Dear Friends,
Here’s a quick stealth meditation you can do anywhere and any time, from Sharon Salzberg’s Real Happiness at Work:
As you sit down at your desk or work space, spend a few moments just listening to the sounds around you, and note your reactions to them.
She has a brief guided sound meditation on her site (~2 minutes)
https://www.sharonsalzberg.com/real-happiness-at-work/
In MBSR Every Day, Goldstein and Stahl explain how mindfulness can change our experience of more annoying sounds, like a horn blaring outside.
The annoyance of those sounds doesn’t come from the sounds themselves; it comes from our interpretation of those sounds as “bad.” When we bring mindfulness to it, we shift our relationship from aversion to curiosity, allowing the sounds to rise and fall, lessening their negative impact.
If you want to do a longer meditation that includes sound, Goldstein and Stahl suggest starting with a narrow attention on the breath, then, after a few minutes, expanding to include sensations of the body, and then, a few minutes later, widening awareness to include hearing, noticing sounds appearing and disappearing.
I have set up some preset timers on the Insight Timer app I use to include some interval bells to mark the different phases of breath, body, sound.
By the way, check out the Resources section for a list of books that I’ve been perusing for inspiration for these emails.
With best wishes,
Andrea G