Meditating dogs

This one's for all you dog lovers out there -- and it's only a minute long. They're such natural meditators! OWN Original Shorts: Dogs/MeditationAward-winning photographer Robin Layton brings her eye for beauty and serenity to OWN with a short meant to inspire peace...

Replacing Urban Anonymity with Affection

In the traditional Metta Bhavana (Lovingkindness) meditation, there's a stage where we bring to mind someone we don't know very well and imaginatively offer our well wishing to him. I always thought this practice was perfectly suited for us modern citydwellers. We...

Negotiating with heart

I really appreciated this perspective from Locana, who wrote about a recent negotiation she was in over buying a new car. Negotiation doesn't have to be a hard-ball, combative situation. By treating the salesman with empathy and understanding, she ended up getting...

A murmuration of starlings

Sometimes nature is just too beautiful for words. This is a chance encounter with a flock of birds who put on an amazing dance of flight. Murmuration from Sophie Windsor Clive on Vimeo.

Mindfulness in daily life as paint-by-numbers

I love this description by Jan Chozen Bays on how mindfulness gradually grows into our daily lives. It's an excerpt from her latest book, How to Train a Wild Elephant. People often say to me, “I’d love to practice mindfulness, but I’m so busy I can’t seem to find the...

STOP and be mindful

People often come to my meditation courses because they want to learn how to slow down their crazy busy lives. So you start sitting for 10, 20, or maybe even 30 minutes a day. But after some weeks of this, you still feel like things are crazy busy and all over the...

When metta doesn’t mean “love”

I remember feeling very frustrated - and frankly a little baffled - when I was first learning the metta bhavana practice. Especially around the fourth stage, the difficult person. How was I supposed to feel warmth and affection for somebody I admitted not getting...

The power of the human spirit

I recently came across two true stories about the amazing power of the human spirit shining through in adversity. I found them both so moving I wanted to share them with you. The first is a full-length documentary that aired on PBS, called Freedom Riders. This tells...

Meditating on anxiety

One of my clients — I’ll call him Mark — took up meditation to help with his lifelong anxiety. He was all too aware of his tendency to over-analyze and worry about everything. He’d been meditating on and off for two years, gone on retreats, read tons of dharma books,...

For a few good laughs

Continuing my tradition of posting things that have nothing to do with anything other than a good laugh -- here are a couple of my recent favorite short videos. What do you suppose a bear does in the woods when he thinks nobody's looking? And here's the trailer for...