Workshops
The Difference between Crystal Bowls Meditation and Mindfulness Practice
October 31, 2013 | 
Author Vanessa Mindfulness mediation is quite different from meditations that aim to raise compassion. This does not mean that mindfulness is without compassion or kindness, on the contrary, mindfulness is at its best when it embraces compassion. By ‘compassion based meditations’ I am simply referring to meditations that help us to feel warm and fuzzy. They include guided visualisations, crystal bowl meditations, meditating to a flower or candle, sound meditation, or meditating to drums, didgeridoos or gentle uplifting music. All of these types of meditations are focused on experiences that are pleasant to our senses. They are heart opening meditations.
How Mindfulness Meditation is Different
While compassion based meditations aim to open our heart space, mindfulness practice aims to train our awareness to expand. Both types of mediation bring us into the present moment, however, mindfulness cultivates awareness to watch ‘what is’. It is irrelevant whether our experience is painful or pleasant, mindfulness is only about watching whatever is occurring with open curiosity and neutrality. Mindfulness aims to expand the mind, rather than open the heart. This is important, as mindfulness strengthens the practice of wisdom and discernment.
I have commonly witnessed people cultivate a beautiful open heart, when their lives or their psyche are not ready for it. This can intensify a “broken our heart”. Compassion is wonderful, however, any wise Buddhist will tell us that compassion is only helpful when we simultaneously develop discernment. Without cultivating the mind, blind compassion can get us into a myriad of problems. A healthy heart/head alignment requires both types of meditations, if we are to cultivate true balance in our lives.
Click Here for the Embrace “What Is Facebook Event Page
Join us on Friday afternoons at 3pm and Saturday mornings at 9am for an hour of mindfulness based training and psycho-therapeutic insights. “Embrace What Is” is an on-going relaxed group that will support your mindfulness practice and help you to integrate this practice into your everyday life.
Call Vanessa on 0424 507 101 to book your place in this exciting and innovative group
Bookings are essential, as places are limited
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Why Happiness is not the Goal of Mindfulness Practice
October 24, 2013 | Author Vanessa 
A lot of people begin mindfulness practice to find happiness or inner peace. However, when they arrive they may find themselves being told that the aim of mindfulness is not to be happy but rather is simply to train the mind to remain present and attentive to what is occurring in the now. This can even be a source of disappointment to seekers of happiness. Disappointment and disillusionment are exactly why happiness is not the goal of mindfulness practice. Generally, when we seek happiness, it remains elusive.
Happiness is like love in relationships or the end of a rainbow. The more we try to find it, the more disappointed we become. The key to happiness and peace of mind is actually to stop looking for it. It is bizarre that when we finally abandon the search and get on with our lives that we are more likely to find what we are looking for. This is why in mindfulness the goal is to expand awareness in the inner moment, and not to find happiness. Ironically, when we attend to the present moment fully and forget about ourselves and our quests, that is the perfect state of being for happiness and inner peace to arise.
Join us on Friday afternoons at 3pm and Saturday mornings at 9am for an hour of mindfulness based training and psycho-therapeutic insights.
“Embrace What Is” is an on-going relaxed group that will support your mindfulness practice and help you to integrate this practice into your everyday life.
Click here for the Embrace “What Is” Facebook Event Page
Call Vanessa on 0424 507 101 to book your place in this exciting and innovative group
Bookings are essential, as places are limited
The Essence of Mindfulness
October 15, 2013 | Author Vanessa 
Most people think of mindfulness as relief from anxiety or depression, a cure for health problems or a recipe for inner peace and increased concentration. However, the truth is that mindfulness does not actually aim to achieve any of these. Mindfulness is simply an Eastern practice to train our mind. It is a practice that cultivates sustained conscious wakefulness or presence. Mindfulness is all about raising awareness of ‘what is’.
The practice of mindfulness is like training a muscle. Only rather than a muscle, we are training our mind. In the East, the mind is not about thoughts and beliefs, as we conceptualize in the West. Rather, the mind is conscious awareness itself. We may bring awareness into our thoughts so we can witness their movement. However, the mind in mindfulness is not thought, but rather consciousness itself.
The benefits of mindfulness The practice of training our mind expands our ability to detach from thought, emotion and body sensation enough to witness them. This then allows us to better regulate emotion, train our brain to think more effectively, and teach our bodies to de-stress. Ironically, when we master this practice we often do find relief from anxiety or depression, cure health problems and create inner peace and increased concentration. So while the aim of mindfulness is to train our conscious awareness to witness what is occurring in the now, the practice often results in increased balance and happiness in our lives.
Join us on Friday afternoons and Saturday mornings for an hour of mindfulness based training and psycho-therapeutic insights.
“Embrace What Is” is an on-going relaxed group that will support your mindfulness practice and help you to integrate this practice into your everyday life.