Bridge of Life

Coach Yourself to Freedom by Letting Go

What does letting go mean to you? To me it means not allowing events from the past to influence your life today. When you let go, you learn to be in the moment, and experience what is happening right now. Buddhists refer to this as mindfulness or being fully immersed in what you’re doing. Mindfulness […]

Meditation: A Tool for Total Wellness

Contemplate on this: Quieting your mind on a regular basis can result in both mental and physical well-being! How wonderful is that? Meditation may, on a physical level: Lower high blood pressure Reduce stress Reduce body pain caused by tension Improve sleep, mood, behavior, and energy level On an emotional/mental level, meditation may: Promote feelings […]

A Case for Loving-Kindness Meditation

We’ve all been there—we’re having a conversation that we don’t necessarily want to have and we begin to feel defensive.  Our mind may start racing or our palms may start sweating. Anger starts rising up hot on our necks, and we’ve hit the point of either shutting down and tuning out or getting upset. Usually […]

Our Personal Awakenings

In The Truth of Our Existence, a new discussion series from Pema Chodron, she provides wisdom on ‘Four Teachings from the Buddha to Illuminate Your Life’— tools that help open you up to the beauty of enlightenment that’s possible in everyday life for all of us. She talks of things that are simple yet profound. […]

Prosperity Through Pain

In today’s world, it can become incredibly easy to lose sight of what’s important. By being inundated with everything from constant digital distraction to ultra-hectic work and home lives, we may feel like we’re barely even in control of our own existence and we just become sick and tired, even complacent, with our routine and […]

Magnificent Mantras Part 3: Do Good, Avoid Evil, Appreciate Your Lunacy.

This last installment of Magnificent Mantras, ties it all together. Its purpose is to allow our practice to “oscillate between two levels, the profound and the mundane.” Meaning, if we’re too full of wonder in our practice, it does us no good because we allow our thoughts to be too existential; we’re not able to […]

Magnificent Mantras to Awaken Your Best Self: Part 2

2. Be Grateful to Everyone “If you feel grateful for what is possible for you in this moment, no matter what your challenges are, if you feel grateful that you are alive at all, that you can think, that you can feel, that you can stand, sit, walk, talk—if you feel grateful, you are happy […]

Magnificent Mantras to Awaken Your Best Self: Part 1

Shambahla Sun recently explored ‘an ancient set of Buddhist slogans’ and paired six of them with powerful techniques to ‘transform life’s difficulties into awakening and benefit’ with guidance from Zen teacher Norman Fischer. Taking these magnificent mantras and the lessons that can be pulled from them—we’ve highlighted three to explore and examine— sharing how to implement their […]

A Case for Meditation

Imagine all of the things you think about throughout the day. In the course of your waking hours, process, for a second, how many different thoughts must go through your head. Now consider, our technologically-dependent society where we’re constantly stimulated from morning until night— digital devices, many times nearby even while asleep — we’re always […]