Week 7 of 8
Join us for Week 7 of 8 of online meditation at 7 pm EST.
Find the meeting link on the Meditation Community webpage:
Join us for “vibrational” compassion meditation inspired by an improv singing class
Week 6 of 8
Join us for Week 6 of our eight-week online meditation series at 7 p.m. EST.
There is no reading today, but we will end with an extended “vibrational” compassion meditation inspired by an improv singing class I joined yesterday. No worries, no singing required.
I have switched our online platform to Google Meet because Proton seemed to be causing problems for folks with slower internet connections. You can still find the meeting link on the Meditation Community webpage:
Join us tonight (Monday Oct 26) for online meditation at 7:00 p.m. EDT.
Week 5 of 8
“… as we return to the seated meditation of zazen as a regular ingredient of our lives, we continue to develop our power of concentration. In Zen training, we call the capacity to focus our attention on one activity wholeheartedly, joriki, the power of concentration. … Joriki taps into our physical, mental, and emotional reserves, and opens our spiritual capacities.”
~ John Daido Loori, Riding the Ox Home, pgs 15-16
Join us for Week 5 of 8 of online meditation at 7 pm EDT. Find the meeting link on the Meditation Community webpage:
Climate change has hired a publicist
“Super El Niño” is a real phenomenon, but it also sounds like climate change has hired a publicist. Suddenly we can talk about extreme heat, disrupted weather and the need to prepare without uttering the words that start a political food fight.
The science matters: El Niño and climate change aren’t interchangeable. But if one gets people discussing risks and backing policies they dismiss under the other, I’m listening. In this political climate, even climate change needs an alias.
Reminder: Join us tonight as our weekly Monday meditation resumes at 7:00 p.m. EDT.
“My root condition still seems to be lucidity, alertness”
Hope you had a good Thanksgiving. Join us tonight as our weekly Monday meditation resumes at 7:00 p.m. EDT.
I picked another short meditative reading from Trembling, Still by Stephen Jenkinson. Concerned about his neurodegeneration due to Parkinson’s, Jenkinson describes a visit to his banker. I find him both dramatic and sharply funny, and I find deep contemplative value for all of us in this passage. The line that sticks with me is this one: “My root condition still seems to be lucidity, alertness. I just can’t find the vernacular sometimes to make the ‘we see each other, right?’ connection” (p. 140).
Our foundation instruction is to keep the breath in your awareness. Your body has been breathing all day, mostly without your noticing. We bring this automatic bodily process into conscious awareness, letting the body breathe in its own way and feeling the sensations of breathing. We will continue to develop focus using different anchors, including the breath at the nose, the movement of the diaphragm, and other sensations in the body.
To join us, find the meeting link on the Meditation Community webpage:
Update: No meditation session this Monday due to Thanksgiving. And a question about the online platform.
UPDATE: There is no meditation session this Monday, October 12, due to Thanksgiving. See you again for meditation on Monday, October 19. The final session will now be on Monday, November 16.
QUESTION: Have you had any trouble joining the online meeting? Please let me know by email on my About page (or comment on the Substack newsletter). I have been using the free Swiss platform Proton, but if it is not stable, I will switch to something else.
Reminder: Meditation Community gathers online this evening, October 5, at 7 p.m. EDT
“Is there a clarity waiting, of the kind that is elsewhere now but will be bountiful then?”
“I take the position there’ll be no cure, that’s sure. But there may be respite. The torque may leave off my hand and my foot, and put them both in the manner of stillness. And if it does, what shall I do with that stillness? What do I think the tremours are keeping me from now, the arms of which I see myself running into? Is there a clarity waiting, of the kind that is elsewhere now but will be bountiful then?” — Stephen Jenkinson, Trembling Still, p. 133
I will share the passage above at the beginning of our gathering. It is worthy of contemplation, whether or not you have Parkinson’s.
Our online meditation invites you to create a sacred inner space in your own home. We establish a meditation posture, then guide you in developing focus through the breath and other meditation anchors before continuing into a period of silence. We close with a compassion meditation that supports your return to daily life.
To join us, find the meeting link on the Meditation Community webpage:
Reminder Meditation Community gathers online this evening 7 p.m. EDT.
Reminder Meditation Community gathers online this evening 7 p.m. EDT. The session last about 30 minutes.
In my preamble, I read a short passage from Stephen Jenkinson’s book, “Trembling, Still.” It is a deeply personal and contemplative account of living with Parkinson’s disease and neurodegeneration. Written in a poetic, sometimes difficult style, the book turns his diagnosis into a meditation on five recurring themes: impermanence, embodiment, uncertainty, limitation, and attention in adversity. His particular experience becomes a way of contemplating the universal experience of being embodied, vulnerable and alive.
The meditation invites you to create a safe, sacred space in your home. We establish a meditation posture, then guide you in developing focus through the breath and other meditation anchors, continuing in a period of silence. We close with a compassion meditation that supports your return to daily life.
To join us, find the meeting link on the Meditation Community webpage
The fall series of the Meditation Community begins tonight at 7 p.m. EDT
The fall series of the Meditation Community begins tonight at 7 p.m. EDT.
This first gathering will be an information session plus a short meditation.
I will explain the explain how meditation works.
I will discuss the new Meditation for Parkinson’s initiative.
I will introduce a method of noticing and reducing distractions by counting them. This is optional.
We will also have a short meditation.
Future sessions will include 30 minutes of meditation, along with approximately ten minutes for settling in and questions.
To join us, find the meeting link on the Meditation Community webpage:
Mindfulness-Based Interventions Are Associated with Increased BDNF: A Link to Neuroplasticity in Parkinson’s?
There is an interesting possible link between meditation, Parkinson’s and brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF).
BDNF is a protein that helps the brain maintain and strengthen neurons and supports neuroplasticity—the brain’s ability to reorganize its neural connections. BDNF activity may be reduced in Parkinson’s, while exercise is known to increase it temporarily.
Could meditation have a similar effect? A meta-analysis of eight controlled trials found that mindfulness-based interventions were associated with increased BDNF measured in the blood. The studies were not specifically about Parkinson’s, and some interventions included movement, so we should be cautious about drawing conclusions.
Still, it raises an intriguing possibility: meditation may support some of the same biological processes involved in the brain’s resilience and adaptation. It’s a hypothesis worth exploring, not evidence that meditation slows Parkinson’s.
Read the study
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC7522212