Soon we were asked, particularly by parents who were putting their children to bed at that time, could we provide some morning sessions and so from 14 April 2020 we added weekday mornings at 10.30am.

In January 2022 we dropped the weekend evening sessions, but to this day we are still providing two online guided meditation sessions on Zoom, each weekday at 10.30am and 7pm.

I know that the daily sit was a lifeline for many during the pandemic and for some it still is. We cover every weekday, even Christmas Day and New Years Day, as this can be a time when people feel especially lonely, if they are on their own.

I am very proud of the Mindfulness Association and our tutors that we have the heart to provide this support, for free, for anyone, without any commitment required. Not even the provision of an email address. Our strapline is:

“Compassion is the heart of what we do.”

And I feel that the provision of the daily sit is the biggest example of this. Our tutors volunteer their time each month and I am so proud of them too. They are also some of the best mindfulness and compassion teachers in the UK, so the quality of the sessions we offer are excellent (even if I do say so myself!)

Some of our tutors have been leading the daily sit from the very beginning, and are still volunteering to do this: Choden, Fay, Jacky, Jan, Kristine, Rosina, Tina and Vin and then in addition in our current team we have Alan, Amy, Audrey, Ellie, Karen, Rachael and Tracey. We remember our dear friend and colleague Chloe fondly, who led the daily sits from the start, but sadly died.

One of my favourite things to do is to lead the daily sit. I love connecting with our community and guiding the practices. I have to say I enjoy how appreciated the sits are and I always leave with a rosy heartfelt glow of kindness and joy.

In the early days we had a couple of Zoom bombing incidents. I had a couple, which I found intensely stressful. Mainly kids wanting to be disruptive, say rude words, etc. As time went on Zoom and the tutor team made the sits more secure and so at times there have been people coming into the Zoom room to be disruptive, but we have managed them so that the sit proceeds as normal.

One time I was leading the sit and I let two people were in a bit late, something I am always sensitive to as a potential for disruption. As they were muted and they could only chat to me, their scope for disruption was limited. So, they both sent me private messages that they wanted to ask a question in the group at the end of the session.

Not wanting to throw someone innocent out of the Zoom room, I messaged them about whether their question was about meditation, and they said it was. Then I messaged them to put their cameras on so I could see them…..all while leading the meditation. One did and the screen was blank, the other did and their hair was combed over their face. So, telling them I was going to do this, I put them both in the waiting room of the meeting and said I would let them come back to ask their question when the meeting ended. So, after the meditation and the group conversation, and everyone had left, I let these two back in to ask their question. All they did was to blow a raspberry, which I thought was hilarious. They didn’t bother us again.

The other problem with the daily sit is that sometimes we tutors forget. I have done this a couple of times over the years and it is always embarrassing and I feel like I let the group down. However, everyone on the Mindfulness Association team and those who attend the daily sit are beautifully gracious about this. So, I have an alarm on my phone that goes of each weekday before the morning and evening sits, so that I can double check whether it is me leading the sit today. It works……mostly!

What has resulted from the daily sit is our supportive and welcoming community of practice. We had been trying to build a community, with our membership and other initiatives, since the Mindfulness Association began in 2010. Nothing else really worked. So, we have the blessing now of our community. Many people attend sessions regularly, many attend sessions when they need to, and many tell me that even if they don’t always attend, they gain great solace from knowing that we are there for them should they need it.

Long may this continue!

Kind Wishes

Heather

One highlight of the year has been our daily sit, which began at 7pm on Monday 16^th March 2020. It has happened every evening since (except those two or three evenings when we tutors forgot to lead it!). I am writing this blog on 16^th March 2021 and although we hoped that the daily sit would be helpful, it has far exceeded the hopes that we had, with many of those who attend calling it a ‘lifeline’ at various times over the last year.

After a while we heard from parents who could not make evenings at 7pm because it was bed time and so started a second sit, every weekday at 10.30am.

For me, leading the daily sits has been an absolute delight and often the highlight of my week. The sense of belonging to our co-created community of practice is palpable and supports me in my life, which I live without other humans, but with two dogs for company. There is so much gratitude shown by those who attend these sits, that leading them also fills up my joy levels, an important resource to move me through my days. The link to join the sits is on the homepage of this website.

So we are celebrating the anniversary this Friday, 19^th March, with a celebratory morning sit at 10.30am, with a birthday cake and candle to blow out! We are also celebrating that same evening, which is the first session of our twice yearly membership weekend. This is a weekend of practice on the theme of hope, led by the MA tutor team. For more information, please click here (link to members weekend page). If you are a member the timetable (with Zoom links) is on the membership site and will be emailed to you this week.

When I look over the last year of pretty much enforced solitary retreat, I realise that I couldn’t have got through it without a soundtrack. A few days ago I was watching the John Carney film Begin Again (I would recommend it for anyone who loves music). The Mark Ruffalo character comments during the film that even the most mundane experiences in life are transformed when we are listening to music. As I walk up the hill most days, I have music on and it does transform my walk by causing me to smile, walk (or strutt!) along to the beat and appreciate the profound beauty of the world around me – even in the rain! Listening to music, for me adds joy to everything. It adds to the pleasantness of the presentness that mindfulness in daily life brings and gives that little extra incentive to be present for the mundane.

Cheerful, uplifting music, in the major scales, has been particular helpful on those days when I have felt a bit lonely or low. Music has been a support for me through my life, in my teenage years it was a refuge and has always helped me to feel safe. I was thinking the other day about the compassionate imagery practice in which we visualise a safe place. I am not much of a visualiser, although I do have a safe place by the sea. For me what might work better is a safe soundscape, drawn from my playlist. Relying on music in this way has been a habit that has seen me through all the most difficult times in my life.

Recently, I can across another John Carney movie, called ‘Sing Street’, which is about a young man forming a band in Dublin in the 1980s – the years in which I was a teenager. So anyone of a similar age, with a love of 1980s music should enjoy this film. An uplifting story and uplifting songs to get us through these (hopefully) last days of lockdown in the UK.

The more I practice, the more I recognise how I create my own reality by how I think. I find that having a soundtrack to some of my day creates a more joyful reality.

I hope to see you on Friday!

Kind Wishes

Heather

Our Free Daily sits are at 10.30am ( Monday – Friday) and every evening at 7pm head to our website homepage for the link each day.

by Martha Postlethwaite

Reassuring and wise words by Martha Postlethwaite. It sounds like she’s been on quite a journey, which lead to writing a book called Addiction and Recovery: A Spiritual Pilgrimage and now sees her work as the pastor of The Recovery Church in Minnesota. This poem has been shared many times and has even inspired Allie Weigh to compose a choral piece around it… I guess it struck a chord! 😉

To me it speaks of the importance of pausing, taking time to practice, going on retreat. This is where I find moments of clearing in my often full life, and they are so important! It is in the spaces in between getting caught up in thinking that insights have a chance to arise and get noticed, that ‘turning in a different direction‘ becomes possible. As I’m writing this, I can feel longing for a retreat space arising, I know how much that helps me ‘to give myself to this world so worthy of rescue’… Luckily, there are opportunities for retreating coming up in the dark days between Christmas and New Year that offer space for ‘waiting there, patiently’… and seeing what gifts land ‘into your own cupped hands’.

Photo by Clark Young on Unsplash