In this audio excerpt from Meditations to Change Your Brain: Rewire Your Neural Pathways to Transform Your Life, Richard Mendius and I offer seven guided practices to “rebuild” your brain for lasting joy and fulfillment. I hope you like it. I’d love to hear your feedback about this audio excerpt in the comments below! The post Meditations to Change Your Brain appeared first on Dr. Rick Hanson. Read more
What’s your sense of peace? The Practice: Enjoy four kinds of peace. Why? “Peace” can sound merely sentimental or clichéd (“visualize whirled peas”). But deep down, it’s what most of us long for. Consider the proverb: The highest happiness is peace. Not a peace inside that ignores pain in oneself or others, or is acquired by shutting down. The post Enjoy Four Kinds of Peace appeared first on Dr. Rick Hanson. Read more
This is the second post in the series on Your Precious Life. You can find Part One here. In it we’ll look at the power of Being For Something. Let’s do a brief practice together. Think of it as an exercise for your mind. You can keep your eyes open or closed, take notes or The post Being For Something appeared first on Dr. Rick Hanson. Read more
Rick’s Picks is a new series of posts highlighting the very best content online. Australian dancer and choreographer Wade Robson choreographed this beautiful modern dance piece set to John Mayer’s Slow Dancing in a Burning Room. He shot this short video staring two of his dancers that really connected with the piece, Ben Susak & The post Rick’s Picks: Amazing Modern Dance Piece appeared first on Dr. Rick Hanson. Read more
I’d like to offer some of my central practices that help me grapple with the First Noble Truth, particularly focusing on skillful means. In this talk at the Spirit Rock Meditation Center I go over some ways to cultivate the feeling of being for something, how to be on one’s own side enough that you The post The Hard Things That Open the Heart appeared first on Dr. Rick Hanson. Read more
Feeling safer is a tricky subject, with complications that can be both personal and political. (This topic and others are explored in depth in my interview with New Dimensions.) Yes, there are real threats out there, but evolution and other factors have left a lot of us walking around in a kind of paranoid trance. The post Feel Safer appeared first on Dr. Rick Hanson. Read more
This series of blog posts is about Your Precious Life: what an incredible opportunity it is to have a life. At all. To fulfill that opportunity, we need a fundamental orientation inside that treats our life as if it matters. As if our happiness is important, as if being mistreated is not alright, as if The post Your Precious Life appeared first on Dr. Rick Hanson. Read more
Rick’s Picks is a new series of posts highlighting the very best content online. Carnegie Mellon Professor Randy Pausch (Oct. 23, 1960 – July 25, 2008) was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in September 2006, and in August 2007 he was given a terminal diagnosis. He gave his last lecture at the university on Sept. 18, The post Rick’s Picks: Randy Pausch’s Last Lecture appeared first on Dr. Rick Hanson. Read more
Attention tends to move around, but something often bubbles to the surface at the front of our awareness. Even if we’re trying to focus just on the breath, the attention tends to wander from one part of the body to the next. In this audio practice from the Spirit Rock Meditation Center, I explore the The post Mindfulness of the Body as a Whole appeared first on Dr. Rick Hanson. Read more
Is it about you? The Practice: Don’t take it personally. Why? Here’s an updated parable from the ancient Taoist teacher, Chuang-Tzu: Imagine that you are floating in a canoe on a slow-moving river, having a Sunday picnic with a friend. Suddenly there is a loud thump on the side of the canoe, and it rolls The post Don’t Take it Personally appeared first on Dr. Rick Hanson. Read more
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