Purple Room Yoga Blog

 You hear it a lot in meditation and yoga classes: be present. But what does that really mean? We spend many years in school when we are young learning how to think, how to analyze, how to look at things critically. We learn numbers, logic, science, we learn history, literature, we learn to dissect ideas, creatures, we dive into facts and discovery. However, we often don't learn about how the mind works, why we do the things we do. In the last 26 years of practicing, studying, and teaching yoga, I have learned a few things about how the mind works.  First, it never stops. There is always some sort of chatter happening. Even in deep meditation, the thoughts come in and out. Although there might be more space between the thoughts, they are still there. They might be quieter, more gentle, but the mind is always working, processing, thinking.  Second, the mind likes to get caught up in thoughts of the past or the future. We are either worrying about future events (over which ...

I have been practicing Yoga and Meditation for almost 25 years and I will share a little secret with you: the Brain almost never shuts up. It doesn't matter how much yoga or meditation you practice, there will always be chatter in your mind. But wait! Don't lose hope! The point of meditation is NOT to quiet the mind. Let that sink in for a moment. I'll say it again, the point of meditation is not to quiet the mind, rather to release your attachment to what is happening there. The mind is always going, the purpose of meditation is to lose your reactivity, lose your judgment of yourself and others, lose your attachment to what is happening mentally, and instead just allow whatever is there to be there. Thoughts, sounds, sensations will come and go, meditation creates space inside your mind for you to tolerate whatever arises.   Research shows that meditation offers mental, emotional, and physical health benefits (a quick Google search brings up many pages of articles). Health...