Your chance to be in a meditation research project

Please consider taking a few minutes to fill out a questionnaire that is part of a Monash University study into the experience of stillness within meditation. This is an important study that needs your help to gather data on the experiences of stillness that occur during different meditation and mindfulness practices.

The study is doubly important as it is one of the new generation of studies that is beginning to compare experiences and outcomes that follow from different meditation styles, so please, read all about it below, and take the few minutes to complete the questionnaire – it is actually quite interesting, then more news about the new Meditation Gateway App, but first


       


            Thought for the day



                   Live quietly in the moment 
  
                  And see the beauty of all before you



                               Paramahansa Yogananda





Dominic Hoseman is leading a team of researchers at Monash University. Together, they are currently undertaking a research project exploring the experience of stillness within meditation and its relationship with mindfulness and wellbeing.

For this project, they are seeking a combination of meditators and non-meditators to participate. The research project received approval from the Monash University Human Research Ethics Committee (CF16/1316-2016000696).

Participants are being sort to assist by
i) participating in the study and

ii) forwarding this email/survey link among their networks in order to invite others to participate in the project.

I personally urge you to help. Your assistance is of course voluntary and anonymous.

The study is for research purposes only. It forms part of Dominic Hosemans’ Ph.D. thesis and is being conducted under the supervision of Dr. Janette Simmons, Dr. Tristan Snell, and Associate Professor Craig Hassed.

The study involves completing an online survey, which will take no more than 15 minutes to complete. ( I found it took about 5 minutes)

If you agree to participate in the study, you will remain free to withdraw at any time and to withdraw any unprocessed data.

For more information on the study, and to access the online survey, please CLICK HERE



HAVE YOU TRIED THE NEW MEDITATION APP YET?
Would love to hear your feedback - use the Comment section below...

The meditation Gateway App I have been involved in developing serves two main functions:

1. For your own use, the App enables you to access a complete meditation program including guided relaxation, concentration, mindfulness, imagery and meditation exercises. 

You can access my own teachings and guided exercises in a choice of 4 voices - my own, Ruth's or an American or Indian accent. The teachings are sent to you progressively and will be excellent as a refresher or for those just learning.

You also receive daily emails containing inspiration, new information and support.

With the App, you can customise your own practise sessions. For example you could start with a meditation bell, then combine different exercises such as relaxation and imagery, and include your own chosen length of stillness before ending with the sound of another bell.

You could also arrange with friends to create a virtual meditation group. We all know the benefit of meditating in company, but often it is not so easy to actually get together. So the App enables you to set a time, where upon it will remind you before that time, and you can all meditate to the same track.

And there is much more....

Go the Meditation Gateway App and sign up for one of the versions of Mindbody Mastery.

2. As a meditation teacher, the App functions as a platform. It is designed to enable you to upload your own material - teachings and guided exercises. This service is available at no cost to the teacher; we use a user pay method of funding. What it does mean is that your students can access your teachings through a technologically sophisticated App.

If you are a teacher interested in using the Meditation Gateway App as a platform, write to me at info@insighthealth.com.au. It is very easy to set up and then your students can interact in a very personal and direct way with you and your own material.

Meditation on App

At last. After several years of hard work, my meditation – theory and guided exercises – will be available via App. The Mindbody Mastery program is just a few days from being launched. Hooray!

To celebrate, an excerpt summarising how to meditate – the Mindfulness Based Stillness Meditation method - that is at the heart of the Mindbody Mastery program, and details of what the App can do for you.

Details regarding the release of the App, and how to access it will come soon, but first






           Thought for the Day

                   Seek the path

                     That demands your whole being

                         Rumi








Many people used Mindbody Mastery in its downloadable form that was first created and made accessed via its specific website. 

The measured results were amazing. On average the system that went with the basic meditation program supported users on average to treble, yes treble the amount of practise they did, and perhaps even more amazingly, treble the satisfaction they reported with their practise.

However, many did find the download system a bit clunky. It took time, required a few IT skills, and was limited in what it could offer.


Enter the App. 

Designed to be ultra user friendly.

Developed to do everything you would hope a meditation App can do.

Easy and affordable.

It has been well tested, put together by an amazing team led by my partner in all this - Saurabh Mishra; and now it is ready for you to use.

I am excited!

The hope is that it will be very helpful...

The new App will make it possible for you to

1. Receive an initial 8 week meditation program. One session is sent to you each week and it will lead you through relaxation, concentration, mindfulness – focused and open, meditation, guided imagery and contemplation.
Ideal for beginners, and excellent revision for the more experienced.

2. You can access all the guided exercises from day one if you choose, or go to them as the weeks unfold.

3. It will be possible to simply use the guided exercises as provided, or create your own meditation sessions using any of the guided exercises in any sequence, with any amount of silent time before or after each exercise; plus you can add meditation bells to start and finish a session as you like.

4. In any imagery based exercise, you will be able to upload personal photos or images to complement the exercise.

5. Want to meditate with friends? The App enables you to create a virtual meditation group with recurring sessions (weekly, twice a week, monthly, etc.) and invite others; or apply to join a virtual meditation group formed by other people using the App.

6. The App will record how much practise you do - unless you prefer it not to – and you will be able to see a leaderboard of how different people and virtual meditation groups have tracked in terms of their regularity of group sessions and attendance of group members.

7. You will receive the daily emails and weekly SMS messages that proved so popular with the initial Mindbody Mastery program, and seemed to be pivotal in encouraging/supporting people to practise and gain more from that practise.

More details and where to access the App next time, and the Android version is in the final stages of being developed but is still a couple of months away; but for now

THE 4 STEP PROCESS OF MEDITATION 
– an excerpt direct from the Mindbody Mastery program

How then do we do it?  Three of the four elements or steps, we have learnt already in our Mindbody Mastery program. We have already taken time to learn how to prepare well, to relax and to be mindful. Now, all we need to do is to add them together and when we do, they actually flow on quite naturally into the fourth phase, the deeper experience of meditation.

Step 1 : Preparation
We start obviously enough with our Preparation. Choosing a time and place, giving ourselves time, taking up our posture. As we do this, particularly as we get more familiar with the exercise, just by simply sitting with the intention of taking some time out to relax and to meditate, we do begin to relax.

Step 2 : Relaxation
The Preparation flows on into the second step, Relaxation. Now we relax a little more consciously. This phase of the meditation we adapt to suit our own situation and needs. Simply speaking, we do whatever we know will help us to relax in the quickest and most direct way, given the sort of day we are having, our level of experience, and what it does take to help us to relax most effectively.

So perhaps we take the time to go through the longer and more methodical Progressive Muscle Relaxation exercise. Perhaps it is enough for us to use the Rapid Relaxation exercise. Perhaps we just take a few deeper breaths and feel ourselves letting go on the out breath. With a little time and practice it becomes easy, almost like second nature. We just know how much time to give to this relaxation phase, and what technique will be most useful.

The aim is to feel the ease of it all. To relax into the relaxation! To feel our body letting go and relaxing; to hold our attention on that feeling of relaxation and to allow our mind to go with it. The aim is to immerse ourselves in the feeling of relaxation. We feel the relaxation all through; through our body and our mind. We allow the relaxation to flow from the body into the mind.

Step 3 : Mindfulness
And as we feel this relaxation, again, quite naturally, we flow on to the next step, Mindfulness. As we relax, our thoughts settle a little and we just simply start to notice what is going on around us a little more clearly.

Perhaps it is the sounds we notice first. We notice any sounds that may be around about us. And we just notice them coming, and going. Maybe then we become a little more aware of the physical sensations in our bodies; and we choose to notice these things more non-judgementally.

We aim to let go of any sense of good or bad; right or wrong, and focus our awareness on just simply noticing what it is that we are aware of. We take up that stance of being an impartial observer; a non-judgemental observer. We are aware; we are interested, we are curious. What is happening right now? We are coming into the present moment with awareness. This is mindfulness.

Out of the thoughts - stillness.

What also becomes obvious is that as we settle a little, as we go with all this and become a little calmer, our thoughts do quite naturally slow down a little. Again, we do not need to do anything more than what we have been doing for this to happen. This is a process based on relaxation, mindfulness and natural ease. We just focus on doing the exercises, go with the flow as they say, and by doing so, we progress quite easily and reliably.

And as we do this and inevitably the thoughts do begin to slow down a little, a remarkable thing.

As we notice our thoughts more clearly, we notice how each individual thought has a starting point, a middle and an end point. Obviously each and every thought we have has to start somewhere, and to finish somewhere. And as we relax more, as we become more mindful, this fact just becomes more obvious. We notice when first we become aware of a particular thought, we notice it passing through our awareness, and we notice when it finishes.

Step 4 – The stillness becomes apparent 
And now, another really useful observation.  As our thoughts continue to slow and we notice them more clearly, we can come to notice that after one thought finishes and before another thought starts, there is often a small gap.

Now in the gap between two thoughts, there is obviously a moment of silence; a moment of stillness.

So now we turn our attention, our awareness, to noticing the gap between the thoughts. And again, when we do this mindfully, free of judgement, just with an open curiosity; not only do we notice the stillness but often enough it lasts a little longer; there is a bigger gap before the next thought comes.

But again we make no effort to force this, or to manipulate it. We just notice it. We are patient. We are the impartial observer. Just simply curious to notice what happens.

More stillness? Another thought? What is it? We take the attitude of a patient, curious, impartial observer and do just that, we observe. We aim to treat this stillness and the thoughts in just the same way. Non-judgementally. With curious awareness. So we notice the stillness. And we also notice if and when another thought comes. We remain aware and undistracted.

NOTICEBOARD

OUR MEDITATION RETREAT
IS NEARLY FULLY BOOKED

DEEPENING YOUR MEDITATION

A unique opportunity to experience 
the deep natural peace and clarity of profound meditation

5 Day Meditation Immersion with Ian and Ruth Gawler

JUNE 2016 – Monday 6th to Friday the 10th

For details CLICK HERE



THEN COMES NEW ZEALAND

MEDITATION UNDER the  LONG WHITE CLOUD

Our annual meditation retreat at the delightful Mana Retreat Centre on the Coromandel Peninsula.

October 2016 - Saturday 22nd to Friday the 28th 

Mana has much in common with the Foundation's Yarra Valley centre - beautiful landscapes, great staff, excellent, mostly organic meals - much from their own garden, and an excellent meditation sanctuary to practice in.

Well worth the travel from Australia, or from around New Zealand.

While this retreat will include ample instruction,
the focus this year will be upon direct experience;
finding and immersing ourselves in the deep inner peace,
the regenerative power and the clarity of our own stillness.


For details click here