Relaxation and Meditation Resources
You should spend 20 minutes a day in meditation.
Unless you are too busy; then you should spend an hour.
Since the pandemic began, multiple people have asked for suggestions and resources on relaxation and meditation. Sharing those here. If you have favorites, I'd love to hear about them! Please share in the comments. Namaste.
Relaxation Music
These are my favorite selections of relaxation music. They were also some of my yoga students' favorites for class, particularly savasana. When you listen repeatedly combined with mindful breathing, your mind starts to make an association with the music, automatically inducing a relaxation response when you return to the music. (I'm not certain the format these are available in, so I'm providing the Amazon link for all. There may be outlets that are free or less expensive.)
This one is my go-to for anxiety-producing situations, like flight take-offs. It's very relaxing music featuring flutes, keyboards, harp, and guitar.
Features drumming and nature sounds, with two long tracks of about 30 minutes each. If you are a fan of mantra, then track one is especially appealing. Track two is a musical journey through the chakras.
A musical collaboration blending Eastern and Western styles, featuring Masakazu Yoshizawa, a flutist, scholar of Japanese music, and film composer.
Recommended by one of my massage therapists, this has been wonderful for times when having difficulty falling asleep or waking in the middle of the night. The design of the music is intended to match brain wave patterns of particular stages of sleep.
Meditation and Visualization Resources
Prepared by a leader in the mindfulness meditation movement, this has multiple ways to try meditation: body-scan, mindful yoga, and more traditional meditation. My favorite is the body-scan, and I recommend it for those who have more challenges with seated meditation. An interesting aside, JKZ is Howard Zinn's son-in-law. During the early months of COVID, Kabat-Zinn offered free guided meditations; the archives can be accessed here.
Meditations / regressions by past-life therapist Brian Weiss (my hypnosis teacher). If you are interested in exploring regression in time, then tracks 2 and 3 are a good start. However, track 1 is a lovely meditation on healing; I use it often.
Like most of her products, this CD contains a Guided Imagery track and an Affirmations track. I enjoy using both, and I have several other of her CDs. A friend told me about the one for Healthy Immune System when I was very sick in summer 2018. It, along with many of these other resources, helped me navigate through a particularly difficult time.
I like the variety of meditations on this product, from grounding and running energy to chakra work to affirmations. You can use them individually or listen to several in a row. Sadly, I learned when compiling this post that Shakti Gawain died in 2018.
I promise that if you spend some time developing your inner life, you will experience more calm and greater insight, as well as being more present to the synchronicities that life provides. The day I began writing this blog, I saw this on the beach:
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