A Sip of Meditation: Recent Episodes
Shedeka Marriott
Greetings my friend, A Sip of Meditation Podcast is your personal library of short weekly guided meditations right at your finger tips. Whether you are just starting out, or looking to support your existing practice, these 15 minutes or less experiences will help you feel centered and grounded.
We invite you to make this your place to find inner peace, love, acceptance and relaxation. Our intention is to create meditation practices that will enhance your wellbeing and develop strength, clarity, flow and personal growth.
You are not your thoughts. You are not your fears. You are not your worries.
This 10-minute guided meditation encourages introspection and mindfulness by visualizing the concept of a shelf where you can mentally place thoughts, emotions, and sensations. By observing these passing phenomena without getting absorbed or identifying with them, one can realize the distinction between the unchanging consciousness (that is Purusha) and the ever-changing nature of the external world (Prakriti).
A fun 7-minute gratitude countdown game with mindful prompts to help you cultivate a deeper sense of appreciation in your life and in the world around you.
A 9-minute mindful practice using the metaphor of a t-shirt for self-awareness on what we project into the world through our interactions. This reflection exercise is aimed at cultivating awareness and wisdom around one's thoughts, feelings and emotions.
In this 16- minute inner child meditation practice, imagine yourself as both the parent and the child. Recognize how certain events in your childhood made you feel. Consider the unmet needs or emotional gaps from your past. By nurturing and healing our inner child through self-awareness, we can pave the way to a more compassionate, understanding, and a more mindful approach to working with limiting belief.
Today we will be guided by the Michele Lawrence as she shares her wisdom and insight through a guided meditation on the senses. Through her own journey of Self-discovery, Michele (MBA, ERYT500, C-IAYT) has come to realize that yoga is a practice for all life situations. She believes in yoga’s ability to heal and transform, and that yoga, regardless of one’s ability, is available to all. Michele has been teaching yoga since 2005, practicing yoga therapy since 2010, and is the founder/director of Inner Peace Yoga Therapy.
To learn more about Michele and Inner Peace Yoga Therapy school you can visit the website at https://innerpeaceyogatherapy.com/
Also, check out her podcast called “This is Yoga Therapy" https://innerpeaceyogatherapy.com/podcast/ .
Also, check out the Video Resource Library showcasing different mudras and meditations as well as breathwork and movement instructional videos: https://innerpeaceyogatherapy.com/video-library/
Follow Michele on Instagram @innerpeaceyogatherapy.
Compassion (karuna) is defined as “the quivering of the heart in response to suffering.” Metta and karuna are connected. When a kind, loving heart encounters suffering, it turns into compassion.
This 14-minute guided practice is a gentle reminder for us to be gracious towards our day to day struggles.
Gratitude and deep respects to my teachers, Gabrielle Harris and Kristin Neff for their wise and loving efforts.
Soundscape omitted
Our intention for this 10-minute practice is to continue on a journey of befriending, caring, listening and attending. We are in the process of relearning what it is to incline the heart towards kindness.
It is not always easy to stand by the painful and the difficult. When we suffer, mindfulness opens the door to compassion.
The more we practice being mindful, the more opportunities we have to make better choices for ourselves, including the choice to practice self-compassion.
Our intention for this 10-minute practice is to continue on a journey of befriending, caring, listening and attending. We are in the process of relearning what it is to incline the heart towards kindness.
It is not always easy to stand by the painful and the difficult. When we suffer, mindfulness opens the door to compassion.
The more we practice being mindful, the more opportunities we have to make better choices for ourselves, including the choice to practice self-compassion.
Wake up to this day that has been gifted to you by the Divine.Start your day with this 13- minute mindful morning practice. Give yourself permission to be exactly where, honoring all parts of you. Cultivate the energy of gratitude, peace and connection to all of life.
This CommUnity guest episode on "Honoring the Elements" is led my Dawn Mauricio
Dawn Mauricio (she/her) has been practicing and studying Insight Meditation since 2005, and has graduated from several Buddhist programs, including Spirit Rock's 4-year Retreat Teacher Training. She teaches with a playful, dynamic, and heartfelt approach in Canada and the US, to Black, Indigenous, and people of color, and folks of all backgrounds.
To learn more about Dawn and her offerings visit her website at https://dawnmauricio.com
Sign up for Dawn's newsletter where, once a month, you'll receive resources and reflections about slowing down, purposeful living, and waking up right where you are. https://dawnmauricio.com/newsletter
You Check out Dawn's Podcast Meditation with Dawn Mauricio
Follow Dawn on Instagram @dawnmauriciomeditation
Welcome to this 7- minute pranayama meditation practice of Nadi Shodhana also known as Alternate Nostril Breathing. Nadi is a Sanskrit word meaning "channel" or "flow" and Shodana means " purification". Alternate Nostril Breathing is primarily aimed at clearing and purifying the subtle channels of the mind-body organism.
Pranayama utilizes breathing to influence the flow of prana (vital energy or life force) in the nadis or energy channels of the pranayama kosher or energy body.
Pendulation meditation is a mindfulness practice that can be helpful for managing physical pain. It involves focusing on the sensations of pain in a non-judgmental way and alternating between the sensations of pain and other areas of the body that are free from pain. This can help to reduce the intensity of the pain and promote a sense of calm and relaxation. As we “pendulate” between places of comfort and pain, we create a relationship with present space and time that can help you come back to a place of feeling enough safety to regulate the body in the midst of pain.
Remember that this meditation is a practice, and it may take time and patience to experience relief from pain. Be kind and patient with yourself, and trust that with practice, you can learn to manage pain more effectively.
This 30-minute deep relaxing and nourishing Yoga Nidra practice is focused on experiencing the breath while releasing physical, mental and emotional tension in the body.
Welcome to this CommUnity guest episode of A Sip f Mediation Podcast. In today's episode we will be led by Sarah Nelsen. I am so honored that she was willing to share this 7- minute guided meditation practice with us on Overcoming Overwhelm, to help center and ground when life feels out of control.
Check out Sarah's website for information on her Yoga in Bed Course
Listen to Sarah Podcast at Swimming and Singing Podcast
Follow Sarah on Instagram @therapeuticyogawithsarah.
Enjoy this 20- minute guided loving-kindness meditation of directing well-being wishes towards yourself and others.
Loving-kindness or Metta practice helps build compassion and yields numerous benefits that have been backed by science from enhanced feelings of empathy to improved relationships
This 5-minute breath awareness practice can help to calm the mind into a peaceful and restful state.
Mindful conscious breathing activates the parasympathetic nervous system (rest and digest) which can signal the rest and relax response, slowing your heart rate and stimulating your vagus nerves. Through breath control we learn to regulate the sympathetic nervous system from a state of fight or flight to a state of calm.
Imagine if we could learn the rhythm and the art of flowing with life.
In this 12-minute talk and guided practice we arrive in presence through stillness and attention to the breath. We explore the benefits of balancing work and rest in a structural and economic world that values overwork and overdoing as a signal of productivity. Rest is vital, it is healing, it is regenerative and it is creative.
When we let go of the incessant state of overdoing we allow for a greater sense of wisdom and clarity that aligns us with the natural flow of life.
Often times the people who we are most closest or most intimate with can be the greatest source of stressor. This 15-minute talk and guided meditation explore ways we can take an active role in creating harmony and nurturing connectedness with others.
First, by tapping into our own feelings and emotions we learn to break down the negative storylines in our head about ourselves and others. Like us, others might be carrying around deep pain and suffering. By cultivating a mindfulness practice we learn to navigate difficult situations and experiences.
At the end of the day, we all want to love and be loved. And it takes practice and intentional effort.
Tune into this 18-minute relaxing body scan guiding you into a state of peace, ease and calm of the body and mind. We hold so much stress and tension in our physical body. Practice exploring ways to increase presence, decrease reactivity and strengthen awareness in your day-to-day.
Many thanks to Calm for the inspiration on this journey.
This 15-minute guided meditation will explore how to work with difficult emotions when they arise
We all experience big, difficult feelings, from common emotions like uncertainty, anger, despair, and regret to difficult experiences like the woes of comparison, stress, burnout, and perfectionism. When we learn to recognize our emotions and allow the experience to be there just as it is, without trying to fix or avoid anything we begin a transformational journey.
This episode was inspired by Calm and Sharon Salzberg. My gratitude to the many great teachers!
Forgiveness is a decision to let go off the burden and the suffering we hold unto. This 10- minute guided practice on self forgiveness reminds us that we can let go of past narratives that bind us in shackles and find freedom through self-acceptance, self-love and compassion.
This 10- minute meditation is about working with our self-criticizing patterns of thinking. As we look to bring awareness to our inner voices and patterns, we are not trying to stop them, instead we observe with curiosity what's going on in our mind and body. Remembering that we are not our thoughts.
By practicing mindfulness of thought we can begin to watch the storms of fear, anxiety and other emotions and give them the space they need to transform and diminish in intensity.
This 5-minute guided breathing technique is one of the most powerful ally we have in restoring calm, decreasing stress and reducing anxiety- right within us.
Tension is a natural part of life. We can learn to pause and take a few deep conscious breaths whenever we get overwhelmed or feel a bit frazzled.
Remember, your breath is always there- a tool you can use to help reset and calm down.
Cultivating loving-kindness gives rise to pure appreciation, friendliness, love and the felt-sense of belonging. We have this negativity bias that leaves us feeling desperate, aversive and particularly hard on ourselves. Give yourself a break with this 10-minutes guided loving-kindness meditation.
Given our mind's natural negativity bias- an inclination to notice negative information, it is easy to focus on what is going wrong.
This 10 minute gratitude practice provides a space for us to explore the tools and techniques in cultivating and expressing feelings of gratitude. The more we pay attention to the things that enrich our lives, the more we become aware that life is a miracle
A 13-minute, guided meditation exploring the power of the breath. Take an ocean journey and flow with your breath like waves in the sea.
The breath is more than just breathing in oxygen. When we pay attention to the sensations of the body breathing in and out, it allows us to receive feedback from our physical and emotional states. It acts as a two-way street and supports the healing of the body on a deeper emotional state.
The breath is always with us, we can come back to it over and over.
This episode was inspired by two of my great teachers, Dawn Mauricio and Meg Krejci.