Stillpoint Visions

Every spiritual tradition and Indigenous culture has a practice of communing with the wisest part of ourselves, or with a spiritual guide, to gain insight and self-knowledge. Use your own inner wisdom to connect with your wise guide, spirit animal, angel, or ancestor. This meditation will help you to lean into your true self, answer burning questions, or learn the gift that is waiting for you. This meditation builds on a script I learned from Dr. James Gordon.

We often think about the seeds that we want to plant for new growth to begin in our lives, but cultivating the soil before we plant is equally important. This meditation will lead you to think about what you want to plant, and what needs to happen before you begin the planting process.

Touch can be a wonderful substitute for the breath as an anchor in your meditation practice. Touch can also help when you are feeling overwhelmed, anxious, or detached. In this meditation, you will use something that you like to feel, hold onto or touch as a way of self-regulating and grounding. Choose something that you want to feel in your hand or on your body (a weighted blanket would work well for instance) before you start the meditation, or - just imagine something!

Creating an internal space is a wonderful way to relax and feel more deeply rooted in yourself. The more you listen to this track, the more you will create a safe trait within yourself as a way of regulating the body and emotions in stressful situations. If you create a body anchor by placing your hands or arms, in the same way, each time you listen to this meditation, you will remind your body to relax each time you engage the body anchor in real-life situations. This is also an excellent way to go to sleep each night.

Mindful eating is a wonderful way to reset the way you experience food and taste. It can help you re-establish your relationship with food, or allow you to look at how fast you tend to eat. This is a very brief exercise in mindful eating - just to give you a small taste of what you might want to look at doing more of on your own.

Try this Sight-Anchor meditation to engage your unique inner resources and wisdom. Mindfulness and meditation build our resiliency and can be one of the most effective tools for healing. It can also be surprisingly activating and difficult for those who have experienced prolonged stress or trauma. When our nervous systems have been over-activated, focusing on the breath as a meditative anchor can be difficult. Let this help you to find that anchor. Becoming aware of our inner resources and senses can help us to calm, center, and think more clearly by engaging the parasympathetic nervous system. This increases relaxation and improves your ability to feel more in control of yourself.

This practice can be an effective way to bring your energy level up, to increase your awareness of your current surroundings, and to feel yourself come back home into the body. When we are spaced out, disconnected, or disengaged, sounds or music can sometimes help us to draw our awareness back into the present moment through anchoring our attention in our sense of hearing.