corrupts. There is an inherent mistrust of wealth in our society, most of it based on the underlying assumption that money corrupts. But the reality is, money doesn’t corrupt—it reveals. Many wonderful people are doing amazingly positive things with their money. Why not you? There is not enough money to go around. Money is not a zero-sum game—it’s an infinite game, and the more people who are playing it, the more money there is to go around. Provided you are spending money and not just hoarding it, the more money you make, the more money will be circulating in the system. In this sense, the richer you become, the richer you will be making others. I don’t want to make money because I’m scared that I will lose it. That makes about as much sense as saying I don’t want to eat a nice meal because I’m scared that I’ll have to flush it down the toilet later. The purpose of money isn’t to keep it forever, it’s to use it. And once you learn the secrets of making money, which I will share with you in the second part of my book, I Can Make You Rich you’ll realize that as long as you have the capacity to think, you have the ability to make more money. In order to question some of your own limiting beliefs about money and restore a healthier relationship with money, do this simple exercise adapted from Patricia Remele’s book, Money Freedom. It’s based on the idea that when you take away all of our culturally imposed beliefs about what it should and shouldn’t be, money is simply a tool we can use to make our lives easier and reach our goals faster. Therefore, what is true about money must be true about other tools as well…

The Shovel Exercise

1. Make a list of the most negative-seeming money beliefs you uncovered in the previous exercise.

2. Substitute the word “shovel” (another practical tool) for “money” in each of the sentences on your list. Notice whether the statements still make sense or have any emotional significance.

Examples:

+ “The love of shovels is the root of all evil.” + “Shovels don’t grow on trees.” + “I feel guilty because I have more shovels than my father ever did.”

Remember, the idea here is to simply take away the emotional “sting” from these ideas—it doesn’t matter whether or not you really believe them.

Where Do All These Ideas about Money Come From?

When we are born, our mind is a clean slate. There are certain things our bodies are genetically programmed to be able to do almost from birth—the basics of movement, communication, and self-healing. However, when it comes to what we choose to believe about the world, our minds are up for grabs. Before the age of seven, a child doesn’t know enough to be able to rely on their own judgment and reasoning. Their critical faculties are undeveloped. A critical faculty is the ability to question, judge, analyze, criticize, and, very importantly, compare. It is because children haven’t developed this critical faculty that they can believe in Father Christmas and fairies as easily as they believe in geometry and money. Until we take control of our own minds, our beliefs about the world and ourselves come from the continual messages that we receive in the first few years of our lives. What we are told again and again, particularly at moments of emotional intensity, has the most powerful effect upon us. In fact, anything that is said at a moment of emotional intensity has the power of a hypnotic suggestion. If you believe you have to work hard to make money, you will only look for jobs that involve a lot of effort. If you believe that everyone is out to rip you off, you will unconsciously find people who will do that. If you believe that you deserve great wealth, then your mind will look for opportunities that create that. This is one of the reasons why hypnosis is such a powerful tool for changing your life and your relationship with money. It allows you to get right to the part of your brain where the old programs are stored and literally reprogram your mind for riches.

Ending Financial Self-Sabotage

Most of us have inherited a mixed bag of some positive and some negative beliefs about what having more money in our lives would mean. These money beliefs in turn affect how much money we will allow ourselves to have. For example, how do you react when you read these statements?

+ I deserve money. + Money can come to me easily. + There’s more than enough to go around. + It’s okay for me to be rich.

If they feel comfortable to you as you read them—as obvious and true as saying “the sky is blue”—chances are you are already living a fairly rich life and a positive relationship with money. If they feel uncomfortable, untrue, or even unforgivable, you’ve just uncovered one of the real blocks to a lifetime of wealth and freedom. In contrast to the above statements, what were you told as a child about money? Many of my clients answer with things like this:

+ You’ll never amount to anything. + Shame on you—why can’t you get anything right? + It’s a good thing you’re beautiful, because you aren’t smart enough to make it on your own.

There is a long list of negative money beliefs and stories people use to keep themselves away from wealth. Maybe you’ve thought that if you became rich you’d change as a person, or you’d become a target, or you would lose your friends. Perhaps you’ve been telling yourself that you won’t be able to handle the pressure, or that you don’t really care that much about money anyway. Many people have been taught things like: “The Bible says money is the root of all evil.” What the Bible actually says is: “The love of money [or, according to some scholars, ‘lust for money’] is the root of all evil”—that is, the pursuit of money for its own sake, as a commodity to be hoarded. Here’s the key: Whatever negative story about wealth you have told yourself in the past, it’s time to let it go. There’s a saying in the world of computer programming: Garbage in = Garbage out. Your mind is like a computer, but it’s only as useful as the programs it’s running. And those programs are made up of your most frequent thoughts and most tightly held beliefs. This is why it is so important to let go of any unconscious money beliefs and ideas you may still be carrying from your childhood about why money is bad or that you’re not good enough to have it. The unconscious mind is not logical. It doesn’t stop and think about what you want or what’s best for you and your relationship with money. It just does whatever it’s been programmed to do. In fact, your mind will not allow you to deviate from the programs you hold in your unconscious. It will do whatever it takes to prove these unconscious programs about money to be true. Over the years, I have worked with many clients who have what they refer to as a “self-sabotage” mechanism. Whenever things are going well for them, it seems as though they manage to screw it up. This is always caused by beliefs in the unconscious mind that will not allow them to succeed. All I do is have them reprogram the limiting beliefs and suddenly their life dramatically changes for the better. For example, I have a friend who was good at creating money, but somehow would always sabotage his efforts to create lasting wealth by finding ways to get rid of his money almost as quickly as he made it. His relationship to money and behavior around money didn’t seem to make any sense until one day he told me of a childhood experience where he had said to his mother that when he grew up, he wanted to be rich. His mother had replied, “Why do you want to do that? Rich people get heart attacks!” No wonder he couldn’t hang on to his money—in his unconscious mind, having a lot of money equaled death! Remember, the unconscious mind is not logical, it’s purposeful—and its number one purpose is survival. Although he hadn’t been conscious of it until that moment, this unsupportive and false money belief had been installed at an impressionable age. As soon as he made any money, his unconscious mind worked at getting rid of it “to keep him alive.” After just 20 minutes of reprogramming, his unconscious fear of getting a heart attack from having too much money had gone. Within a few months his business went into overdrive, and just over a year later he had created a brand new career for himself and was living the life of his dreams. Just becoming conscious of your old programs around money is often enough to take away their power and bring about a happier relationship with money.

Undoing Cultural Hypnosis

One of the tabloid newspapers recently ran a series of articles entitled “So Rich You Want to Slap Them.” This certainly mirrors the views of a proportion of the population who are angry with the people who have mastered the art of creating money. We are continually told that “there is only a finite amount of wealth” and that “the more we have, the less there will be for others.” It’s common in our culture to hear terms such as “filthy rich” or “fat cat,” which are indicative of an underlying mistrust of people with money. This sort of cultural hypnosis creates one of the largest blocks people have about making money and living rich—who they think they’ll have to become and what they think they’ll have to give up in order to get it. Some people believe they will have to sacrifice their time, or their health, or even their family to the cause of “making money at all costs.” Yet when we broaden our definition of rich from “having a lot of money” to “living life on our own terms,” those sacrifices can all be seen to be unrealistic. If you had no time, you wouldn’t be rich no matter how much money you had. If you don’t have your health, you don’t have anything—all the money in the world can’t buy you another minute of life. And if you give up the love of your family for a few dollars more, your life will only become poorer. There is, however, one sacrifice you will need to make to strengthen your relationship with money—you will need to give up your resentment of people who have more money than you! When I began on my own journey to wealth, I believed (among other things) that:

+ The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. + If I win, others must lose. + In order for someone to make a lot of money, they have to screw other people over.

You may be holding some similar money beliefs for yourself, but here’s the simple truth: If you dislike people with money, it will be difficult to become one of them. Once I became aware of how much I resented people with money, I became aware of how much that resentment was holding me back in my own pursuit of wealth. I knew I had to change the pattern—to reprogram my automatic, unconscious reaction to people who have money. Even if I didn’t like what I thought they had done to get their money, I realized that the only person I was hurting with my resentment was myself. As the saying goes, hanging onto resentment is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die! At first, I used a simple system of substitution. Anytime I noticed myself grumbling inside my head at the success or wealth of someone else, I would immediately replace that thought with a positive one wishing that person well. It felt strange at first, but each time I did it, I noticed I felt a little bit better inside myself. Then, I learned a technique that enabled me to make even more dramatic changes more quickly. Instead of focusing on what I didn’t want (i.e. “to be like them”), it focused my mind on what I did want—to make money and live rich in an ethical and enjoyable way. Here is what I learned, exactly the way that I practice it to this day…

From Resentment to Riches

Be sure to read through all the instructions before you begin…

1. Think about someone whose success or wealth you have been resenting. Create an image in your mind of what they look like. What color is their hair? What clothes are they wearing? What expression do they have on their face?

2. Now, think about yourself being exactly the way you most want to be—living life on your own terms with the financial assets to do what you really want to be doing. How do you stand, smile, and speak? How happy and confident do you look?

3. Shrink down that picture of your rich self so that it fits in one small corner of the picture of the person you have been resenting.

4. Now, switch the pictures as fast as you can! As the picture of the person you have been resenting shrinks down into the corner, expand the picture of your rich self until it fills the screen. Make sure the expanded picture of your rich self is big, bright, and bold!

5. Take a moment to clear your mind, then repeat the process at least five times. Make the switch faster and faster each time you do it.

Several years ago, there was a study conducted into happiness and comparative wealth, which was quite revealing. Participants were asked to choose between two scenarios. In the first, they were to be paid $90,000 and their friends and colleagues would all be paid $80,000; in the second, they would receive $100,000 but their friends and colleagues would receive $110,000. What do you suppose people chose? If you guessed that they opted for more money, you’d be wrong—an overwhelming majority said they would prefer to have less money as long as it was more than everyone else! This is poor thinking in its most insidious form—using money as a measure of personal value, status, or worth—and sabotages a pleasant relationship with money. In contrast, rich thinkers don’t use their money to make themselves feel better—they use it to make themselves a richer life. The more comfortable you become around every person’s capacity to make a contribution and create wealth, the easier it becomes for you to do the same. This is one of the absolute keys to rich thinking: The more comfortable you become with the wealth of others, the faster your own wealth will grow. Here’s one last exercise you can do that will make it easier for you to release any residual negativity around money and become instantly richer in your thinking and actions…

Creating a Richer World

1. Think about someone you believe is struggling financially and imagine them wealthy and successful.

2. Think about someone you believe is already doing well and imagine them becoming even more wealthy and successful.

3. Repeat steps 1 and 2 with as many different people as you like until you feel “clean”—no pity and no resentment.

4. Imagine what the world would be like if there was no poverty and everyone had more than enough to live life on their own terms. How do you feel about living in that world? How do you feel about yourself?

The more often you repeat this exercise, the faster your relationship with money will change and the faster your wealth will grow. This piece is excerpted with permission from I Can Make You Rich by Dr. Paul McKenna. It is published by Hay House and available in bookstores and online at hayhouse.com. The book includes an audio download which works with the unconscious mind book to reprogram your money beliefs and change your thinking and behavior around money for good.

About The Author Paul McKenna, Ph.D. has consistently astounded his audiences and clients by proving how small changes in people’s lives can yield huge results, whether it’s curing someone of a lifelong phobia or clearing up deep-seated issues in a matter of minutes. He currently hosts his own TV show on Hulu, where he interviews the most interesting people in the world. His guests include Simon Cowell, Harvey Weinstein, Rachael Ray, Sir Roger Moore, Roger Daltrey, Tony Robbins, Paul Oakenfold and Sir Ken Robinson. Visit his website: paulmckenna.com

photo: bench accounting

Your Home Is a Mirror: What Are You Projecting?

In my previous book, Mind, Body, Home, each part of the house is broken down into the correlating mental, emotional, and physical counterpart of ourselves. Even the fascia of a house takes on a form similar to the human face with the front door as the mouth, the windows as the eyes, and the roof as the head. It’s no coincidence that the home has been used as a metaphor for our mind or body in religions, mythologies, and dream symbols for thousands of years. Our home is an energetic extension of ourselves with every aspect reflected somewhere in it. This is made even more exact by the stuff we possess. Every item is an expression or extension of our mental and emotional selves. This is why decluttering your life and home can be such an arduous process. You are literally letting go of mental and emotional aspects of yourself. The only variable is how active your emotional connection to a particular item is. Has it passed its expiration date in your life? Is it supporting you or keeping you stuck? These questions may seem like a weighted conversation for a broken toaster tucked away in your kitchen cabinet or an old art project stored in the guest room closet. But not so when you consider that every item is taking up physical space in your home and energetic space in your mind. Even if it seems out of sight, your clutter is projecting this energy out into your life just like an outdated outfit or a broken car would. Decluttering and organizing your house is serious energy work, not unlike going to an energy healer, acupuncturist, yoga class, therapist, or any other healing modality. This is why letting go of clutter is so powerful and life changing. In all my work in the holistic arts, I have found decluttering your life to be the quickest way to make profound changes. You are literally removing old, stagnant energy to make space for new, fresh energy. For example, if you’ve been sending out résumés and going to job interviews, decluttering your home office space will expedite the process. After creating space, new energy in the form of phone calls and job offers can now come in. Clutter is the physical representation of our emotional and mental blocks, and once it is removed, change can happen fast. We ultimately manifest our life from our mental and emotional bodies. The act of organizing and decluttering your home literally frees those areas of our psyche like removing the wall of a dam to allow water to flow through once again. As you become more aware of what items are blocking your energy, you can begin to use your home organization as a manifesting tool to attract more of what you want in your life.

Using Your Home to Manifest Your Life

The law of attraction has become the predominant concept for manifestation among spiritual and self-help communities. Manifestation is the process of turning ideas and thoughts into physical form. As spiritual beings having a physical experience, we are all alchemists turning non-physical concepts into physical objects for survival and enjoyment on earth. It is through the law of attraction that we create our own reality—from the home we live in, to the car we drive, to the relationships we attract into our life. At the root of the law of attraction is energy, or vibration. Like energy attracts like energy. If you are a vibrational match to a Mercedes, then you will attract a Mercedes to you. This also works on the emotional level. For example, if you are a vibrational match to abandonment as a result of childhood wounding, then you will attract more abandonment into your life through relationships. This will continue until the contrast becomes so stark that you consciously desire for something different. Once that desire becomes conscious, you will then attract the right people and situations to heal the past wounds. So how does this relate to decluttering your life? When it comes to organizing your life and decluttering your home, you have manifested everything in your home with your thoughts and emotions. You wanted a comfy tan couch and made it happen by shopping, ordering, purchasing, and having it delivered. Everything in your home was a vibrational match to you at some point, and you attracted it to you. Yes, even your spouse or roommate. Your home, and your home organization, is a giant composite of you. It’s also a giant emitter of your energy. Think of it as a living vision board. A vision board is a commonly used tool for activating or expediting the law of attraction. You can create a vision board by placing images or key words of what you want in your life onto a two-dimensional poster or mat board. In addition to consciously determining what you want, the subconscious mind responds well to the imagery on the board, similar to subliminal messages. Your home has the same effect. If you want to know what you’re manifesting, look no further than your home. Imagine pasting your home and all its contents on a flat board. Spread it out like a map of the world. Artwork, pictures, books, closets, cabinets, bedroom, garage, office, living room—they’re all tangible representations of the energy you’re beaming out into the world. Our world is a hologram that reflects back to us what we emit out. That which you put out comes back to you, and this is true for your home as well. Look at your home objectively, not just the pretty parts, but the closets, cupboards, and clutter too. How is your home not in alignment with what you want? What needs to go? What is stuffed, cramped, outdated? Where can you provide better home organization? What would be a better representation of you? Inspirational artwork, curtains you love instead of tolerate, current books, functional rooms? Are you in a transitional space that is currently serving you during a transitional time, or do you desire more permanence? Is it time to change some things on your virtual vision board? If you’ve worked with a vision board or other law of attraction methods, you may have wondered why you manifest some things but not others. Either the desire wasn’t truly there or, in most cases, there’s an underlying subconscious block that is stronger. Our subconscious thoughts and beliefs that lie beneath the surface are as important as our conscious thoughts—actually, more so. Our subconscious thoughts make up approximately 95% to 99% of our thoughts and behaviors, and yet we have little awareness of them. They consist of past programming, influences from the collective conscious, and our shadow sides. These are sometimes referred to as our blind spots or shadows because they are below our conscious awareness. The more we can become aware of and integrate our shadows, the more whole we will feel and the more precise our manifestations will become. The question is, how do we see what we can’t see? This is the power of working with our home, which is a three-dimensional projection of ourselves. All your shadows are in your home. Are you wondering what yours are? The better question is, where in your home have you hidden them? And are you ready to declutter your life and home?

Shadow Work through Space

Each room of the home represents a correlating aspect of ourselves, with the closet symbolizing what we would rather keep hidden. It’s where we hide our shadows, and is an area where home organization and decluttering is often needed. It’s no wonder we use the phrase “skeletons in the closet” to refer to things we keep hidden. And, of course, there is the common phrase “coming out of the closet,” which refers to expressing an aspect of ourselves that we have kept hidden from the world. We all have shadows or shadow sides. These are aspects of our personality that we have disassociated from or denied because at some point in childhood it was not safe for them to be seen. These aspects have been termed shadows or shadow sides because of our inability to see them. You can also think of it as a blind spot, your dark side, or the unconscious. The collective consciousness has a shadow side as well, commonly termed dark forces, dark energy, or even the devil. In Taoist philosophy, the duality of light and dark, or yin and yang, is prevalent in everything. It only becomes a problem when we deem it bad or wrong and hide these aspects of ourselves, which then become shame. The more we hide them, the darker they become. This causes a division within the self. This is what leads to feeling inauthentic and generally dissatisfied with life. Instead of whole, we are fragmented. Psychologist Carl Jung was the first to bring to light the impact of our shadow sides in the field of psychology. Many spiritual and self-help teachers have since integrated shadow work into spirituality, including Deepak Chopra, Debbie Ford, and Teal Swan; and soon we’ll talk about how decluttering your life and home, can be a form of this work. Becoming your whole self, in alignment with your soul, is at the crux of spirituality. To do so, your shadows must be integrated. Our shadows are also where our best gifts lie dormant. Carl Jung has been credited in calling our shadows the “seat of our creativity.” It’s usually those shadow aspects that make us unique, and it is our uniqueness that the world wants to see. How do we work with something we can’t see? Jung is also quoted as saying, “Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate.” Our shadows show up in our home and life organization and in everyday life, including our projections onto other people. Those traits you most dislike in others are a good sign of your own shadows. For example, if someone with a boisterous personality annoys you, then you’ve most likely hidden a more outgoing aspect of yourself. You may have received punishment at a young age for acting out and this side of you was deemed bad. Being more outgoing and energetic is now a trait that not only would benefit you in some way, but would also bring more joy into your everyday life. Unconscious shadows also show up in the home. We can bring our shadows into the light by organizing and decluttering our home, specifically with stuff we’ve stored in our closet or other storage areas. The closet is where we store items so that others can’t see them, nor do we have to look at them ourselves. For those with limited closet space, it could be other storage spaces, such as the basement, garage, storage shed, or even an off-site storage unit. I recently discovered shadow aspects of myself in the closet of my childhood bedroom.

Out of the Closet and into the Light

Before I share my experience, keep in mind that there’s nothing wrong with storing items. Storage serves a really good purpose. We don’t want to see our clothes strewn around the bedroom or extra towels and toilet paper sitting out. Closets are great for keeping rooms clear of clutter, and off-site storage facilities are sometimes necessary during transitional times. But when storage becomes a permanent mausoleum for stuff from our past, then it’s a red flag that we are storing things we don’t want to deal with and that we’re in need of decluttering our life. The phrase “coming out of the closet” is usually used in terms of announcing one’s sexuality in terms of it being different from what’s “normal.” But there’s more to “coming out” than an announcement to the world. It’s an acknowledgment of oneself. At its core, it’s self-acceptance. Imagine how amazing it would be if we all came out of the closet and accepted ourselves for who we really are.

+ I’m super short and love myself. + I am a big mouth and think I’m awesome. + I sing show tunes in the shower and think I sound pretty good. + I dress up in women’s clothes and look stunning. + I didn’t go to college and know I’m smart. + I can juggle while playing the harmonica and think I’m totally cool.

We hide aspects of ourselves not just from the world, but also from ourselves. What if these were, in fact, the more interesting parts of you? Most likely they are. However, we tend to believe our idiosyncrasies make it harder or impossible for us to fit in. As a result, we overcompensate for them and perhaps even have shame about them. When I went back to Nashville due to my mother’s passing, I spent a lot more time than usual at my family’s home. It seemed like the perfect time to go through the few remaining belongings I had stored at their house. I was surprised during the process of decluttering my parent’s house when I stepped into the closet and sitting neatly on the shelf was a box labeled “Tisha crystal.” How had I overlooked this box? It was the never-used crystal from my wedding in 1998, a marriage that ended shortly thereafter in 2001. I’d moved more than a dozen times since then and released so many items from that relationship and many others. Somehow through all my purges, online sales, and moves, that box hadn’t budged in fifteen years. The better question was, why were these items still in my childhood closet—never to have left? I opened the lid of this Pandora’s box. It was full of crystal wine glasses, still in original wrapping, with a few notecards still tucked in. They were relics from a time I thought I had fully dealt with, but the “Tisha crystal” box told a different story: Guilt. Shame. Failure. The gifts. The failed marriage. The witnesses. The celebration. The disappointment. Disappointing my family. The hiding. The shame. Self-acceptance. Coming out. The rejection. Disgrace. Shame. Tolerance. Rejection. The trying. The nonconformist. Self-acceptance. Self-love. More self-love. Unconditional love. Sitting on that shelf was the last shred of evidence of an old identity. It was liberating to finally get rid of that box—one that I could never fit into. It’s a perfect example of believing that we’ve worked through issues only to find remnants or new layers we’ve not completely worked through. I share this story of decluttering a home as an example of how our stuff can represent that last remaining percent of emotional energy that is awaiting completion and integration. Instead of the whole package, sometimes decluttering your life and organizing your house represents the red bow that needs to be tied up and finally handed off. In order to transform anything, we have to bring it into the light—into our conscious awareness. We have to see it, acknowledge it, and accept it. This is exactly why our ego shoves our shadows in the dark of our closets or other unseen storage areas and not our living rooms. The farther back, the better. And then we can remain in denial about emotions we don’t want to deal with. When these shadow aspects are kept hidden over time, they fester and become regret, resentment, remorse, and rejection. These toxic emotions are the stepchildren of guilt and shame.

The Fear of Empty Space

In addition to storing emotions in our closets, we also tend to fill just about any space we can find with our stuff. The predominant emotion in today’s culture is feeling overwhelmed, and unless we declutter our life, our homes generally mirror this trend. Most people complain about not having enough time in their day or space in their home. Our life is cluttered with time clocks, technology, and trying to maintain it all with our home reflecting this back to us. We are undergoing a cultural clutter epidemic on all levels. But it’s not really about our stuff. It’s about what our stuff is covering up. While we complain about not having enough time or space, we stay busy trying to fill up both. Most of us feel a need to fill any bit of empty space we find—silence in conversation, an empty wall, a painting with just a brush stroke, an empty calendar. Empty space is uncomfortable for most people. In art, empty space is called the negative space. In music, it’s the pause just prior to a crescendo. In homes, it’s the area where the space breathes. In meditation, it’s the pause between the inhale and exhale. In Japanese art (one of the few cultures that value empty space), the void is called ma and is highly revered. In all art forms, the beauty lies in the empty space. Why then are we so uncomfortable with it while also craving it? Fear breeds in empty space. It’s where we can hear our thoughts. It forces us to look at our life. We have to witness the choices we’ve made. We have to remember the ungrieved past. To avoid this, we fill our homes and lives with stuff, rather than consciously organizing our home. We fill our calendar. We put a console along an empty wall. We fill quietness with idle chatter or TV noise. Before long, our lives become cluttered all in an unconscious attempt to avoid the emptiness. Other words for empty space are the gap, the void, the liminal, or nothingness. This scares the hell out of us. In this state, the ego clamors for reassurance that it exists. There is a rush to fill the space with anything, even if it’s not soul fulfilling. Anything not to have a black hole reflected at us. It’s like walking down a dark hallway with no end. And so we fill our calendar and home with people, places, and things. Before long, our life is cluttered, our home is unorganized, our life is unorganized and we feel overwhelmed with stuff with little or no meaning. The ego is validated, but at a high price. I’m overwhelmed and therefore I exist. The void is also where creation is born. The same place we find our fears is the place we find our soul. Follow the fear and you will find your authentic self. This is what we’re truly afraid of. Finding our true self comes with moving out of our comfort zone, changing family beliefs, taking risks, being seen, and feeling vulnerable. The more these words scare you, the deeper your piles of clutter. Clutter is shallow; space is deep. Filling empty space is like filling the lungs with black balloons. What I don’t see, I don’t have to deal with. The more I distract myself, the less likely I will have to see the truth. Another common problem related to letting go of clutter and organizing your home is when people allow others to fill their spaces. In an attempt to avoid emptiness or when we are unable to embody our own energy in the form of our own sense of power, we allow others to take our energy. This can show up in the form of other people’s stuff stored in the home, burglars, or even rodents. If you are allowing unwanted energy in your home, then you are allowing unwanted energy in your life. This is a telltale sign of boundary issues that can show up in personal relationships or even with strangers. Are you allowing others to take up your space, your energy, your boundaries, and your preferences? Most people struggle with either having too much space or not enough space. The amount of space that feels best is personal with no one-size-fits-all rule. The best barometer is to ask yourself questions: Do I feel stuck, scared, or free? Is my vision clear or clouded? Am I filling space out of fear or joy? From ego or soul? Out of anxiety or creativity? What am I really covering up? Whatever it is, there also lies a portal of beauty underneath. We all have a different standard of how much stuff we desire—in our home and on our calendar.

How Much Stuff Is Too Much?

It’s common to think that letting go of clutter is dealing with an overabundance of stuff. However, that’s not always the case. The real problem could be a few items that are hidden away in a closet like a time capsule. In this case, the problem is harder to spot because it’s been buried so deep in the psyche and therefore hidden or disguised in the home. The further away something is stored, the more we don’t want to deal with it. This is often the location of the diamond in the rough that holds the key to unlocking the past in order to move forward. Those who admit to having too much stuff with a desire to declutter their home and life are usually more conscious of their personal challenges. This allows for more self-growth and transformation, whereas the issues of those with organized clutter and the appearance of being clutter-free and in control of their life are more disguised and harder to consciously change. These people tend to store away their issues in drawers and closets in a neat and tidy manner. For people who simply have too much stuff with no desire to declutter their home and lives and address their discomfort, it’s usually a subconscious tactic for covering up or distracting from the past to the point of affecting one’s present level of happiness. When one’s living space is visually cluttered, the mind is cluttered. This strategically keeps people from having to look at their life. It’s like turning the TV volume up loud so that you don’t have to hear yourself think. We all have a different standard for what is too much and what we like in terms of home organization. Some people are minimalists and prefer sparser and clean-lined spaces, whereas others prefer more knick-knacks. What may seem cluttered to me may feel like a cozy haven to you. What may seem cold and stark to one person may feel liberating to another. There are also cultural differences that can influence the amount of stuff we like to have in our living spaces. For example, living rooms and kitchens in England tend to be cozy and homey and could be considered cluttered to a minimalist. This is, of course, a generalization. It’s no coincidence that the Victorian style of decorating, known for its bric-a-brac, began in England. Japanese culture, on the other hand, is known for its calm and minimalist spaces. For some, these spaces could feel barren and impersonal. Even within the United States home organization and decorating styles vary, with climate being a major factor. It’s important to recognize your particular style, which is a byproduct of your culture, familial environment, and personality type. When you know what feels good, you then know what doesn’t feel good. And vice versa. The key to decluttering and organizing your life and house is to know when too much is too much for you. When I work with clients with too much stuff, they are usually aware of it because they don’t feel good in their home. They often comment that it feels like the walls are collapsing in on them. This is always a sign of what’s showing up on the mental and emotional levels in the form of stagnation, confusion, emotional claustrophobia, regret, lack of direction, weight gain, or depression. Your home should feel safe and comfortable and also expansive and liberating. Finding this balance isn’t always easy and requires an ongoing consciousness of your space and how you feel about it. This is the beauty of using feng shui principles for decluttering and organizing your home, not as a one-time application but as an ongoing practice of home organization. If you’re not conscious of your space, then what are you conscious of? Aside from your mind and body, it is the only space you have any control over and is always a direct reflection of yourself. When it comes to decluttering your life, look at your home through an objective lens. Everything in your home is from the past. Unless you purchased or were given something today, then everything you own was acquired prior to this moment. Our lives are a collection of experiences up to this moment, and our belongings represent this. Our stuff contains stories, memories, and associations, some good and some not so good. At any moment, we have a choice to make a different decision, tell a different story, or take a new path. By now you’re starting to see that your belongings are not just household items sitting around but a mosaic of you. What from your past do you want to take forward? Which items are still relevant to you now and to where you want to go? By making no decision and keeping what you currently own, you are in effect making a decision to continue on as things have been. This is fine if that’s what you want. But if you are tired of the old stories, the old patterns, the old thoughts, then it’s time to dump the past and declutter your life. When the past is more present than it should be in your life, that’s when you know too much is too much. That’s when it’s time to organize your home and declutter areas of your life. This is when memorabilia becomes a rogue force keeping you stuck instead of a supportive platform from which to move forward. When the past is so present that your vision for your future is cloudy, fuzzy, or overwhelming, that’s when you know too much is too much. That’s when you know you’ve clung to the past out of fear of the unknown future. That’s when it’s time for a clutter intervention. This article is excerpted from Clutter Intervention by Tisha Morris. © 2017. Used by permission from Llewellyn Worldwide, Ltd., llewellyn.com

About The Author Tisha Morris is a best-selling author, feng shui expert, interior designer, and intuitive life coach. Prior to entering the healing arts, Tisha practiced law and obtained a fine arts degree in interior design. Tisha combines traditional feng shui techniques, design aesthetics, and intuition to turn challenging spaces into supportive environments to help improve the lives of all those who live and encounter the space. Tisha also works one-on-one to help people identify subconscious blocks and make desired changes in work and relationships. Visit her website: tishamorris.com

photo: angus

Meditation For Busy People With Busy Minds

The key to succeeding in meditation is to treat all thoughts as a legitimate part of the meditating experience, regardless of the content. Say it with me: All thoughts matter. This is not hyperbole. The more we celebrate our thinking mind, the more transcendent and blissful our experiences will be in meditation and consequently, the richer and more spacious our experiences will become outside of mindfulness and meditation.

+ The first step in celebrating the mind is to get rid of the word “distracting” when describing our unrelated thoughts in meditation.

+ The next step is to liberate ourselves from the need to witness, let go of, or replace those previously unrelated thoughts with more focused or wholesome thoughts.

+ Third, we should absolve ourselves from the need to focus on any thoughts in particular or actively ignore them.

Instead of practicing exclusivity, we’re going to begin practicing the opposite—treating all meditation thoughts, sensations, emotions, desires, feelings, inspirations, or anything else we may be thinking about while meditating as 100 percent legitimate. To appreciate this novel approach, it helps to see the bigger picture of how the previously labeled distracting thoughts play a useful role in our meditation process. The five zones of meditation are: focused thinking, random thinking, mixture of random thoughts and daydreams, dreams, and the settled mind. These five zones encapsulate all the mental experiences that you might have within a given meditation.  The “random thinking” zone is a deliberate word choice and an effort to help you stop seeing random thoughts in meditation as distractions (obstacles) and start seeing them simply as any thoughts that are unrelated to the knowledge (awareness) that you’re meditating. Focused thinking is thinking exclusively about the task at hand, which in the case of meditation may be thoughts related to the act of meditating: “I’m sitting on my couch meditating . . .” “My mind is very busy while I’m meditating . . .” “This meditation feels long . . .” Random thinking includes thoughts that are relevant to your life, but they are otherwise unrelated to the act of meditating: “I want to have macaroni for dinner . . .” “I forgot to call the dentist to make an appointment . . .” “Why hasn’t my friend messaged me back . . . ?” Next we have a mixture of random thoughts and daydreams. Daydreams are thoughts that may make partial sense but are experienced as even more random and fragmented than normal unrelated thoughts, such as: “I should go back to college to become a circus clown . . .” “Maybe I’ll be a clown who entertains elephants . . .” “But only if the elephants are from Cleveland . . .” Then we have meditation thoughts that are interpretations of dreams. In other words, these are thoughts that either don’t make any sense or are predominantly related to sensations, emotions, or feelings, such as colored lights; feelings of floating, heaviness, or numbness (loss of feeling); or spontaneous fits of laughing, sadness, guilt, shock, or tiredness: “That shade of blue is beautiful . . .” “I can’t feel my hands . . .” “I’m getting sleepy . . .” And finally, we have the settled mind, where pure bliss is directly experienced—pure bliss being another name for the experience of samadhi (union with the divine) or nirvana (supreme inner peace and serenity). To the novice, to calm the mind like this sounds like an impossibly mercurial experience that would take great effort or intense concentration to reach, but it’s quite normal and requires no more effort than having a dream while taking a nap. In the settled-mind zone, the pure bliss becomes so great that the thinking process spontaneously comes to a halt, without you having to try to quiet your thoughts. In terms of awareness, the settled state is the deepest state achievable through meditation. The irony is that the meditator is left with little to no awareness that they are achieving it in the moments when they are achieving it. We’ll discuss later how you will know your mind was settled despite the fact that you won’t be aware of it in the moment. This may sound like you’ll “miss the bliss”—how can you know you were experiencing it if you didn’t realize it at the time? But you will know, mainly because of how you will show up outside of meditation.

The Correct Way to Meditate?

When I began dabbling in meditation, one of the instructions I heard repeated, mainly by my yoga teacher peers, was how there is no correct way to meditate—meaning there is no way to meditate that works best for everyone. Instead, the meditator should tap into how they are feeling in the moment and practice a simple meditation technique appropriate to how they feel. There are numerous problems with this philosophy, but the main issue is that saying “there is no correct way to meditate” ignores the cardinal rule of learning any new skill: while there may not be a correct way, there are certainly best practices for every skill, and by adhering to those best practices, at least in the beginning when you are learning how to do meditation, you establish good habits that help you increase both the consistency and reliability of the desired results and benefits of meditation, as well as your chances of becoming proficient and self-sufficient in the quickest amount of time. I know about this shortcoming from direct experience with another learned skill that everyone seemed to know how to do but me: swimming. I didn’t learn how to swim properly until I was in my thirties. That’s not to say I never swam before that. In fact, when I was about ten years old I figured out how to doggy paddle. And then I learned how to tread water with the peanut butter-spreading arm motion when I was a teenager. So if I was just frolicking around in the pool, I would be fine, as long as I didn’t have to tread for too long. Much more than about a half a minute of treading water, however, and I would go into a full-blown panic. Now, if you know how to swim, you might think that knowing how to doggy-paddle and tread water provided me with a good base to learn the rest. But I’m proof that truly swimming— moving your arms and legs in sync—is not as intuitive as it may appear, particularly if you didn’t put the movements together until you were an adult, like me. My inefficiencies in swimming were embarrassingly exposed while on vacation one summer in Hawaii. I found myself in a once-in-a-lifetime dream situation, hiking with a buddy of mine (who happened to be an expert swimmer) and four beautiful women along the gorgeous coastline of Maui. We arrived at a volcanic rock overlooking the Pacific Ocean, and one of the women suggested that we strip down to our birthday suits and dive into the sea for a swim around the bend, which meant jumping off the jagged rock we were standing on into choppy ocean water, and navigating around to the other side—at least fifteen hundred feet of ocean swimming. Because the rock stood about ten feet above sea level, once I jumped in, there was no way to get back out. I would be committed. Obviously, I had a major dilemma. Meanwhile, my buddy couldn’t get his clothes off fast enough, and within seconds everyone was diving into the ocean, leaving me behind, topless, shoulders slumped, visualizing the horror and embarrassment of needing to be rescued by one of the women while naked and drowning. As I watched them all swim like dolphins away from the rock, I yelled out over the thunderclap of the unforgiving waves that I would “stay back to watch our clothes.” Even though there was no one around for miles, this was the least emasculating excuse I could think of. Then I quietly vowed to never allow myself to be in that situation again. In fact, my buddy still teases me about it to this day: “Hey, Light, why don’t you stay back and, uh, watch our clothes?” The first thing I did upon returning home to Los Angeles was to go down to the local community pool and sign up for some basic swimming lessons. Cut to me on my first day of swim class, surrounded in the West Hollywood city pool by children of all ages who were also learning to swim. The coach instructed me to swim the length of the pool to assess my abilities. I didn’t want to embarrass myself by needing her to jump in and save me on my first lesson, so I pleaded for her to just teach me under the assumption that I didn’t know anything at all. But she insisted. Reluctantly I waded into the shallow end, held my breath, pushed off the wall, and started flapping my arms and legs in my best impression of a swimmer. I had no idea what I was doing. And after no more than ten meters, all of my energy was spent, I was taking in water, my chest was on fire, and my life began passing before my eyes. In a panic, I clutched and clawed my way through what felt like an ocean over to the side of the pool and held on for dear life, as if I had just completed an Ironman competition in record time. “Okay, good,” my new coach said with a reassuring smile, as if she’d just witnessed me cross the Ironman finish line. “Let’s start from the beginning.” She got me out of the pool and started teaching me the fundamentals. She showed me how to elongate my body, how to kick my legs, how to twist from side to side so that I could breathe in the water properly. In short, she was teaching me the pieces I’d need to put together to swim freestyle. Then she drilled me over the next several lessons until each individual skill became second nature. For me this course was revolutionary, and completely changed my relationship with water. Over the first month, I began to learn how to move in concert with the water instead of fighting it. I noticed that whenever I fought the water, it became my enemy, slowing me down and threatening to drown me. But when I practiced lengthening my body, extending my arms, breathing and moving with less effort, the water instantly became friendlier and would assist me as I glided across to the other side. If I stopped moving altogether, the water would support me gently while I caught my breath. If I fought, the water would turn and immediately begin to sink me. Before long, I was able to swim effortlessly from one side of the pool to the other side. As I mastered the fundamentals, my decades-long panic around large bodies of water transformed into delight. After another month or so of practice, I was finally getting it—do less to accomplish more. Swimming requires repetition more than anything else (just like calming the mind and achieving the benefits of meditation). There’s so much to remember initially, but after you swim a thousand laps, you get out of your head, stop analyzing everything, and start moving with maximum efficiency and effectiveness. I couldn’t believe it. Something that had eluded me my entire life now seemed as natural as breathing. After my swimming training, I could go into a pool and swim a mile with relative ease. I could go into the ocean and swim with confidence. And if I’m in another position to go skinny-dipping off a volcanic rock in Hawaii, I’ll be the first one to dive in. The point is, when it comes to thoughts during meditation, you are essentially learning how to navigate the thing that every new meditator is deathly afraid of—their thinking mind. Or their busy mind. Or their distracted mind. Or their monkey mind. Or whatever they want to call it. To the untrained meditator, their mind is as scary as that ocean was to me on that day I stood on that jagged rock, looking at the waves crashing, and imagining the worst possible outcome—humiliation, then death by drowning. But if you know how to swim, it doesn’t matter how much water is in front of you. If you know how to meditate, it doesn’t matter how busy your mind is. Meditation is never about stopping your thoughts, in the same way that swimming is never about stopping the water. Rather, swimming is about learning how to move in concert with the water so you can glide through it and have fun. Likewise, the skill of meditation is about learning how to navigate the contours of the thinking mind so you can glide from the busy focused-thinking zone down into the blissful settled-mind zone.

Go E.A.S.Y On Your Mind

Any swimming style can get you from one side of the pool to the other. It could be the breaststroke, the backstroke, the butterfly stroke, or the freestyle stroke. The only question is, how hard do you want to work? If you ask any swimmer which of the four main techniques is the easiest to learn and practice for a beginner, most will agree that the freestyle technique is the one you always want to start with. Is the freestyle stroke the only “correct” way to swim? No. Is it the easiest for getting from one side of the pool to the other? Yes. And will it teach you the fundamentals (in this case, the hydrodynamics) for the other strokes? Absolutely. In the same way, any mindfulness meditation technique can get you to bliss. But the question is the same: how hard do you want to work? What I’m going to show you is not the only meditation technique, nor is it the only “correct” technique, but in my extensive experience, it is by far the simplest meditation technique to begin with, and in practicing it, you will experience bliss (and learn the fundamentals of how to meditate in the process). It is the meditation equivalent of the freestyle swimming technique. And the key to practicing it is to keep everything easy. Do less to accomplish more. To help you remember how to be in meditation, I’ve created the E.A.S.Y. meditation approach—and now you’ll learn what each of those letters stands for.

How to Keep Meditation Feeling E.A.S.Y.

E.A.S.Y is an acronym for the four key principles of the meditation technique. You’re going to apply these principles to all meditation thoughts, noises, and sensations you experience—not just the positive ones but the negative ones, too. Each E.A.S.Y. principle will help you form an always-reliable foundation for your daily practice, making meditation feel easy and relaxing. That way you’ll reap its many benefits, especially those that occur outside of meditation itself. These principles don’t necessarily build upon one another, so don’t think of them as progressive. Instead, call to mind each of the four principles as you become aware of your mind wandering in meditation.

E = EMBRACE

Embrace means you want to practice allowing the existence of all of your thoughts and experiences. If you feel like you’re dreaming, embrace all of your dreams, embrace your sleepiness, all noises, or anything that you previously considered distracting in meditation. Embracing your experiences will help your meditations remain easy, go by very fast, and give you maximum benefit.

A = ACCEPTANCE

Now take embracing one step further: accept. Acceptance means that you want to cultivate an attitude that whatever is happening in your meditation is what should be happening. That includes happy thoughts, sad thoughts, negative thoughts, sleep, dreams, wondering about the time, and feeling antsy. No need to resist or reject any of those thoughts.

S = SURRENDER

Surrender is another directive that implies embracing and accepting, but it refers specifically to your expectations. In other words, be willing at all times to surrender your idea of how you feel your meditation should be progressing. You ideally don’t want to be locked into an agenda of “This is what I should be experiencing in meditation.” Instead, you want to practice surrendering to whatever meditation thoughts, sensations, noises, or distractions are happening in the moment.

Y = YIELD

Yield complements the principles of embrace, accept, and surrender. It’s so important to be open to whatever is happening in your meditation. As you’ll see, yielding is easier said than done. If you’ve tried and failed at quieting your thoughts in meditation, it’s likely because you’ve been conditioned to do the exact opposite of the E.A.S.Y. approach. Think about what we’ve been trained to believe it takes to be successful in most life endeavors: working hard, control, focus, diligence, remembering important information. That indoctrination will inevitably show up in your process and make your meditations feel hard and clunky. So whenever you catch yourself attempting to control your mind in meditation, remember to return to your E.A.S.Y. approach, and yield to whatever else is happening in your experiences. By following these four principles, your meditation will go from this experience, where your mind feels trapped in the busy surface zone of focused thinking . . . . . . to this experience, where your mind becomes progressively de-excited, until it becomes settled.

The E.A.S.Y. Meditation Technique

1. Sit comfortably. 2. Use an easy-to-see timing device, ideally not an alarm. 3. Calculate your finish time (ten to twenty minutes). 4. Close your eyes. 5. Passively think the sound “ah-hum.” 6. Let yourself simultaneously get lost in your thoughts. 7. When you remember that you’re meditating, passively begin thinking “ah-hum” again. 8. Peek freely and often at the time. 9. Once you’re done, wait a minute or two before opening your eyes. 10. Come out slowly.

Recommended Schedule

Meditate once in the morning, upon awakening, for ten to twenty minutes. Sit up and make sure you have comfortable back support. Meditate again once in the afternoon or early evening for ten to twenty minutes. Do not exceed two meditations per day. This article is excerpted with permission from Bliss More: How to Succeed in Meditation Without Really Trying by Light Watkins. Copyright © 2018 by Light Watkins. Published by Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. All Rights Reserved.

About The Author Light Watkins has been practicing and teaching in the meditation space since 1998. He travels the world giving talks on happiness, mindfulness, and meditation, as well as leading trainings and retreats. To date, Watkins has shared his knowledge with thousands through his live courses, books, and online trainings. He contributes to wellness blogs and writes a popular email newsletter called Light’s Daily Dose of Inspiration. Watkins’s TEDx talk has garnered hundreds of thousands of views, and he is the founder of The Shine Movement, a global movement with a mission to inspire. Visit his website: lightwatkins.com.

photo: melancholie photocase.com

There’s nothing quite as profound as the journey toward motherhood. Over the course of nine months, a woman’s body undergoes countless physical transformations—her belly expands to make space for her growing baby, her breasts change as they prepare to make milk after delivery, and her ligaments soften to prepare for giving birth. For a long time, moms-to-be have focused on accompanying these physical changes by nourishing the body with prenatal vitamins, healthy food, exercise and plenty of rest. All of which are known for helping to create a healthy pregnancy. However, recent research shows that a pregnant woman’s body isn’t the only key factor when it comes to a healthy pregnancy—the health of her mind is as well. In fact, the mind and body connection has a profound effect on the wellness of both mom and baby during pregnancy. Luckily, when it comes to keeping the mind healthy, you don’t need to spend 30 minutes at the gym or make sure you take all your vitamins. All you need is a space to sit and a few minutes a day to practice prenatal meditation.

The Health Benefits of Meditation During Pregnancy

Many expectant mothers might be surprised to learn how meditation benefits their developing baby, their birth outcomes, and their emotional health. Several recent research studies show that mindfulness meditation can help women manage pregnancy-related stress, help prevent preterm birth, and help them cope with the fears of childbirth. We’ve outlined some of these studies about meditation for pregnant women below, highlighting the science behind this age-old practice. Here’s some of the science behind pregnancy meditation.

Promotes a Healthier Birth Process

1. Decreases risk of premature birth [2] High levels of stress and anxiety increase risk factors for premature birth during pregnancy, lowering stress levels through regular prenatal baby meditation gives you and your baby a better environment in which to grow. One research study also found that women who participated in a prenatal mindfulness program were 50% less likely to give birth early when compared to those who did not receive mindfulness education. 2. Improves Immunity [4] Science shows that meditation improves the body’s immune function, ensuring physical wellness for mother and baby. 3. Decreases Childbirth Fears [6] Research shows that women who learn mindfulness skills as part of childbirth education experience less fear about the childbirth process. 4. Helps Women Manage the Pain of Labor [3] One study shows that people who attended a four-day mindfulness meditation training were able to decrease the intensity of physical pain by 40%. Pregnancy meditation tips and techniques can ease the labor process. 5. Helps Women Manage Symptoms of Insomnia [5] Mindfulness meditation helps women manage the symptoms of insomnia, which helps prevent preterm birth, suggesting another potential benefit of meditation for pregnant women.

The Emotional Benefits

6. Decreases Risk of Prenatal Depression and Anxiety [4] Women who learn the life skills of mindfulness during pregnancy experience fewer symptoms of prenatal depression and anxiety, highlighting the importance of learning how to meditate and practice baby/prenatal meditation. 7. Lowers Cortisol Levels (the stress hormone) Practicing mindfulness meditation helps reduce cortisol levels (the stress hormone), which is associated with physical and emotional distress. Research shows high levels of the hormone may negatively impact the baby’s physical and cognitive development and suggests that pregnancy meditation can benefit the mom and baby’s mental health. 8. Helps Women Cope With Uncertainty [8] Science shows that practicing mindfulness meditation, including pregnancy or baby meditation, can help mothers cope with the myriad physical and emotional changes that pregnancy brings. 9. Regulates Emotions [5] Learning the life skills of how to meditate helps us to regulate our emotions, making it more likely that we can ‘respond’ instead of ‘react’ to stressful situations. 10. Helps Women Cope with Stress [4] Research shows that women who learn mindfulness skills, like prenatal meditation, during pregnancy experience a greater decrease in prenatal anxiety than those who do not learn meditation techniques for pregnant women.

The Science Behind Postnatal Meditation

Mindfulness meditation isn’t only beneficial during pregnancy; science shows it’s helpful during the postpartum period, too. In fact, research also suggests that ‘Mindful Parenting’ helps mothers (and fathers!) to manage the stress of parenthood, offering health benefits throughout the parenthood journey.

Physical Benefits and Emotional Benefits

Here’s some of the science behind postnatal meditation. 11. Improves Sleep Quality for New Parents [1] Sleep disruption is part of new parenthood, but research shows that individuals who practice meditation experience higher quality sleep than non-meditators. 12. Increases Milk Production [4,5] Low milk supply is stressful for new mothers, and stress can impact production. Post-pregnancy meditation can help lower stress levels, positively impacting the breastfeeding experience. 13. Reduces Risk of Postpartum Depression [3] Almost 20% of new mothers experience postpartum depression (PPD), the #1 complication of pregnancy. Research shows that mindfulness may reduce the risk of postpartum depression, improving a woman’s psychological health through pregnancy meditation and mindfulness practices. 14. Enhances Stress Tolerance [6] New parenthood is filled with unknowns, and coping with the uncertainty that motherhood brings is stressful. Research suggests that mindfulness practices, such as prenatal and baby meditation can help increase one’s tolerance for emotional discomfort, which increases your ability to cope with feeling out of control or overwhelmed—a common experience for new mothers and fathers. 15. Increases Parental Well-being [9] Research shows that practicing mindfulness meditation helps mothers to manage parenting stress, which helps to increase positive interactions with their babies and children.

How to Begin a Pregnancy Meditation Practice

Despite [1,2] what people believe, you don’t have to schedule a long meditation retreat to learn and benefit from the life skills of mindfulness meditation. To begin practicing prenatal meditation, simply focus on one thing like your breath, a single word, or a sensation in your body. If your mind wanders, simply bring your focus back to whatever you were focusing on. Like exercise, mindfulness meditation is a practice that grows the more you do it. Over time, you’ll become more aware of your thoughts, anchoring into the present moment instead of ruminating about the past, or worrying about the future.

The Easiest Way to Get Started

Meditation apps, such as Expectful make the practice accessible and easy to use. Expectful provides specific guided meditations for women throughout their fertility, pregnancy and new motherhood journeys. The company helps women strengthen the mind and body connection along with their connection to themselves. The app and website offer a menu of mindfulness meditation options for pregnant women and couples to cultivate everything from sleep to deeper connection (just to name a few). Grounded in science, the meditations are all developed by licensed hypnotherapists, meditation experts, sound engineers, and psychologists. [3]

Pregnancy References

1. Whirledge, S., & Cidlowski, J.A. (2010). Glucocorticoids, stress, and fertility. Minerva Endocrinologica, 35(2), 109-125. 2. Sriboonpimsuay W., Promthet S., Thinkhamrop J., & Krisanaprakornkit, T. (2011). Meditation for preterm birth prevention: A randomized controlled trial in Udonthani, Thailand.. International Journal of Public Health Research, 1(1), 31-39. 3. Zeidan, F., Martucci, K.T., Kraft, R.A., Gordon, N.S., McHaffie, J.G., & Coghill, R.C. (2011). Brain mechanisms supporting modulation of pain by mindfulness meditation. Journal of Neuroscience, 31(14), 5540-5548. 4. Davidson, R.J., Kabat-Zinn, J., Schumacher, J., Rosenkranz, M., Muller, D., Santorelli, S.F., … Sheridan, J.F. (2003). Alterations in brain and immune function produced by mindfulness meditation. Psychosomatic Medicine, 65, 564–570. 5. Black, D. S., O’Reilly, G. A., Olmstead, R., Breen, E. C., & Irwin, M. R. (2015). Mindfulness meditation and improvement in sleep quality and daytime impairment among older adults with sleep disturbances: a randomized clinical trial. JAMA internal medicine, 175(4), 494-501. 6. Byrne, J., Hauck, Y., Fisher, C., Bayes, S., & Schutze, R. (2014). Effectiveness of a mindfulness‐based childbirth education pilot study on maternal self‐efficacy and fear of childbirth. Journal of Midwifery & Women’s Health, 59(2), 192-197.

Motherhood References

1. Nagendra, R. P., Maruthai, N., & Kutty, B. M. (2012). Meditation and its regulatory role on sleep. Frontiers in Neurology, 3(54), 1-4. 2. Halbreich, U., & Karkun, S. (2006). Cross-cultural and social diversity of prevalence of postpartum depression and depressive symptoms. Journal of Affective Disorders, 91, 97-111. 3. Dimidjian, S., Goodman, S.H., Felder, J.N., Gallop, R., Brown, A.P., & Beck, A. (2015). An open trial of mindfulness-based cognitive therapy for the prevention of perinatal depressive relapse/recurrence. Archives of Women’s Mental Health, 18(1), 85-94. 4. Vieten C, Astin J. (2008). Effects of a mindfulness-based intervention during pregnancy on prenatal stress and mood: Results of a pilot study. Archive of Women’s Mental Health, 11, 67-74. 5. Marchand, W. R. (2012). Mindfulness-based stress reduction, mindfulness-based cognitive therapy, and Zen meditation for depression, anxiety, pain, and psychological distress. Journal of Psychiatric Practice, 18(4), 233-252. 6. Keith, D. R., Weaver, B. S., & Vogel, R. L. (2012). The effect of music-based listening interventions on the volume, fat content, and caloric content of breast milk–produced by mothers of premature and critically ill infants. Advances in Neonatal Care, 12(2), 112-119. 7. Dewey, K. G. (2001). Maternal and fetal stress are associated with impaired lactogenesis in humans. The Journal of Nutrition, 131(11), 3012S-3015S. 8. Kraemer, K.M., O’Bryan, E.M., & McLeish, A.C. (2016). Intolerance of uncertainty as a mediator of the relationship between mindfulness and health anxiety. Mindfulness, 7(4), 859-865. 9. Bögels, S. M., Lehtonen, A., & Restifo, K. (2010). Mindful parenting in mental health care. Mindfulness, 1(2), 107-120.

About The Author Dr. Juli Fraga is a psychologist and health writer. She specializes in women’s health, especially as it relates to the reproductive and maternal wellness. She’s written for the New York Times, The Washington Post, and NPR. You can find her on Twitter, @dr_fraga.

in many ways the ancient rishis and yogi’s that formulated ayurveda knew more about sex , sexual health, pleasure and consciousness than any modern day expert. photo: kristopher roller

Healthy Sex with Ayurveda The Ayurvedic tradition celebrates human sexuality not only because it enhances physical and sensual pleasure but also because it enhances emotional intimacy and mutual respect and can even, in the act of physical union, bring individuals to the experience of their own divinity. One Sanskrit word for sexual intercourse is sambhoga, which brings together samyaka (a word that means maintaining a balance) and bhoga (pleasure or sensual enjoyment). Thus, in Ayurveda, sex and sexual intercourse means that activity by which one maintains equilibrium and also acquires sexual gratification. From time immemorial, human sexuality has been celebrated in India and Ayurveda incorporates sex. The sages who gave us the holy Vedas were usually married and sexually active family men and women with spouses and children. The Hindu gods are likewise depicted to be enjoying conjugal bliss.

Sex and the Divine

Though India also has a strong monastic tradition, there is no requirement that, in order to know the Divine, a person must suppress natural, biologically rooted instincts. In ancient India, the souls who took a vow of sexual abstinence for spiritual purposes were few in number; they were the exception and not the rule. To be celibate was a voluntary choice and was never undertaken by the mainstream. The goal of the Vedas was certainly not to convert a human being into a sexless being in the name of spirituality. Rather, this tradition can help us appreciate the power of our inherent sexuality and—something much needed in today’s world—to temper this sexuality with wisdom and moderation. One word that is often identified with celibacy in India is the Sanskrit term brahmacharya. Translated literally this means “quest for the Ultimate Reality, Brahman.” Within Vedic culture, brahmacharya represents chastity during a time of spiritual studentship. In this sense, it is celibacy but for a limited time and for a specific purpose. In an Ayurvedic sexual context, brahmacharya also connotes the voluntary regulation of sexual energy and desires. In this context, brahmacharya means fidelity in marriage or sexual partnership; it means the monogamous, balanced, and healthy expression of sexuality between committed partners and lovers.

Healthy Management of Sexual Energy

In Ayurveda, brahmacharya is often adopted as a way of life and refers to our acceptance of ourselves as more than just beasts under the control of a frenzied sex drive. Instead, we are asked to celebrate our sexuality and at the same time accept the responsibility to understand and regulate our sexual drive. We accept that our sexuality itself is God-given. Thus, the word brahmacharya beautifully brings together the opposites of sexual indulgence and sexual restraint. The Ashtanga Hridayam puts it this way: “From a disciplined indulgence in sex through brahmacharya, one gains memory, intelligence, health, nourishment, sharpness of sense organs, reputation, strength, and long life.” The Vedic sages were farsighted, indeed, when they conceived of a society that holds its collective sexual energy with transparency, accountability, respect, sensitivity, and care. Human pleasures, such as singing, dancing, playing, enjoying material wealth, and sexual gratification, are seen by the sages as pursuits that play an important role in the overall health and wellbeing of an individual and a society. In fact, when speaking of sex, the Ayurvedic sages go so far as saying that if the sexual instinct is forcefully suppressed, it leads to mental perversions and countless physical diseases. Sexuality (kama) is, thus, recognized as a valid and legitimate human goal by Ayurveda. To aid the realization of this goal, several texts called Kama Shastra were compiled that serve as manuals for engaging in fulfilling sex. The Kama Sutra written by Sage Vatsyayana is one such example. In the context of Ayurveda, sexual desires—along with all of our other personal wants and desires—are seen in relation to the whole of dharma. This context and sexual education within a larger framework of values and ethics gives our sexual desires a healthy outlet and prevents sexual perversions, addictions, and compulsions. Our preferences are not needs; our wants are not gut-wrenching cravings. Established in the spiritual self, auspicious in its intent, universal in its character, abundant in its means, the embodied spirit is encouraged to play out its earthbound desires with its fellow beings and express itself through the joy of sex. Remember, cosmic ecstasy is a natural aspect of our divine nature. 

Keeping Things Balanced and Healthy

To the one awakened to exercising choice, sex is like a magic tool, an inborn cosmic expectation of pleasure, a passion so pure, a permission to play with life and fondle and enjoy this world in which we have chosen to journey. It is, however, quite significant how we choose to indulge our sexuality. According to ayurvedic sexual teachings, when kama, or desire, becomes a dominant force, hiding our own higher purpose from us, then the potential to suffer emotionally increases. Lurid craving, restlessness, emptiness, and bondage to obsessions can descend on us as if from nowhere. A simple sexual desire and its pursuit can take us literally to heaven or hell in a single moment, and all within the hallowed cave of the mind. In the end, it is we who have to decide if kama or sex rules us, or if we rule kama. The Ayurvedic sage Vagabhata described sex as a pleasure of two kinds: instant and delayed. Instant gratification is the happiness that is changeable and is related to the material world. Here is the kind of sexual gratification associated with one-night stands and pleasure with no commitment. Such sex may feel deliciously indulgent, but it is riddled with risks. Delayed pleasure, on the other hand, implies accumulated happiness through self-control, self-respect, and the exercise of restraint and discernment. What one “discerns” is the difference between immediate sense gratification and the actions that lead to ultimate freedom, or moksha. This is the mindful path, the path of balance and moderation. The art and science of divine lovemaking is an important facet of health in the Ayurvedic tradition, and a full treatment of this subject is not within the scope of this. What I would like to do, instead, is to communicate some fundamental Ayurvedic sex principles that you can incorporate in your daily life.

Choosing a Partner: What to Watch Out For

In this modern age, sexuality is treated casually by many, and this casual approach to such a powerful act as sex is not what the sages of Ayurveda ever had in mind. According to ayurveda, sex should be consummated with a partner you like and of whom you approve of mentally—someone who engages in respectful speech, who lives by ethical values, and who honors healthy boundaries. This ensures a healthy state of mind and emotions for both partners. Respect and affection are an important part of sexual consummation, and the ancient sages definitely recognized this. An ancient Ayurvedic text promises that after an “ethical” sex engagement, a person will enjoy “happiness, longevity, renewed youthfulness, improved luster, improved physique, and improved mental and physical strength.” Without question, sex is to be performed with a person you know and love, beloved partners, spouses, and consenting adults with underlying honorable terms of engagement for sex. Ayurvedic texts also stress the importance of not engaging sexually with a child, with someone who is married to another, with someone in your family of birth, with your guru or your guru’s spouse, or with someone who has excessive libido or is sexually demanding. And once the partner has been responsibly selected, Ayurveda recommends enhancing sexual anticipation with the use of fragrances (special desire-arousing perfumes), flowers, special beds, and cosmetics. The various Ayurvedic sex guidelines I outline below will be considered a boon to anyone who is in a long-term, committed sexual relationship. These are rules that will allow you to maintain a sexual relationship without depleting yourselves. For those who have just embarked on a sexual relationship, it’s probably difficult to imagine following rules of any kind in this moment. For you, I suggest that you eat the right foods to support your sexuality and take good care of yourself. You can come back to this full discussion at a later time. The commonsense controls I go into are a strong protection against the loss of something precious: shukra.

The Presence of Shukra: Sexual Essence and Vitality

One of the most important concepts regarding Ayurvedic sex involves shukra, a Sanskrit term that denotes not only the human sperm, ovum, and hormones regulating sexuality, but something more—a matter-based and intelligent potency that is located in every cell. It is because of the presence of the shukra that each and every cell can regenerate itself again and again. It is important to note that shukra is not merely energy, like the Chinese concept of chi or the yogic concept of prana shakti. Shukra is formed from food that has undergone several levels of metabolic transformation. It is an extraordinary tissue. Inwardly it explodes as creativity in all that we think and do, and outwardly it can create an entire human being! While shukra’s presence in our reproductive organs becomes the cause of procreation, shukra’s presence in the rest of the body is the basis for sexual attraction, beauty, and magnetism. Within Ayurvedic sexual teaching, shukra is the generative tissue, and it has the power to create a human being and to endow that being with the capacity for pleasure, happiness, strength, and courage. Shukra’s presence in our minds ties imagination, memory, creativity, and inspiration together into a bouquet of inexplicable enthusiasm and joy. Shukra is present in our cells from birth; and from puberty onward, it becomes a potent force in the body, manifesting through the development of secondary sexual characteristics. The power of shukra peaks in our youth; and then, from middle age onward, its potency begins to decrease with the natural result of a decline in libido, fertility, and alas, youthful beauty, with progressing age.

How to Avoid Losing Shukra and Wasting Sexual Energy

Ayurveda sex principles address this issue head-on by slowing down loss of shukra by following a regimen that directly protects shukra. Through activities like intercourse and masturbation, shukra is lost. Through activities like eating special foods and restoring the body between sexually active periods, shukra can be built up. By following certain rules regarding when to engage in sexual activity—the season, the time of day, the time in our own lives—we can protect ourselves from the unnecessary loss of shukra. This is, in essence, the sexual wisdom of Ayurveda. Increasing age is a natural cause for shukra loss. But time is not in our control, so we need not fret. Fortunately, nature does her job gently and gives us ample time to play and procreate if we wish. Shukra is also replenished naturally from time to time—by nature in certain seasons and by ourselves by eating certain foods. The most telling way to deplete shukra however is solely our own responsibility—and this is our choice to indulge in stress and in negativities like shame and self-pity. Shukra, the sages declare, is the source of inexplicable joy and creativity, of skills and artistic talents, of cheer and poise in the face of life’s challenges. If, however, our minds are especially negative or caught up in rajas and tamas—modes of extreme passivity or extreme aggression—then the mind can have an unfortunate effect on shukra, destroying it, as if through emotional self-poisoning. It sounds harsh, but it’s true. Ayurveda taught the world’s first holistic lesson on sexuality by identifying shukra’s presence, not in the human genitals or organs of reproduction alone, but in each and every cell, as an inherent bridge to the mind. One significant way of seeing our sexuality, according to Ayurveda, is in its cycles.

The Ideal Times For Sex: Diurnal Sex Cycle

The ideal time of day for sex in Ayurveda is between two hours after dinner and before you fall asleep at 10:00 p.m. From the aspect of the doshas, sex at night is optimal as opposed to early morning sex, which is a second choice.

Human Sexuality Cycle by Age

Ayurveda recommends sexual activity from age eighteen to seventy. This means no sex before the age of eighteen. After the age of seventy, a person should engage in sex infrequently or—and this is ideal—not at all. These age restrictions prevent the loss of vital energy that is contained in sexual fluids. The ideal ages to initiate sexual activity, with the highest frequency, are between eighteen to twenty-five; moderate sexual activity should be between twenty-five to forty; and the time to begin tapering off the frequency of sex is between forty to fifty-five, with the time to consider mindfully abstaining from sex (as a self-care practice) at age seventy and onward. Of course, sexual intimacy is made possible by the presence of a partner and the right social situations, but these guidelines can serve as a reminder that sexual frequency cannot and must not remain the same throughout our lifetimes according to Ayurveda’s sexual wisdom. It is best to be realistic and to preserve the body’s vital shukra, whose production peaks in youth and early adulthood and begins to taper off with increasing age.

Women’s Sex Cycle

Ayurveda recommends not engaging in sex during an active menstrual cycle because this can cause dosha problems. This is a complex issue, which I will only summarize by saying that vata dosha can become aggravated in a woman if she regularly engages in sex during her menses. Low back pain, tendency toward miscarriage, and a host of other problems can result. Sex during pregnancy, how much, and when to stop, are questions that are also important, and Ayurvedic texts on sex have addressed such questions in detail.

Digestion-Related Sex Cycle

Digestion is also a significant physiological cycle, and sexual activity is neither a substitute for eating nor a suitable activity to immediately follow eating. The body needs energy for each. Below are appropriate times for sex in relation to when food was last eaten. Following the rules summarized will prevent uncomfortable symptoms such as regurgitation of food, cramps, and fatigue. The key is to allow the digestion to be far enough along in the process so that the body has freed up energy for sex. When hungry and thirsty, abstain from sex. Eat and drink instead. Adverse symptoms if not followed include: dizziness, headache, bloating, tiredness, possible exhaustion during or after sex. Immediately after a meal, abstain from sex. Adverse symptoms if not followed include: indigestion, heaviness in heart region, pain in chest, possible breathlessness during or after sex. Two hours after a meal, engage in sex if you wish. No adverse symptoms related to digestion.

Guidelines for Mindful Sexual Engagement

We can see that Ayurveda does not ban or curb our sexuality as much as connect it to natural cycles. For centuries, Ayurveda has been concerned with how to prolong sexual pleasure and enhance human fertility. Ayurvedic sages found interesting connections between sexual health and the immunological capacity. Sexuality was also found to be important for mental wellbeing and to be connected to creativity. For all of these reasons, along with the all-important reproductive function, sexual health is paramount in Ayurveda. Fortunately, a few simple lifestyle rules pertaining to our sexual nature and foods that replenish sexual tissues can help to ensure our Ayurvedic sexual health with.  These rules, which I share below, are a fraction of Ayurveda’s vast body of sex-related wisdom. Ayurveda cautions that, in ignorance, we can fritter away our shukra and lose our God-given natural sexuality, something that could have been prevented. Perhaps shukra is a prize that only the wise can claim through lives lived in harmony with the material and spiritual laws of nature. So for starters, Ayurveda recommends initiating the sex act only when we are truly engaged—mind, body, and soul—and a genuine interest in sex is present. This is a precondition for sexual engagement. There is no room for obliging another, for faking it, and pleasing another if our own self is not pleased. Immediately after copulation—I’d say within thirty minutes of an orgasm—Ayurveda recommends drinking warm cow’s milk with added cane sugar. This is like a miracle food for shukra. This Ayurveda sex tip may appear like the stuff of sexual fantasy, but the sages predicted that when the body experiences depletion of precious shukra tissue, it immediately attempts to restore it if it has the right ingredients handy. Hence the warm, sweetened milk bypasses regular channels of digestion with much more speed and converts into shukra within minutes!

Post-Sexual Rejuvenation Practices

Many an aging couple who has sought help for post-intercourse exhaustion at our school’s clinics now approach lovemaking with a flask of warm milk at their bedside—and they cannot thank Ayurveda enough. And since milk is a natural sleep aid, it also helps the couple fall asleep like babies, when it is time to sleep, augmenting lost kapha further through restful sleep. After sex, whenever possible, take a warm shower or bath, put on fresh nightclothes, apply fresh essential oils or natural scents, and prepare yourself for bed. If it is warm, then a light breeze through an open window or a fan is great. Moonlight exposure on summer nights is especially beneficial, so sleep with curtains open or sleep near an open terrace or balcony. The sages, I find, are quite poetic about the healing effect of moonlight, known as jyotsna. One says, “It confers coolness, pacifies pitta, as the moon rays enter the body through exposed skin, and relieves our being of sexual exhaustion, thirst, and any pending morbid thoughts.” For the next few days after engaging in sex, Ayurveda recommends that you eat nutrient-dense, rich foods that replenish shukra: goat’s meat; chicken soup; meat and seafood lightly sautéed in ghee; black gram (urad dal) with rice and ghee; recipes including some form of winter melon, pumpkin, okra, sweet potato, asparagus, and avocado; pure sugarcane-sweetened syrups and desserts (rice pudding with cane sugar, wheat pancakes with cane syrup or sugarcane-based molasses); cow’s milk and cream-based recipes; coconut water and coconut cream; unsalted butter; dried fruits, especially figs, raisins, and dates; and of course, seasonal sweet fruits, especially sweet mangos, bananas, peaches, plums, and pears. A spice that purifies the genitourinary tract in males and the uterus in females is cumin. Use cumin along with turmeric (always a help in daily micro-quantities!) and rock salt (a salt that sweetly enhances libido for next time).

Foods and Factors That Deplete Shukra

A strong, vital body that is well fed and well rested is the foundation of healthy shukra, according to Ayurvedic sexual science. Make sure every meal counts and provides fuel to build kapha. Various eating and lifestyle choices are particularly detrimental to shukra. Here is a simple list of things to avoid—nutritional and otherwise—to prevent shukra depletion:

+ Avoid excessive eating of pungent, astringent, bitter, salty, and sour foods.

+ Avoid excessive intake of dry foods. (Fats and oils are required for the manufacture of shukra.)

+ While balanced exercise improves shukra production, excessive physical activity reduces the quantity of kapha, which is required to manufacture shukra. So, do not remain sedentary but watch out for excess.

+ Injuries, especially to the genital organs, do not help shukra—be careful during sports.

+ Do not consume empty calories, such as diet soda.

+ Do not fast excessively.

+ Do not indulge excessively in alcohol (though wine in regulated doses can act as an aphrodisiac).

+ Avoid or minimize habitual ingestion of detrimental substances such as coffee, tea, and soda.

+ Simply abstain from tobacco, marijuana, and other recreational drugs. These substances are anti-kapha, anti-health, and quickly destroy shukra.

+ Don’t stay up late regularly. Try your best to go to bed by 10:00 p.m.—a good night’s sleep restores shukra.

Eating to Enhance Shukra

Shukra can be consciously cultivated and enhanced through foods that increase kapha, but we must also take into account our digestive capacity. Optimum digestion is our best ally here because shukra is the final and seventh tissue formed in the body from the food we eat. (The other tissues are, Ayurveda says, plasma, blood, muscle, fat, bone, and nerve tissues.) Shukra is the ultimate, refined finale of a healthy digestion. If you want to build a healthy stock of shukra, take stock of your daily diet and assess if you are eating adequate kapha-promoting foods. Shukra requires foods that are more nurturing, heavy, moist, sweet, cooling, and fatty in nature. Next, consider your digestion and your elimination with regard to Ayurveda and sex. It is important not only to eat and digest shukra-building foods but also to properly eliminate the physical waste afterward. Now you are set. When shukra-enhancing food is digested well, with maximum efficiency and minimum toxic by-products, then the shukra produced will be high in quality and quantity. You will experience not only higher libido but also a greater sense of well-being. Of course, if the food is laced with toxins, fillers, chemical additives, and pesticides; if the food is overly processed; or if the food has been genetically altered, then your shukra will also be affected. There is no circumventing this issue. I feel, in fact, that these problems with food shed light on why sexual disorders, immunological disorders, and birth defects are on the rise. Our polluted food has damaged our seed. So, for the sake of your own body and the sake of your offspring, I advise you to take any measure needed—even those requiring extraordinary effort—to obtain your food from fresh, organic, non-genetically modified sources. This is a part of showing due reverence for yourself and for Mother Earth and taking a serious approach to Ayurveda and sex.

The Importance of Sweet and Fat for Shukra

Shukra is best enhanced by eating naturally sweet-tasting foods like milk, sweet fruits, and even cane sugar, and also by eating fatty foods such as ghee or clarified butter. With the modern trend of valuing thinness at any cost, sweet and fatty foods like these are considered an anathema to good health. So I think it’s important to mention the perspective on sugarcane and ghee when it comes to Ayurvedic sex. Sugarcane (ikshu) has been researched by the Ayurvedic tradition extensively in its numerous forms: fresh cane juice, treacle, molasses, jaggery, sugar crystals, and powdered sugar. All of these forms are shukra-enhancing. Obviously, there are health issues involved in eating too much sugar. If, however, entire generations of humanity were to reject sugar and ingest instead only artificial sweeteners or honey (which is anti-kapha), then our collective sexual and fertility principle (shukra) would be seriously compromised. Ghee, according to Ayurvedic sexual science, is also considered a major promoter of shukra and of the body’s natural immune principle (ojas). Ghee is cooling in its potency and sweet in its taste. Though there are many forms of ghee available in India, in the West what is found is predominantly cow’s milk ghee, which is the strongest of all in promoting both shukra and oja. Ayurveda does not leap to either “fat is bad” or “fat is great.” Ayurveda prescribes the responsible use of fats, considering with awareness and caution our own dosha requirements and digestive limitations. From a common-sense perspective, it’s better to eat rich, fatty foods earlier in the day rather than in the evening. The season as well comes into play. You can eat more ghee in winter, less in summer and fall, and the least (or even none at all) in the spring. If you suffer from the symptoms of indigestion or toxins, you should abstain from eating ghee or any other fat until you have undergone a physical detoxification. Given all of these considerations with regard to Ayurveda and sex, people who are healthy should eat the amount of ghee that helps them remain healthy; and those desiring shukra, after thinking seriously about their digestion, should eat foods cooked in ghee to the extent that they can—in other words, as many as possible. Besides ghee and sugar, there are other dietary considerations to enhancing shukra.

Shukra-Enhancing Foods

Ayurveda sexual wisdom wants to ensure that depletion of sexual tissue through orgasm (in both males and females) is countered by the shukra-enhancing foods listed here.  Dairy: Milk, cane sugar-sweetened yogurt, sweet cream, sweetened lassi (yogurt drink with cane sugar), ghee, sweet butter, fresh-made cheeses such as cottage cheese (paneer), and mozzarella Sweeteners: Sugarcane and all its derivatives Fruits: Sweet mangos, peaches, plums, pears, fresh or dried figs, ripe bananas, Indian gooseberry preserves or jam (amalaki), pomegranates, sweet and ripe jackfruit, and musk melons Vegetables: Garlic and onions cooked in ghee (never raw), eggplant (fried in ghee), beetroot, sweet potato, pumpkin, okra, yams, snake gourd, winter squash, climbing spinach or Malabar spinach, water chestnuts, asparagus, drumsticks (all vegetables are to be cooked in ghee) Spices: Cloves, carom seed or ajwain, cumin seeds (all of these spices purify the shukra-carrying channels), turmeric (removes toxins from shukra), saffron (aphrodisiac) Meats: Goat and chicken with mildly spiced curry, soups, and ghee-based stir-fry; also meat of sparrow, duck, partridge, deer, rabbit, pig, quail, and grass carp; crab (aphrodisiac) Eggs: Chicken, duck, goose, quail, turkey, pheasant, ostrich Dried fruits and nuts: Almonds, walnuts, pine nuts, raisins, dates, figs, sesame seeds, and apricots Cereals: Rice, wheat Beans: Black gram (urad dal) This piece on enlightened sex with ayurveda is excerpted with permission from Ayurveda Lifestyle Wisdom: A Complete Prescription to Optimize Your Health, Prevent Disease, and Live with Vitality and Joy by Acharya Shunya. Sounds True, February 2017. Reprinted with permission.

About The Authors Acharya Shunya is an internationally recognized spiritual teacher, ordained lineage holder, and authoritative scholar of the Vedic Sciences of Ayurveda, Yoga, and Vedanta. She is the founder and spiritual preceptor of Vedika Global Wisdom School and Spiritual Community in California and the president of California Association of Ayurvedic Medicine. She is also the bestselling author of her newest book Ayurveda Lifestyle Wisdom. Visit her website: acharyashunya.com