Category: Mindfulness

New Therapeutic Mindfulness coaching service & reading anthology

Post author By Toby
Post date April 13, 2024

Dear Integral Meditators,

From September thru December 2023 I facilitated a course called “Re-discovering your inner vitality & joie-de-vivre – An introduction to integrative therapeutic mindfulness & meditation”.

I am now offering it as a 1:1 coaching service, which can also be facilitated in a group coaching context. You can read about the coaching & training by following the link above. Essentially the question it seeks to answer is “How can we re-work our relationship to the past in a way that helps us to see the present & future with clarity, enthusiasm & vision?”

I have also created this ‘Therapeutic mindfulness reading page’ which is an anthology of all the articles that I wrote during that time. You can find these summarized below, with links to each article.

The recordings of the original course are also available as an online course, if you are interested in that then just drop an email to info@tobyouvry.com

In the spirit of re-awakening inner joy,

Toby

Therapeutic Mindfulness Article Anthology

Creating an inner therapeutic mindfulness space – six positions

“The purpose of therapeutic mindfulness is to go back to previous stages in our development in order to reconnect to feelings, emotions, body sensations & memories that we have repressed, denied, or lost touch with. The healthy re-integration of these experiences sets the scene for a renewed sense of wellbeing within our present life, & for safely engaging in higher, deeper levels of personal growth.”

Mindfulness of mood & atmosphere of your life-story

“You might think about your inner mood as being like the weather. If you are playing a game of tennis in a sunny, lightly breezy day, its completely different from playing it on a rainy, very windy day. We can usually shift ourself at least partially toward a better mood if we try, and this then affects everything for the better”

The projector behind you – How the past interweaves your present & future

“Past-focused mindfulness involves delving consciously into past memory & narratives, releasing pent-up energy, and then gently reworking these stories to create a more optimistic and energized outlook“

Progressively recovering your joie de vivre (Meditating with your inner child)

“If you are prepared to do the work, it seems there truly are no edges to your level of inner joy”

Meditating with your teenage-self

“The ‘teenage self’ is one of several aspects of our inner-self or psyche that, if we take the time to connect to, we can find ourselves being enriched. For example, if I am well connected to my inner teenager, then I can draw upon his innate curiosity, ambition and appetite for life in a way that other middle-aged folk who lack a vital connection to their inner teenager cannot!”

Suppression & repression – the difference, & it’s importance

“Suppression can be used positively and strategically to enhance our effectiveness and wellbeing in life, whereas repression almost always results in long term inner turbulence and interference in our ability to see and work with our present life as it is”

Re-working your ego by expanding your self-concept (AKA: Van Halen therapy)

“In a situation where your self-concept doesn’t believe you can meet & solve a challenge, you can do one of two things. You can give up, or you can change your idea of yourself, making it one that can work with what is presenting”

Transcending & including – Integrating the big & the small selves

“As you grow & mature, if you repress your previous selves, they can become ‘allergies’. If part of you remains trapped within them, they become ‘addictions. Transcending & including means to grow beyond who you were, whilst still giving your previous self a seat at the table”

All content © Toby Ouvry 2024, you are welcome to use or share this article, but please cite Toby as the source and include reference to his website www.tobyouvry.com

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Integral Meditation Asia

Online Courses * 1:1 Coaching * Books * Live Workshops * Corporate Mindfulness Training *Life-Coaching * Meditation Technology

Tags inner growth, integral meditation, integral meditation asia, integral mindfulness, meditation, meditation in singapore, mindfulness, mindfulness in Singapore, mindfulness meditation, power of mind, therapeutic mindfulness

Awareness and insight Inner vision Integral Meditation Life-fullness Meditating on the Self Meditation and Psychology Meditation techniques Mindfulness Presence and being present

From fusion to Supermind – The journey of developmental mindfulness

Post author By Toby
Post date April 8, 2024

“Supermind is a stage and structure of consciousness that has to be earned, step by step. This is different from simply a ‘Big-mind’, or non-dual awakened state that we can have in meditation, but that can occur at any stage in our inner growth”

Dear Integral Meditators,

This week’s article looks at growing your perspective taking capacity through mindfulness. Essentially it explores 5 perspectives:

Your first person ‘I/me’ space
Your second person ‘we/us’ space
Your third person ‘it’ space
Your fourth person ‘self-as-the world’ space
Your fifth person ‘integral perspectives’ space

Growing all these together within you gives what Ken Wilber describes as ‘Supermind’. If you enjoy the article, then do consider joining us for the Exploring your hidden maps of consciousness –mindfulness meditation for growing up course that starts this week!

In the spirit of the journey,

Toby

From fusion to Supermind – The journey of developmental mindfulness

The journey from fusion to ‘Supermind’ is essentially a journey of perspective taking. It is the journey of going from being a baby to a fully developed and integrated human being. A main goal of mindfulness in this developmental sense is to stimulate our growth along that journey, making more and more perspectives functionally available to us as time goes by.

The stages & perspectives of consciousness that we journey along are essentially 1^st to 5^th person perspectives, and from egocentric, to ethnocentric to worldcentric, to universal/Kosmocentric. Here is a very summary in seven stages:

Egocentric, 1^st person, ‘I/me’:

Note with egocentric these are essentially childhood stages, but adults can and do regularly regress to these stages in their daily life.

Level 1 – Archaic/fusion – Our first year of life is spent like this, largely fused perceptually with our physical and emotional environment, reactive to very basic needs, hunger, thirst, warmth, cold etc…

Level 2 – Tribal fantastical – Fantasy wish fulfilment emerges 18months to 3 years old: Superstitions or magical thinking within self, being incredibly special & unique, the world revolves around me (hence the ‘terrible twos!’ etc…).

Level 3 – Mythic fantasy – 4-7 years old – Often termed ‘self-protective, ‘security’, ‘power’ or opportunistic’ level. Self-centred desires for power & control.

Ethnocentric, 2^nd person ‘we/us’

Level 4 – Mythic membership – 7-12 years, but still a dominant perspective in many adults lives today. “Belonging-ness” (to groups, family, race, religion etc…) stage. The shift from me focused to we/us focused, or group focused. Strict conformity to the rules. Them vs us.

Worldcentric, 3^rd person, ‘it’

Level 5 – Rational/scientific – The emergence of an objective, 3^rd person ‘rational’ perspective, capacity to care for all of humankind, even if not part of our ‘group’. The emergence of true individuality, self-esteem, and goal/achievement focus.

Universal, 4^th person

Level 6 – Pluralistic – The ability to take a 1^st and 2^nd person ‘I/we/’ perspective on our 3^rd person rational/worldcentric perspective, resulting in a capacity for deep compassion and empathy for all living beings and the world.

Integral, 5^th person

Level 7 – Integral – The ability to:

Take an objective perspective on our 4^th person pluralistic perspective, resulting in ‘Universal objective subjectivity’ (!)
Take all the previous developmental stages along with their perspectives (1-6), and ‘transcend and include’ them – Each has their place honoured in the overall picture, but none are identified with exclusively. They function together in an integrated and ‘whole’ way, like a healthy organism.

This integral level of perspective taking is what is referred to as ‘Supermind’. Supermind is a stage and structure of consciousness, which is different from simply a ‘Big-mind’, or non-dual awakened state that we can have in meditation, but that can occur at any of the developmental stages mentioned above.

So then, the interesting thing about this list is, at the moment, all of us have main ‘centre of gravity’ at one of these stages. By practising mindfulness around each of them we can:

Unearth the hidden maps of consciousness within us
Note which stage we are at, and how that changes or varies in different situations in our life
Observe or ‘videotape’ the level you are at in mindfulness meditation in order to transcend & include it, and encourage movement to the next level*

You can then observe your current the lower and higher levels of development within you, ‘cleaning up’ the lower levels that you sometimes notice yourself regressing to, and opening to the higher stages by becoming familiar with what they are and how they function.

Related articles: Your primal self as your object of mindfulness

Transcending & including – Integrating the big & the small selves

*Three named terms in this paragraph from Ken Wilber’s ‘Integral Meditation’ book.

Article & content © Toby Ouvry 2024, you are welcome to use or share this article, but please cite Toby as the source and include reference to his website www.tobyouvry.com

All upcoming classes and workshops at IMA:

Ongoing – Weekly Tuesday, Wednesday Online class schedule

Ongoing on Wednesday’s, 7.30-8.30pm – Wednesday Meditation for stress transformation and positive energy with Toby (Bukit Timah)

Ongoing on Tuesday evenings, 7.30-8.30pm – Tuesday Meditation for stress transformation and positive energy with Toby (East Coast)

Starts Tuesday/Wednesday evening 9/10^th April – Exploring your hidden maps of consciousness –mindfulness meditation for growing up

Saturday & Sunday April 20^th & 21st – Integral Meditation 1.5 Day Retreat

Tags developmental mindfulness, inner growth, integral meditation, integral meditation asia, integral mindfulness, meditation, meditation in singapore, mindfulness, mindfulness in Singapore, mindfulness meditation, power of mind

Inner vision Integral Awareness Integral Meditation Life-fullness Meditation and Psychology Meditation techniques mind body connection Mindful Resilience Mindfulness Stress Transformation

Your primal self as your object of mindfulness

Post author By Toby
Post date April 1, 2024

“As we develop from one stage of growth to another as a person, we leave behind the old self in favour of a more evolved one. This new self-sense them becomes ‘I’ or me, with the previous self-identity becoming part of us that we manage or parent”

Dear Integral Meditators,

This weeks article explores looks at oour early-stage development as an object of mindfulness, & what the benefits of doing so might be. If you like it, do consider joining us on the new adventure starting on 9/10th April: Exploring your hidden maps of consciousness –mindfulness meditation for growing up, either live or online!

This week there will be only one meditation class on Wednesday, & it will be on the subject of single-headness (how to manage your stress more effectively thru mindfulness) & ‘head-lessness‘ which is a kind of non-dual meditation.

In the spirit of primal integration,

Toby

Your primal self as your object of mindfulness

As we develop from one stage of growth to another (psychologically) as a person, we leave behind, or objectify the old sense of self, in favour of a more evolved one. This new sense of self them becomes ‘I’ or me, with the previous self-identity becoming a part of us that we manage.

Our first sense of self – Basic appetites, fusion confusion

The first 18 months of our life is characterized by the absence of a separate self-sense. Initially we are ‘fused’ our environment. Later we start to separate our self-sense physically, but remain for a while longer in a state of emotional fusion with our environment and particularly our mother. This is a symbiotic or fusion stage, a bit of a fusion-confusion!
This self-sense is accordingly completely dominated by our physiological needs, food, thirst, warmth, coolness, comfort, discomfort, rest.

Addictions & allergies – Yes, we left it behind but…

We start to grow out of this fusion-confusion stage from 18 months. As a 51 year old I say “I am hungry” rather than “I am hunger!”. I can distinguish myself physically and emotionally from my environment. However, if I have left parts of me behind at that level, either as a secret identity or as a dissociation, then that can result in an ‘addiction’ or an ‘allergy’. For example, regarding hunger:

Addiction: If I still have a part of me still fully identified as being (not having) hunger, then this may result in me having trouble regulating my diet and weight, resulting in extreme cases as obesity
Allergy: If I have dissociated myself from hunger, then I may be out of touch with my basic hunger needs, not eating properly and being underweight or undernourished. In extreme cases this might manifest in anorexia or bulimia

Sometimes also you may notice a fusion-confusion type experience with your environment or in your relationships. Public spaces become confusing as your senses ‘merge’ with them, or the emotional space between yourself and others becomes very blurred and difficult to regulate. Some of this may be due to a part of self that has been left behind at the primal stage.

Clearing up to grow up more fully using mindfulness

From a mindfulness-as-therapy point of view, the essential method is quite simple; you bring to mind basic needs like hunger, thirst, as well as experiences of ‘fusion-confusion’ mentioned above (separately, not all at once!), and practice mindfully observing them, and your relationship to them. The making subjects into objects nature of mindfulness will naturally help start to clear up any allergies or addictions that may remain at this stage…

My personal experience of being mindful with this stage

Regarding basic appetites I discovered that I tend toward the “allergy” relationship to food, I usually have trouble keeping up my weight, and eating is a discipline rather than a joy. So, it helped me re-balance that which was useful.
Secondly the revisiting the fusion-confusion stage resulted in me feeling a surprising increase in clarity regarding my environmental and relational awareness.

Integrating, transcending & including

A healthy integration of your primal-self* enables you to create healthy self-regulation of your basic needs & appetites. It also helps create a clear distinction of self from others & environment. We have a healthier ‘separate’ self-sense, but can engage (and withdraw from) conscious ‘fusion’ when appropriate.

I’d encourage you to spend some time with this as a practice, it seems initially that we should all have grown fully out or this stage. But if you look at problems humans have around basic appetites and self-regulation like food, we can see that there are huge imbalances there. You may be surprised at how powerful and transformative it is for you. It certainly was for me!

*In integral psychology this is level 1 of human psychological development, and termed ‘Infrared archaic’

Related content: Subjects to objects – How meditation helps you grow to greater degrees of freedom

Article & content © Toby Ouvry 2024, you are welcome to use or share this article, but please cite Toby as the source and include reference to his website www.tobyouvry.com

All upcoming classes and workshops at IMA:

Ongoing – Weekly Tuesday, Wednesday Online class schedule

Ongoing on Wednesday’s, 7.30-8.30pm – Wednesday Meditation for stress transformation and positive energy with Toby (Bukit Timah)

Tags inner growth, integral meditation, integral meditation asia, integral mindfulness, meditation, meditation in singapore, mindfulness, mindfulness in Singapore, mindfulness meditation, power of mind, primal mindfulness, psychological mindfulness

A Mind of Ease Inner vision Integral Meditation Meditation techniques mind body connection Mindful Breathing Mindfulness Presence and being present

Using mindful flow to train in strengths-building

Post author By Toby
Post date February 20, 2024

“Using mindful-flow to develop particular inner-strengths can rapidly accelerate the pace at which we can grow them. What would normally take much longer, mindful-flow enables us to assimilate with confidence in a much shorter period”

Dear Integral Meditators,

This week’s article looks at a major foundation of integral meditation practice, mindful-flow, what it is and how to go about starting to use it in your life.
If you enjoy it, then do consider coming along to this Saturday’s Deep-dive meditation mini-retreat, where we will be putting mindful-flow to good use!

This week’s Tues & Weds evening class is on the art of non-thinking.

In the spirit of flow,

Toby

Using mindful flow to train in strengths-building

What is mindful flow?

Mindful flow is a method of concentration that meditators use to remain present in their practice, and stay present for extended periods. It consists of two complementary qualities:

The quality of focus
The quality of relaxation

Often when people begin meditation, they try a bit too hard to focus, which means they then have difficulty relaxing, which then means their mind has difficulty settling into meditative presence. Other people relax a bit too much and find themselves falling asleep, which is the other end of the spectrum. So good quality mindful concentration contains the alertness of focus, in combination with the ‘flow’ of relaxation, hence mindful-flow. If complete relaxation to the point of sleep is a 0, and absolute effortful focus is a 10, in meditation we are generally trying to stay somewhere within the 4-6 range.

Building the technique of mindful flow

Generally, I recommend specifically developing your practice of mindful flow as an exercise, which can be done using a simple breathing technique:

Breathing naturally, as you breathe in, emphasize focusing your attention on your in-breath. You can focus on a particular area of the breathing (like the movement of the belly for example), or the overall sensation of it.
As you breathe out, emphasize relaxing your body and mind. If you are aware of particular areas of tension in the body, you can be specific in relaxing those body parts.

You can practice mindful flow continuously for 5-10minutes, or if you like you can do it in sets, for example:

3-5 breaths of mindful flow, followed by a short pause, and when you are ready repeat.

I find that this second technique is quite useful, because it encourages you to really focus well for those 3-5 breaths!

Using mindful flow to bring strengths & strength-combinationsOnce you have practiced mindful flow, and got a sense of that balance of focus and relaxation, you can then use it to build strengths, qualities and capacities within you. Here I am going to use gentle-determination as an example. Once you understand how to do it with one quality, you know how to do it with others. So then with gentle-determination:

For the first part, as you breathe in, connect of a sense of gentleness, as you breathe out, relax into that feeling of gentleness.
In the second part, connect to a sense of determination, perhaps about something specific in your life right now. As you breathe out, feel that sense of determination as an attitude in the mind and as an energy in the body.

In the third section, bring the qualities of gentle-determination together; as you breathe in connecting to determination, as you breathe out soften that determination with an appropriate degree of gentleness.

You can spend as much time as you like on each section, but ideally the most time would be spent with stage three, bringing the gentleness and determination together into a flow.
Dropping into a mindful-flow state and using it to develop particular strengths and qualities can rapidly accelerate the pace and depth at which we can grow them within us. What would normally take much longer to develop competency around, mindful-flow enables us to assimilate with confidence in a much shorter period of time!

Article & content © Toby Ouvry 2024, you are welcome to use or share this article, but please cite Toby as the source and include reference to his website www.tobyouvry.com

Tags inner growth, integral meditation, integral mindfulness, meditation, meditation in singapore, mindful flow, mindfulness, mindfulness in Singapore, mindfulness meditation, power of mind

A Mind of Ease Essential Spirituality Inner vision Integral Awareness Integral Meditation Life-fullness Meditating on the Self Meditation techniques Mindful Resilience Mindful Self-Leadership Mindfulness Zen Meditation

Effortless adaptation – Solving all your problems & none (II)

Post author By Toby
Post date January 22, 2024

‘Witnessing is a practice that solves your problems without changing them. They are still problems, but they are not problems in the way they were. It solves all your problems and none at the same time.’

Dear Integral Meditators,

This week’s article looks at meditative effortlessness from the perspective of witnessing practice. It’s a playful variation on a past article on ‘That which solves all your problems & none‘ from back in 2014. If you enjoy it, then it will form a central part of this week’s Tuesday & Weds meditation class. So do feel free to pop in, either live or online!

It’s a slightly longer article, so you might find it worthwhile reading it in two or three parts, coming back to it at different times…

In the spirit of the effortless,

Toby

Effortless adaptation – Solving all your problems & none (II)

You can’t master what you are over identified with

This article is about how to adapt and flow with challenges in our life in as ‘effortless’ or ergonomic manner as possible. We can divide our challenges into ‘problems’ and ‘situations’. In a previous article entitled ‘Wanting what you like, or liking what happens?’ I made the distinction between the two as follows:
“A lot of the things that we have labelled ‘problems’ in our life are more like ‘situations’. A problem is something that by definition has a solution. A situation is more a set of circumstances that we find ourself in. There may be no apparent solution to the situation, or the solution would cost more than it would be worth to ‘solve’ the problem. In this case we have to simply accept and work with what is. If we can harmonize our relationship to what ‘is’ today, meaning our situations, then chances are we will find ways to enjoy it and derive some value from it.”
If we want to solve and adapt effortlessly, a primary principle is you can’t master what you are over identified with. Here we are going to explore how to become more objective in our challenges, therefore struggling less as we adapt and solve.

The ultimate subject of consciousness

Initially in meditation (and then in daily awareness), if we look within, we can divide our consciousness into two:

The objects within consciousness, or the content that we can observe
The subject of consciousness, or that which is observing, AKA ‘the witness self’

During the day, quite often (almost always in fact), we confuse the subjects of consciousness with the objects of consciousness. We identify with our physical body and sensations, emotions, and moods. We identify with our story, our idea of who we are, as well as our beliefs and worldviews. All of these can be observed, watched, made into objects. The ‘self’ is, to use a Zen expression, ‘the ultimate subject of consciousness’. It is that within us that observes, which we can experience and be, but that we cannot watch as an object. You can rest in the witness self, but you can’t ‘see’ it. This is because it is simply consciousness itself, with no characteristics of form or time. It just ‘IS’!

Witnessing to adapt & solve

One of the beauties of sitting as the witness self is that it helps us to gradually dis-identify with the things in our consciousness that we are currently identified with. By doing this we make our challenges as well as the thoughts, feelings and beliefs associated with them objects rather than subjects. This means that its much easier to work with them and master them, because they are not ‘me’ or ‘mine’. I can be more objective, calm, strategic and (holistically) compassionate because I am not over identifying with what is going on. If you apply witnessing to any challenge, you are going thru, it will help substantially. Here are two examples from the last week:

In a conversation with a friend, I was told a story of someone who had been aggressive and racist to him. Later in the day I felt strong anger and protectiveness about this. I noticed I was strongly identified with this ‘protector/guardian/’ aspect of myself. I modulated it simply by witnessing it; making it an object of awareness rather than ‘me. This helped me to integrate the good parts of this part of my personality, without wasting energy getting caught up and attached to the energy it generated in me.
I had a discussion which verged on an argument. I noticed that there was a part of me that I identified with that was very concerned about being ‘right’. Noticing and witnessing this part of self helped me to transform it from subject to object, and accept the situation without wasting mental, emotional or verbal energy. Relatively effortlessly it helped me to keep focused on what I considered important in the day, without getting ‘trapped’ by my identification with rightness.

Through witnessing around your challenges, you can change your experience of them without much of a struggle, using the technology of witnessing. I can’t recommend highly enough building your competency around this domain of mindfulness. Life gets a lot easier, free-er and more creative, even in the face of intractable and long-term circumstances.
A final somewhat Zen sentence for you: ‘Witnessing is a practice that solves your problems without changing them. They are still problems, but they are not problems in the way they were. It solves all your problems and none at the same time.’

Article content © Toby Ouvry & Integral Meditation Asia 2024. you are welcome to share, but please cite the source, thanks! Contact info@tobyouvry.com

Tags inner growth, integral meditation, integral meditation asia, meditation, meditation in singapore, mindfulness, mindfulness in Singapore, mindfulness meditation, power of mind, witness, witness self

Awareness and insight Inner vision Insight Meditation Integral Awareness Life-fullness Meditating on the Self Meditation and Psychology Meditation techniques mind body connection Mindful Resilience Mindful Self-Leadership Mindfulness Presence and being present Shadow meditation Stress Transformation

Transcending & including – Integrating the big & the small selves

Post author By Toby
Post date November 27, 2023

Dear Integral Meditators,

This week’s article looks at the practice of transcending & including. It is an important practice for everyone, but particularly if you are on a path of inner growth, as you are actively transcending and including as your path evolves.

This week’s Tuesday & Wednesday meditation continues our journey into Therapeutic mindfulness, and will look at the theme of transcending & including. If you enjoy the article, feel free to join us!

In the spirit of inclusion,

Toby

Transcending & including – Integrating the big & the small selves

As you grow you get inwardly, as well as outwardly bigger
Babies identify only with their physical body up until around 18months. Up until the age of 4 years, we can only take a first-person perspective: ‘me’, ‘I’ & ‘mine’. Growing older as children and teenagers, we see ourself as a part of a ‘we’ space, our family, our friends, my team. If we become fully fledged rational humans, we learn to take a healthy third person perspective, an ‘it’ space, where we consider everyone to have value, and our circle of concern becomes world-centric, universal and much bigger.
As we continue this growth further onto higher levels, our self-sense gets bigger and bigger, more and more inclusive. Our ‘I’ becomes more & more universal in nature.

The principle of transcending & including
When we grow it’s not that our older, smaller selves cease to exist, it’s just that they get transcended. My child-like egoic self is still there when I grow to the next stage, it’s just that it becomes only a part of what I am, held and contextualized by the bigger, more inclusive self of the next stage. The bigger self transcends, but includes the smaller self.

The ‘transcending’ part of this means that we grow beyond our previous limited sense of who we are
The ‘include’ part of this ensures that the smaller self feels secure and honoured within the new self structure.

A simple example: Yesterday I spent quite a lot of time playing with my three year-old. This meant my ‘inner child’ coming online and me being ‘childish’! However, my child-self was held by my mature or adult self. For my daughter, she ‘is’ the child. For me as an adult I act in a child like way, but he is held by a bigger self-sense that is the adult. My adult self transcends and includes my child self.

Avoiding allergies & addictions
Transcending and including needs to be done in a healthy manner otherwise:

If I transcend the previous stage too much, instead of detaching from it healthily, I disassociate with it, it becomes an ‘allergy’, something foreign. For example if I dissociate with my inner child, outer children become incomprehensible, silly and foreign. Inwardly I lose the ability to be playful, joyful and spontaneous. I become a stiff, repressed adult, ‘allergic’ to child-like behaviour
If I include the previous stage too much, a part of my identity gets ‘stuck’ at that level. I find myself compulsively becoming child-like in some situations, the behaviours feel like ‘addictions’. I keep regressing to this level uncontrollably. To return to the child analogy, I might usually keep a good diet, but then keep sabotaging that by eating one biscuit, and then the whole packet. My self-regulation becomes periodically child-like and chaotic!

Mindful therapeutic integration
To work therapeutically with the transcend and include principle, take any part of your smaller selves as the object. For example, you could take:

Your child self
Your eating urges
A part of you very identified with a past trauma
A part of you identified with a particular belief

The list here is very large. Sitting in a mindful state you simply bring it to mind, and watch it. As Ken Wilber says, you imagine you are video -taping it as an observer. The part of you that observes simply witnesses it with a ‘transcend and include’ approach:

The ‘transcendent’ part of it means that your witness has a sense of itself as something bigger than and separate from the part of self you are observing
The ‘include’ part of it means that your witness self acknowledges, accepts, and gently embraces the smaller self.

If you do this, the idea would be that any ‘addictions’ or ‘allergies’ that you have developed to smaller parts of yourself as you have grown beyond them will gradually be released. You will find yourself in an increasingly balanced and integrated relationship to your smaller selves, free from addictions and allergies.

Related reading: Creating an inner therapeutic mindfulness space
Suppression & repression – the difference, & it’s importance
Bodies within bodies – Witnessing with your energy bodies
The body is in you – How to go into deep meditation quickly

Article content © Toby Ouvry & Integral Meditation Asia 2023. you are welcome to share, but please cite the source, thanks! Contact info@tobyouvry.com

Integral Meditation Asia

Online Courses * 1:1 Coaching * Books * Live Workshops * Corporate Mindfulness Training *Life-Coaching * Meditation Technology

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Tags inner growth, integral meditation, integral meditation asia, integral mindfulness, meditation, meditation in singapore, mindfulness, mindfulness meditation, power of mind

A Mind of Ease Awareness and insight Energy Meditation Inner vision Life-fullness Meditating on the Self meditation and creativity Meditation and Psychology Meditation techniques mind body connection Mindful Confidence Mindful Resilience Mindful Self-Leadership Mindfulness Motivation and scope Presence and being present

Effortless effort – Making everything workable

Post author By Toby
Post date November 16, 2023

“The art of Effortless-effort makes difficult things feel manageable, & effort over a long period of time sustainable, even quietly joyful”

Dear Integral Meditators,

Just starting to get my thoughts together regarding the Effortless effort – The art of doing by non-doing, a ten-week meditation course coming up in January. The article below explores a few working definitions and practices

In the spirit of skillful sustainability,

Toby

Effortless effort – Making everything workable

When Chogyam Trungpa, the famous Tibetan Buddhist Master was asked “What is Dharma?” (Dharma means the teachings of the Buddha), he replied “Dharma means that everything is workable.”
The other day I was texting a friend I hadn’t seen in a while. He asked “How is everything?” to which I replied “With acceptance, everything is workable.” This made me recall the Trungpa quote, then leading to a few thoughts about the principle of ‘Effortless effort’.
You might think about Effortless effort as a way of accepting and working with the reality that you are presented with. It is a ‘state’ of being that then leads into a way of doing that works with whatever we are facing.
‘Effortless effort’ could also be described as ‘Doing though non-doing’, also known as ‘Wei wu wei’ in Chinese (translating into ‘effortless action’). It is a philosophy of life & way of meditating found explicitly in the Zen, Chan & Taoist schools of meditation. Implicitly it is found in most of the great wisdom traditions of the world. It indicates skilful and ergonomic ways of working with life that facilitate balance, resilience, creativity & wisdom.

The feeling of Effortless effort (E-E) in the body
One of the things that I really enjoy and appreciate about E-E is the sense of flow and energy efficiency that it brings. It makes difficult things feel manageable, and effort over a long period of time sustainable, even quietly joyful.
The state of E-E can be described as a way of holding your body, as well as a state of mind. As a bodily state, here are some pointers:

The muscles are soft, with only enough tension in them to perform the presenting task. For example, if you are standing or sitting upright, the crown may be high and the body upright, but the centre of gravity is low in the belly, so that the chest and shoulders are not carrying their own weight. Hands and arms are loose, and the belly is not holding onto emotional stress.
The feeling of the inner self is one of comfort in the body, or ‘comfort in your own skin’. There is an absence of rush or panic, even, and particularly in the face of persistent stressors
The body feels at home in its environment. There is a sense that the world is a friendly place, where you are things are workable. As a sensation in the body, there is a feeling of trust in process, a sense of quiet alertness and relaxed attention

An everyday reflection
This morning I had a coaching appointment cancelled at short notice. So, I thought it would be nice to take my daughter to pre-school. I took her, but forgot to bring her nap-time bedding. I had planned to work on this article before going to work, but now I had no time, because I had to go back to the school. Pausing, relaxing, and working on the principle that ‘everything is workable’, I transferred the article from my computer to my phone, and use the extra time on public transport to continue to edit my article. Through-out the process, I simply focused on staying calm, feeling flexible and accepting. Having come up with a simple battle-plan, I relaxed into it’s execution. I consciously worked on being smooth and ergonomic, working with the situation rather than fighting it.
This is a very simple example, but hopefully it gives you a feeling for how to start working with E-E in everyday situations. If you can practice daily actions with E-E, then you will burn up a lot less energy, and arrive at the evening feeling less fatigued, with your mood more positively disposed. A final point, if you get good at E-E during the day, when you sit down to meditate, you will find that you are already near a state of meditation, and that moving into formal meditation feels more like slipping into a warm bath; a natural, easy transition from doing to being!

Related reading: Working Samadhi – The way of the mindful warrior
Mindful ergonomics – Making the most of your energy

Article content © Toby Ouvry & Integral Meditation Asia 2023. you are welcome to share, but please cite the source, thanks! Contact info@tobyouvry.com

In case you missed this week’s other article: Shamanic meditation – Psychopomping & other non-ordinary adventures

Shamanic meditation, often described as ‘Shamanic journeying’ occurs mainly in the dream state, which is to say the psychic and subtle levels of mind. You might think of shamanic meditation as a type of ‘conscious dreaming’ done whilst meditating…read full article

Integral Meditation Asia

Online Courses * 1:1 Coaching * Books * Live Workshops * Corporate Mindfulness Training *Life-Coaching * Meditation Technology

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Tags inner growth, integral meditation, integral meditation asia, integral mindfulness, meditation, meditation in singapore, mindfulness, mindfulness in Singapore, mindfulness meditation, power of mind

Awareness and insight Concentration creative imagery Energy Meditation Inner vision Integral Awareness Integrating Ego, Soul and Spirit Life-fullness Meditating on the Self Meditation techniques mind body connection Mindful Confidence Mindful Resilience Mindful Self-Leadership Mindfulness

The conscious-self – Your inner CEO

Post author By Toby
Post date November 6, 2023

“Your Conscious-self is: The captain of your inner ship directing the crew, The CEO of your consciousness, setting the direction of your inner organization, & the conductor of your inner orchestra, co-ordinating all the different sub-elements of the self into a coherent unity”

Dear Integral Meditators,

This week’s article explores the theme of the Conscious-self, and it’s importance in the health and wellbeing of our self-sense and personality. If you enjoy it, then do consider coming along to the Mindful Presence Masterclass & group coaching: The Inquisitive Sumo Wrestler – Turning up to life calm & curious , where we will be looking at mindfulness practices to create a high-functioning Conscious self.

If you like you can combine the Masterclass with the Qi gong class as an Integral Life Practice Session. It’s a morning you will come out of feeling at the top of your game!

In the spirit of your inner CEO,

Toby

The Conscious-self – Captain of your ship & CEO of your body-mind

The Conscious-self is that part of you that is aware in the present, and of what it finds in the present moment. This includes:

Sensory orientation in your environment
Co-ordinating what is going in within the body
Content of mind; thoughts, emotions, patterns of mental activity
The activity of your subconscious mind
Awareness of awareness itself, and where we are directing it through attention in any given moment

The Conscious-self is responsible for the wellbeing of our body, mind, and emotions. It oversees our choices and decision-making process. It is in charge of how we deploy our energy and resources. It is in charge of our life-plan and self-discipline. All the different sub-personalities that exist within ourself should be marshalled by and taken care of by the conscious-self. Think of your Conscious-self as being like:

The Captain of your Ship directing the crew
The CEO of your consciousness, setting the direction of your inner organization
The conductor of your orchestra, co-ordinating all the different sub-elements of the self into a coherent unity

The Conscious-self (C-S) is supported by your higher mind (your soul-level or philosophical/principled self), and your Overmind, or spiritual being. These appear mainly as aspects of our values, imagination & intuition that the C-S can access and refer to for guidance. The C-S is in charge of co-ordinating our ego and personality in everyday life, directing it towards a sense of effectiveness in the face of challenges, and happiness in its various forms. The Higher and Over-mind’s are like a wise inner ‘Board of directors’ that the C-S can refer to for advice and wisdom.

Leading yourself through life
The Conscious-self is, in essence the leader of your consciousness. As the leader, its main functions are:

Creating a compelling vision for the rest of the personality to follow, that can take us boldly and enthusiastically into our future from where we stand in the present
Getting the ‘buy in’ from the rest of the personality. For example, if a part of us is feeling doubtful about the vision, the C-S needs to listen and help the doubter to come along for the ride.

This leadership function is very much like the CEO of a company; The main job is envisioning the future creatively, getting the buy-in from the team, and then delegating tasks to the team members. The C-S delegates to the other parts of self, tells them what to do and why they are doing it!

Contemplation

Being present as your conscious mind – In meditation, get used to sitting and centring yourself in your conscious-self. Practice being present to the content of your consciousness, observing the movement of the different elements. Get used to distinguishing the C-S as the Captain and CEO in charge, and the other activities of your consciousness, which are what your C-S oversees.

Observing your relationship to choices – Notice how comfortable your C-S is with making choices and taking responsibility. Notice when you want to ‘duck’ choices, feel anxious and confused, want to give away responsibility for what you need to decide on. Work on getting more comfortable, confident, and responsible in this space.

Inspiring and supporting – From your position as the C-S, the CEO of consciousness, the captain of your ship, set an inspiring direction:

For the next 3-5 years,
For the next year, 6 months, 3 months
The next month, week, day,
For the next activity today!

Create a vision for your life that the rest of your body, mind and personality can follow. Then delegate tasks, and support your sub-selves, getting them on board and up for the program.

In conclusion, a high-functioning Conscious-self is the key to effective self-leadership, and to organizing your life effectively. The proposition would also be that the better at self-leadership you become, the better you will tend to be at outer leadership…

Article content © Toby Ouvry & Integral Meditation Asia 2023. you are welcome to share, but please cite the source, thanks! Contact info@tobyouvry.com

Integral Meditation Asia

Online Courses * 1:1 Coaching * Books * Live Workshops * Corporate Mindfulness Training *Life-Coaching * Meditation Technology

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Tags conscious self in meditation, inner CEO, inner growth, integral meditation, integral meditation asia, integral mindfulness, meditation, meditation in singapore, mindfulness, mindfulness in Singapore, mindfulness meditation, power of mind

Awareness and insight Enlightened Flow Insight Meditation Integral Awareness Integrating Ego, Soul and Spirit Life-fullness Meditation and Psychology mind body connection Mindful Resilience Mindfulness Presence and being present

Fourteen levels of mindful intention

Post author By Toby
Post date October 3, 2023

“We almost always have an intention, even in our dreams. That intention drives our actions & acts as the context for our experiences, shaping them substantially. What intentions have you been oriented around today, & how have they been shaping your experiences and actions?”

Dear Integral Meditators,

One way you could define mindfulness is ‘Living with conscious intentionally’. The article below unpacks some aspects of this, I hope you enjoy it!

The Therapeutic mindfulness course is ongoing, with this weeks class focusing on ‘Positive Acceptance vs resignation, repression vs suppression – Understanding the dynamic of good quality therapeutic mindfulness‘.

Heads up for this Saturday morning’s Monthly Qi Gong & Taoist Breathwork Clinic & Mini-retreat, & for the main event for October, theIntegral Meditation Two Day Retreat on the weekend of the 28/29th.

In the spirit of intention,

Toby

Fourteen types & levels of mindful intention

We almost always have an intention, even in our dreams. Some of these intentions are conscious, some of them are unconscious. These intentions drive our actions & acts as the context for our experiences, shaping them substantially. What intentions have you been oriented around today, and how have they been shaping your experiences and actions?

One way you could define mindfulness is ‘Living with conscious intentionally’

When I was doing my first serious decade of meditation training back in the 90’s I was working with Tibetan Buddhism as a practice vehicle. One of the main practices was a series of twenty one practices called the ‘Lamrim’ or ‘stages of the path. Each stage was had a particular meditation object associated with it. What was interesting was that twenty of the twenty one meditations was about developing a specific intention, which shows you how important intention is in meditation in general, and in Tibetan Buddhism in particular. What I have done in this article is condense the twenty intentions into fourteen, in a way that can be understood and explored by anyone. The premise is that any one of these intentions will cause us to think, feel and act in ways that are beneficial both to ourselves and others. Our actions follow our intentions and thoughts. If you change your intention, you change your life, literally.

The fourteen levels of intention:

The intention to seek out reliable guides who can provide us with reliable wisdom in the important areas of our life
To recognize and appreciate the amazing opportunity of a human life and use it in the most meaningful manner
Mindful of death and impermanence, to not waste our life on meaningless distractions, rather to ‘carpe diem’; seize the day!
To seek out communities and people who have integrity and can provide us with genuine refuge from suffering, and ‘sail together’ to happiness and wellbeing
To be mindful of our actions and the effects that they have in our life. To avoid thoughtless, counter-productive actions, and engage in ‘constructive’ life-enhancing ones
To practice healthy detachment regarding our desires, and pursue more and more reliable forms of fulfilment, freedom, and wellbeing
To cultivate equanimity and even-mindedness, both in our pursuit of success, and in our treatment of others
To cultivate loving kindness toward ourself, our community and all living beings as far as possible
To wish ourself and others true and lasting happiness
The intention of compassion: To wish ourself and others to be free from needless pain and suffering
The active intention to relieve the suffering & pain of ourself
The active intention to relieve the suffering & pain of others, in fact all living beings
The active intention to give happiness and joy to others, in fact all living beings
The determination to realize enlightenment or awakening ourself, in order to fulfil our intention to relieve the suffering of all others, and bring them true and lasting happiness

Intentions 1-6 are primarily focused on ourself, 7-14 progressively lead us to a concern for others; from our ‘close circle’ (friends, family, colleagues) progressively to include all living beings.
The final intention ‘to realize enlightenment and awakening’ means something specific in Tibetan Buddhism. But it can equally be interpreted as simply to become the wisest, most capable person you can be in order to benefit to the evolution of the world. Dwelling upon each of these intentions mindfully can lead us to some powerful, pro-active places within ourselves, you can work with them systematically, or just drop into the ones that catch your attention as you read through.

Article © Toby Ouvry 2023, you are welcome to use or share this article, but please cite Toby as the source and include reference to his website www.tobyouvry.com

In case you missed last week’s articles:

Tree of Life – The union of ego, soul & spirit
&
Distinguishing suppression & repression

All upcoming classes and workshops at IMA:

Ongoing – Weekly Tuesday, Wednesday Online class schedule

Ongoing on Wednesday’s, 7.30-8.30pm – Wednesday Meditation for stress transformation and positive energy with Toby (Bukit Timah)

Ongoing on Tuesday evenings, 7.30-8.30pm – Tuesday Meditation for stress transformation and positive energy with Toby (East Coast)

Ongoing – Re-discovering your inner vitality & joie-de-vivre – An introduction to integrative therapeutic mindfulness & meditation

Saturday October 7th, 9.30-11.30am – Monthly Qi Gong & Taoist Breathwork Clinic & Mini-retreat

Saturday & Sunday October 28th & 29th – Integral Meditation Two Day Retreat

Tues/Weds Oct 31^st, Nov 1^st – Seasonal class: Samhain – Healing the wounds & receiving the gifts of our ancestors

Tues/Weds Nov 14^th/15^th – Seasonal class: Deepavali -connecting to your inner light

Sat/Sun Nov 25th/26th, 9.30am-1pm – Shamanic meditation workshop retreat

Integral Meditation Asia

Online Courses * 1:1 Coaching * Books * Live Workshops * Corporate Mindfulness Training *Life-Coaching * Meditation Technology

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Tags inner growth, integral meditation, integral meditation asia, integral mindfulness, intention, meditation, meditation in singapore, mindful intention, mindfulness, mindfulness in Singapore, mindfulness meditation, power of mind

A Mind of Ease Insight Meditation Integral Awareness Life-fullness Meditating on the Self Meditation and Psychology Meditation techniques Mindfulness Presence and being present Stress Transformation Using the Energy of Negative Emotions

Creating an inner therapeutic mindfulness space – six positions

Post author By Toby
Post date August 28, 2023

Dear Integral Meditators,

On the 26th/27th September I will be starting a 10 module program – “An introduction to integrative therapeutic mindfulness & meditation – Re-discovering your inner vitality & joie-de-vivre“, the article below explores how we can create a context for mindfulness as a therapeutic practice. Many of the positions below I’ve written about reasonably extensively before, but the ordering of them is specific to doing therapeutic mindfulness.

If you enjoy the article I invite you to click on the link & find our more about the course!

In the spirit of our inner support system,

Toby

Creating an inner therapeutic mindfulness space – six positions

The purpose of therapeutic mindfulness is to go back to previous stages in our development in order to reconnect to feelings, emotions, body sensations and memories that we have repressed, denied, and lost touch with. The healthy re-integration of these experiences sets the scene for a renewed sense of wellbeing within our present life. It also lays the foundation for then exploring the higher, deeper levels of meditation states (psychic, subtle, causal, non-dual) in a way that is balanced and sustainable. Below are a set of qualities to cultivate when engaging in therapeutic mindfulness. Each one of them has benefits in an of themselves, but practiced together they make for a good combination within which we can then go on to do some inner healing work.

Grounding in the senses – Work that involves contacting potentially volatile emotions or feelings needs to be done whilst grounded enough in the present moment in order to feel the stability of our senses supporting us, so that we don’t feel completely ‘carried away’ by the experience.
Safety – Repressed emotions can feel dangerous, so connecting to the basic safety of this moment – recognizing that there are no immanent threats to our present wellbeing – is a fundamental position to be familiar with.
Warmth & compassion – Establishing as far as we can a feeling of basic warmth and compassion toward ourselves at the beginning of the session, and as we encounter our experiences during the TM session.
Appreciation – Having an appropriate sense of our life being a good place with the existence of people, places and experiences that make it rich and enjoyable. This then means that when we encounter challenges in our therapeutic mindfulness practice, it is always contextualized by this sense of overall appreciation/ positivity.
Curiosity & courage – TM can feel like heavy work sometimes, so cultivating a sense of lightness and curiosity is helpful in this regard. It helps us avoid getting overly caught up and identified in the experience. Similarly, courage can help us hugely as, by its nature TM involves contact and sometimes confrontation with parts of us that we fear or would otherwise wish to avoid. This doesn’t mean you have to be some kind of big hero, just that you have whatever courage you possess present and available to you when doing TM.
A sense of being supported – It can be useful if you have any belief or sense of a higher, deeper supporting being or intelligence to invoke or feel the presence of it/her/him before you engage in therapeutic mindfulness practice. This is personal and can be done any way that the practitioner finds acceptable or appropriate.

With these six positions available to you and in place, you should then feel confident in engaging in any kind of therapeutic mindfulness practice that you might want to, with a sense of these qualities supporting and enhancing your practice.

© Toby Ouvry 2022, you are welcome to use or share this article, but please cite Toby as the source and include reference to his website www.tobyouvry.com