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Below conscious awareness, your emotion system is constantly scanning the environment for signs that something important to your wellbeing is taking place.Upon detection, a cascade of changes occur in your physiology and psychology – emotions change your heart rate, muscle tone and even your attention and decision making. We can learn these distinct patterns of…

Mental training such as meditation requires a sensitivity not required in other pursuits. The key is the relaxation pyramid – which is described with more skill and depth by Dr Alan Wallace in his book the ‘The Attention Revolution’ – here it is in brief: Relaxation as the foundation. Out of this we develop a…

Meditation What we mean in reference to meditation is a technique used to improve the quality of our experiences. Like a ‘software upgrade’ after which things run with a sense of balance and ease – less hangs or blue screens. The definition also implies that one is going to engage with the world – the…

Ways to meditation When we think of mental training such as meditation how do we treat the body? To either neglect or indulge the body are extremes which are not conducive, so how to find the balance? The rider and horse analogy gives us a place to start. In the horse rider analogy, the horse…

Our approach to balance Still the mind, move the body. Our bodies can be stagnant and fixed in sub-optimal positions. Take the sternocleidomastoid muscle (SCM) – you find it by turning your head to one side and feeling for that large muscle that pops out the side of the neck connecting from your collar bone…

Self-control isn’t about feeling miserable. Willpower wanes over time but there is another way to strive towards our goals – comapssion. Research has shown that compassion and other pro social mental factors naturally incline us to be patient and persevere, not by squashing our desires for pleasure in the moment but by increasing how much…