Category: Mindful Self-Leadership

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A Mind of Ease Inner vision Insight Meditation Integrating Ego, Soul and Spirit Life-fullness Meditating on the Self meditation and creativity Meditation and Psychology Mindful Confidence Mindful Resilience Mindful Self-Leadership

Mindful of – the quest for safety & excitement

“How can you start co-creating a greater sense of both safety & excitement in your life today?”

Dear Integral Meditators, 

This week’s article looks at how to transform conflicting desires into complementary desires. Its a topic that comes up quite often in my Life-fullness life coaching, and in my executive coaching, and getting a hang for it can open up lots of positive possibilties.

This week’s Wednesday & Saturday class continue our inner-smile meditation, with the focus being on ‘Meditating on the lungs & on transforming sadness/depression, cultivating courage.’ All welcome!

In the spirit of integration,

 Toby


The quest for both safety and excitement
 
Our contradictory desires
 
One of the challenges that we face to our sense of even-mindedness in life is that we have desires. Not just desires, but conflicting desires that actively seem to be pulling against each other!

  • We want safety and excitement in life
  • We want money but also plenty of free time
  • We want our body to look good, but don’t want to suffer from exertion

 
The list could go on, but I want to just double click on the safety and excitement and look at that as a primary example. One of our most feared emotions is, well, fear itself! Many of us feel uncomfortable about fear, and act to avoid it, and its subsidiaries, insecurity and anxiety. We desire safety, physically, psychologically, spiritually, and take out the element of risk, uncertainty, and danger (real or perceived). In an attempt to experience safety:
 

  • We choose to trade the hours of our day for work that pays a salary
  • We settle into a predictable romantic relationship
  • We stay with known patterns and activities in our life

 
The issue with this then becomes that our life feels boring, predictable, unexciting. This then blocks another common desire, the desire for excitement in life, for variety, change, growth, adventure! To get excitement in our life we have to create a degree of risk, an encountering of the unknown, a place where the result is not guaranteed.
 
If we aren’t careful, we find ourself locked between the horns of these two desires. Our desire for safety stifles the excitement we crave. The excitement we crave threatens our sense of safety and stability. Either way we are unhappy, or feel unhappy because it looks like a loose-loose paradigm, we feel condemned by the contradiction.
 
From contradictory to complementary – Both and, not either or
 
In my Life-fullness life coaching, and in my executive coaching, quite a lot of what I do is help people spot contradictions or conflicts in their life, and work on balancing them out, turning them into mutually enhancing polarities that can propel them toward a better experience. In the case of safety and excitement, I can create a greater sense of safety by:

  • Recognizing that I am physically safe almost all the time, and that the illusion of danger on the biological level is often merely an imbalance in my nervous system
  • I can create psychological safety by choosing to be mindful of my inner narrative, supporting myself, not attacking myself
  • I can articulate my vision of a greater intelligence in the universe that is benevolent toward me, thus learning to recognize and rest in a sense of spiritual safety

 
By cultivating in this way, I can feel more secure in life, satisfying my desire for safety. Having done this, I can then use that sense of safety to take more positive risk, and court excitement in my life! With my broader sense of safety, I can:

  • Be a bit more socially daring/entertaining, without being afraid of judgments
  • I can assert my wishes and desires for a fulfilling work life, not just staying silent and keeping on keeping on for fear of change
  • I can take up activities I am not yet good at but want to be, and not be so afraid of looking foolish as I do so

 
With my healthy sense of safety, I can cultivate MORE excitement in my life, and my desire for both becomes a mutually supporting, virtuous cycle.
How can you start co-creating a greater sense of safety and excitement in your life today?

© Toby Ouvry 2026, 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
 

Upcoming classes & workshops

Ongoing on Tuesday’s & Wednesday’s (live & online), 7.30-8.30pm – Weekly integral meditation classes

Ongoing on Saturdays, 5.30-6.45pm SG time – Saturday Integral meditation deep-dive sessions with Toby

Ongoing on Wednesdays – The inner smile – Meditations for inner regeneration & connecting to the Earth – An 8-week course

Ongoing on Saturdays – The inner smile & Earth healing deep-dive – An 8 session practice series

Saturday 25th April, 2.30-4.30pm – Mindfulness for emotional intelligence masterclass
 

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Integral Meditation Asia

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

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Awareness and insight Insight Meditation Life-fullness Meditating on the Self Meditation and Psychology Mindful Resilience Mindful Self-Leadership Presence and being present

Are you building self-esteem or self-alienation?

“What are the areas of your life that you tend to get stuck in self-alienation? How can you start using self-acceptance in these situations, strengthening your self-esteem in the process?”

Dear Integral Meditators, 

In this week’s article I look at self-alienation as an object of mindful enquiry. In my view self-alienation is a common, pervasive issue for many people. If we can start to see it, we can start to deal with it! It is a topic that comes up with regularity in both my shadow coaching work, and my therpeutic mindfulness coaching.

If the subject interests you, then you might enjoy the  Mindfulness for emotional intelligence masterclass on Saturday 25th April, 2.30-4.30pm.

In the spirit of integration,

 Toby


Are you building self-esteem or self-alienation?
 
Self-esteem is
 
One way of thinking about self esteem is as having two parts:

  • The part that considers ourself to be worthy of happiness and to have value
  • The part of us that feels capable and effective in the face of life and life’s challenges

 
If you have self-esteem as a foundational building block of your psychological experience of life, it will affect almost everything else in a positive way.
 
Self-alienation is
 
Self-Alienation happens whenever we turn away from, reject, or repress awareness of an aspect of ourself. We literally cut ourselves off from a part of who we are, and this part becomes a stranger to, or alienated from our conscious self. Nathaniel Branden wrote a book ‘The disowned self’ on the subject of all the different ways in which we alienate ourself from ourself. It mostly does not happen consciously, very few people wake up saying to themselves “Today I am going to practice self-alienation, and dis-own different parts of myself.” Nevertheless, without knowing it many of us do exactly this, without understanding that it is happening, or how we are doing it.
 
Why & how we create self-alienation when trying to create self-esteem
 
Let’s say I am deeply disappointed about not getting a job opportunity that I had interviewed for and had a good chance of getting. To protect myself from the difficult feelings and ‘lowness’ of feeling disappointed (and like a ‘loser’) I repress them, banishing them from my consciousness. By doing this I am trying to protect my self-esteem, but what I am really doing is alienating myself from the part of me that feels disappointed. This ‘disappointed self’ is the very part of me needing support and acknowledgement in that moment. Instead, I turn away from him and disown him.
In this example my instinctive efforts to protect my self-esteem actually sabotage it, and make me weaker by cutting myself off from a part of me. Secondarily, and just as importantly, sub-consciously a part of me will know that I have done this, and will know that we have ‘betrayed ourself’ on some fundamental level. This further lowers our REAL self-esteem, but tragically it has been done to protect the very self-esteem that we are damaging.
 
Self-acceptance as a route to genuine self-esteem
 
Let us say that, in the face of my disappointment over the job opportunity, instead of repressing and alienating my disappointment I turn towards it, acknowledging and accepting it. I allow myself to feel and experience my emotions, expressing a degree of understanding and care toward the part of me in pain. By bringing into consciousness the wounded part, and choosing to accept and look after it I:

  • Increase my self-esteem by displaying both courage and competency in the face of a challenge
  • I keep my personality from being divided against itself, it remains interconnected and in integrity
  • I actually pass through the disappointment much more quickly, feeling much more resilient and adaptable as a result

 
Self-acceptance becomes a route to higher self-confidence and self-esteem, preventing the disastrous (and often unconscious) results of self-alienation and dis-association.
 
What are the areas of your life that you tend to get stuck in self-alienation? How can you start using self-acceptance in these situations, strengthening your self-esteem in the process?
 
Related reading: Choosing to be on Your Own Side
Motivating Yourself to Meditate Part 2 – Meeting Your Deeper & Higher Needs Through Meditation

© Toby Ouvry 2026, 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
 

Upcoming classes & workshops

Ongoing on Tuesday’s & Wednesday’s (live & online), 7.30-8.30pm – Weekly integral meditation classes

Ongoing on Saturdays, 5.30-6.45pm SG time – Saturday Integral meditation deep-dive sessions with Toby

Ongoing on Wednesdays – The inner smile – Meditations for inner regeneration & connecting to the Earth – An 8-week course

Ongoing on Saturdays – The inner smile & Earth healing deep-dive – An 8 session practice series

Saturday 25th April, 2.30-4.30pm – Mindfulness for emotional intelligence masterclass
 

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Integral Meditation Asia

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

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Insight Meditation Integral Awareness Life-fullness Meditating on the Self Meditation and Psychology Meditation techniques mind body connection Mindful Confidence Mindful Resilience Mindful Self-Leadership Presence and being present Uncategorized

Mindfully talking, & not talking to yourself

“The most important conversations you are having are the inner ones that you are having with yourself. Has what you have been saying today inwardly helped or hindered you?”

Dear Toby, 

This week’s article looks at the inner conversation that we all have with ourselves, and how to start working with it mindfully…

A couple of free seasonal meditations coming up, the Winter solstice & new year online sessions, you are all invited!
 
In the spirit of self-talk,

Toby


Article: Mindfully talking, & not talking to yourself
 
Most of the time you are talking to yourself
 
For almost all people, there is an internal conversation we are having with ourself all the time. It is probably the most important conversation you are having because:

  • As mentioned, it is going on almost all the time, whether someone else is around or not
  • If it is working for you, it can be an almost constant source of support, encouragement, and resilience
  • If it is working against you, it is an almost constant source of discouragement, conflict, and weakness
  • You can’t escape it by running away. Unlike other people, the voice follows you wherever you go!

 
Noticing the conversation & making adjustments
 
Step one then could be to recognize the inner conversation and acknowledge its importance. This can then be a motivator to start working with it. To start working with it, we need to start to watch it and notice what’s going on as we talk to ourselves!
As in all mindfulness practice just becoming aware of it, and starting to study it as an object of consciousness can be profoundly transformative. Based on your observation, you can then practice making small, skilful interventions in the conversation that make it more balanced and useful for you. For example, there is a tremendous difference between
“You’ve just wasted half an hour procrastinating, you idiot, why do you always do that”
And:
“Its normal for me to take half an hour or so to settle into my work, lets see if I can make it just twenty minutes today!”
It’s not rocket science, but it can make a big impact, particularly if we do it regularly, and start to get the compound effect going!
 
 
Learning to suspend the conversation
 
Part of the joy of meditation of course, is to learn that you can actually switch the conversation off, what a relief! Ways to begin the conversation suspension include:

  • Watching the spaces between the words in your inner conversation, dropping into them and gradually extending them
  • Placing short pauses between your inbreath and out breath, practising suspending the conversation just for those pauses

Exercises such as there help to build familiarity with the state of silence, even when our mind is still quite active
 
Being pro-active about the conversation
 
A final method that I can’t recommend highly enough is to activate your ‘inner life-coach’. This means you are taking charge of your inner conversation and saying things to yourself that are encouraging, supportive, balanced, and wise as you go through your day. Being pro-active about this conversation when I play sport is the single best and most consistent tool I have found to bring my best performance out. But, and more importantly, if life is the sport, and today, right now is ‘game day,’ then the time to activate this capacity within yourself is now!
Sometimes it may feel like being pro-active like this takes a lot of work. But then its a lot more work living with a miserable, oppressive inner voice. So you may as well engage in the inner work that is taking you somewhere, rather than just being miserable and running round in circles!
 
Practicum

  • Set aside time to watch your inner conversation with a degree of curious objectivity
  • Practice making small skilful interventions
  • Practice ceasing the conversation for short periods
  • Cultivate your ‘inner life-coach’!

 
Related articles: Life-fullness
From ‘life is a problem and…’ to ‘life is good and…’
Trusting your inner guru
Four ways of working with your inner voice

© Toby Ouvry 2025, 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

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Awareness and insight creative imagery Inner vision Integrating Ego, Soul and Spirit Life-fullness Meditation and Art meditation and creativity Mindful Self-Leadership Motivation and scope Primal Spirituality spiritual intelligence

Getting your imagination & creativity to work for you

“Your reality is a dynamic co-creation between your imagination & your environment. Learn how to use this to open doors in life for you, rather than close them”

Dear Integral Meditators, 

This week’s article focuses on the psycho-dynamic relationship between your imagination and your environment. 
If you enjoy it, then feel free to come along to the Wednesday and Saturday bright shadow meditations, which are psycho-dynamic in the way described below. 

Heads up for the last workshop of the year, Saturday 13th December, 9am-12.30pm – Psychic & Psychological Self-defence half day workshop, also very much an ‘evolutionary magical’ focus here.
 
In the spirit of the imaginal,

Toby

Your inner magician part 2 – getting your imagination & creativity to work for you
 
In my previous article on activating your inner magician I defined your inner magician as:
“The inner magician is that part of our inner self that is both creative and magical, and that if we harness it effectively has the power to change our daily life and experience for the better”


I then went onto define magic as defined magic as:
“The higher expression of our inner magician is that part of self that is able to work with the higher, evolutionary or developmental expression of magic.”  
 
This article looks at the second and third aspect of activating our inner magician:
 
“Engaging our creative imagination consciously to ‘sculpt’ our experience of any given situation for the better,” and
 
“Not being content to let good ideas remain in our head, but actively finding ways of expressing those ideas concretely in our daily life.”
 
Aspect 2: Engaging our creative imagination consciously to ‘sculpt’ our experience of any given situation for the better
 
We think that there is a concrete reality ‘out there,’ waiting to be discovered, that has some kind of fixed or intrinsic qualities. Actually this is not quite the case. What happens is that the “bare facts” our outer reality meets our mind, which then imagines or projects its own ideas onto that outer reality.
From this we can see that what we experience in life has something to do with the “facts” of our life, but equality as much it also has to do with our imaginative response to those facts. Our reality and our imagination are in a constant process of interacting together in a psycho-dynamic manner. To work with magic is to realize the power of your imagination to co-create any given situation in your life, and leverage on that imaginative power effectively. For more on this you can read my past article “Taking your creative imagination as your object of meditation”.
Our imagination is deeply and powerfully magical, it can create great art and great bliss, or it can create our own private hell.
 
Aspect 3: Not being content to let good ideas remain in our head, but actively finding ways of expressing those ideas concretely in daily life.
 
Our inner magician realizes that any good idea that we understand, create or hear about is an INJUNCTION. An injunction is somewhere between an invitation and an obligation. This means that when we have or hear a great idea, we recognize that our understanding of this idea is INVITING us to use the idea as a practical tool with which we can change our life for the better. By virtue of understanding of the idea we could also say that we have an OBLIGATION to try and integrate that idea into our life. If we just let that idea remain in our intellect that would be a great waste right? Many of us are guilty of this; having great insights and ideas about our life, but not implementing them, thus wasting them.
So, our magical self or inner magician is delighted when good idea come our way and immediately seeks ways to start expressing these ideas in a practical way to change our life for the better.
 
Practical Work
 
If you want to follow up on this article on a practical level, here are two suggestions:
 

  1. Use the image above as an object of meditation in order to help you to intuitively connect to your own “Inner Magician”. Alternatively find a picture of a ‘magical person that resonates with you, and use that as a visual base for connecting to your IM.
  2. Observer the interaction between your imagination and inner conditioning with your outer environment. Notice how your reality is a dynamic co-creation between these two. Reflect on how to use this to open doors in life for you, rather than close them.
  3. As soon as you have or understand a good idea intellectually, immediately ask yourself “How can I make this idea a concrete, practical reality in my life?” Do whatever you can to act upon your answer to this question.

 
Related article: Connecting to your magical self or inner Magician part 1

 
© Toby Ouvry 2025, 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

Upcoming classes & workshops

Ongoing on Tuesday’s & Wednesday’s (live & online), 7.30-8.30pm – Weekly integral meditation classes

Starts Tuesday 11th & 12th November, 7.30-8.30pm – Going beyond your limitations, tapping into your hidden strengths – Meditating with your bright shadow, a 6-week course

Starts Saturday 15th November, 5.30-6.15pm SG time – Bright shadow meditation Deep-dive – A 5 session practice series

Saturday 13th December, 9am-12.30pm – Psychic & Psychological Self-defence half day workshop

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Integral Meditation Asia

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

Categories
Energy Meditation Inner vision Insight Meditation Integrating Ego, Soul and Spirit Life-fullness Meditation and Art meditation and creativity Meditation and Psychology Meditation techniques Mindful Resilience Mindful Self-Leadership

Connecting to your magical self or inner Magician

“Magic means being able to change one level of our reality by working on it from the level, or plane above it”

Dear Integral Meditators, 

This week’s article is the first part of a re-work  of an old article of mine on your ‘inner magician’, with part 2 next week. 
If you enjoy it, then you might enjoy coming along to the Wednesday and Saturday bright shadow meditations, which are magical in the way described below. 

Heads up for the last workshop of the year, Saturday 13th December, 9am-12.30pm – Psychic & Psychological Self-defence half day workshop, also very much an ‘evolutionary magical’ focus here.
 
In the spirit of your inner magician,

Toby


Connecting to your magical self or inner Magician

I have recently been working on re-titling and writing notes for some artworks that I completed back in 2005. The first of these “The Magician” you can see in the image on this page. The image itself is meant as a way of visually connecting to our “Inner Magician”. The inner magician is that part of our inner self that is both creative and magical, and that if we harness it effectively has the power to change our daily life and experience for the better.

Who or what is our inner magician? 

Here is a working definition:

“The higher expression of our inner magician is that part of self that is able to work with the higher, evolutionary or developmental expression of magic.”  

Magic in this context means the following:

1) Being able to affect or change one level of our reality by working on it from the level, or plane of reality above it.
2) Engaging our creative imagination vividly and consciously to “sculpt” our experience of any given situation for the better.
3) Not being content to let good ideas remain in our head, but actively finding ways of expressing those ideas concretely in our daily life.

Let’s take a closer look at these three aspects of magic:

1) Being able to affect or change one level of our reality by working on it from the level or plane of reality above it.
In its simplest terms this means that you use your mental or thought-based mind to change your physical and emotional reality for the better, and you use your spiritual or intuitive mind (which operates on a level beyond thought) to change your thinking patterns for the better.

A simple example might be this: 

  •  If I experience physical pain because of an injury or illness I use my thinking mind to be constructive, telling myself that the pain won’t last forever, and encouraging myself to practice patience. This is using my thoughts to positively affect my physical reality. 
  • If I find myself having repetitive dissonant thoughts about my pain and illness, then I can temporarily suspend my thinking (this is really where meditation comes into the picture) and move into a state of mind beyond thought. Doing this enables me to release the momentum of all the imbalanced thoughts that I was having, so that my mind becomes a “clean slate” so to speak which I can then replace the cycle of ‘negative’ thoughts with more appropriate and affirmative ones.
     

So, thinking mind works magic on physical world and emotions, spiritual/non-conceptual mind works to affect and control the thinking mind.

Looking at this example, you might think that this is simply working skillfully and creatively with your mind and consciousness to affect your bodily experience, but in terms of the way we are talking about it, that is exactly what a large part of functional magic is!

I’ll be posting a part 2 of this article next week, or if you like you can read the full original article here.

 
© Toby Ouvry 2025, 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

Upcoming classes & workshops

Ongoing on Tuesday’s & Wednesday’s (live & online), 7.30-8.30pm – Weekly integral meditation classes

Starts Tuesday 11th & 12th November, 7.30-8.30pm – Going beyond your limitations, tapping into your hidden strengths – Meditating with your bright shadow, a 6-week course

Starts Saturday 15th November, 5.30-6.15pm SG time – Bright shadow meditation Deep-dive – A 5 session practice series

Saturday 29th November, 7-9pm – Living Life From Your Inner Center – Meditations for Going With the Flow of the Present Moment

Saturday 13th December, 9am-12.30pm – Psychic & Psychological Self-defence half day workshop

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Integral Meditation Asia

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

Categories
A Mind of Ease Concentration creative imagery Energy Meditation meditation and creativity Meditation and Psychology Meditation techniques Mindful Self-Leadership Mindfulness Presence and being present

Squares & triangles – Mindful strengths building

“Once you know how to breathe in squares and triangles, you can create your own mindful flow practices to build the qualities & capacities that you wish”

Dear Toby, 

This week’s article looks at a practice I have evolved over the years, designed to enable creativity within a basic, consistent structure. Enjoy!

Last call for this Saturday 22nd Nov, 9am-12.30pm – Meditations for Developing the Language of Your Shadow Self Workshop
 
In the spirit of building strength,

Toby


Squares and triangles – Mindful strengths building
 
Square and triangular breathing, the basic concepts
 
Square and triangular breathing are methods where you combine your inhalation and exhalation with short pauses. The practice of pausing your breath in itself offers benefits such as: 

  • calming the nervous system, improving focus, and enhancing emotional regulation
  • increasing the amount of carbon dioxide in the blood, which reduces the excitability of the amygdala (the brain’s fear center) and promotes a sense of calm
  • greater control over the breathing process, which can lead to increased mental clarity, resilience, and better decision-making

 
Square breathing is where we place a short pause both at the top and the bottom of the breath. A well-known form of this is called box-breathing where you breathe in, pause, breathe out and pause at the bottom of the exhalation, each for a count of four, hence ‘breathing in a box’, or square.
 
With triangular breathing there is just one pause, at the bottom of the breath, hence three stages or ‘sides’ like a triangle.
 
To use these breathing forms for strengths building, we simply combine the breathing with qualities, or states of mind to build them as we breathe. For example in my Wednesday class last week we began by practising breathing in a square in the following manner to cultivate mindful flow and presence:

  • Breathing in, gathering and focusing our energy in our body
  • Pause, being focused and present
  • Breathing out, relaxing our body, relaxing into the present moment
  • Pause, holding a state of relaxed presence

We practiced with sets of three square breaths like this, with pauses in between just to enjoy the sense of being in state of focused, relaxed presence. Focused, relaxed presence are foundational strengths for building competence in meditation and mindfulness. In this practice we used square breathing to build these strengths systematically.
 
In the Saturday class last week, we opened with a triangular breathing form, where:

  • As we breathed in, we opened to a state of adventurousness
  • Breathing out, dropping into a state of calm
  • Pausing at the bottom of the breath, relaxing in a state of calm adventurousness

 
Adventurousness and calm are qualities we can use to meet our challenges and opportunities in such a way that we enjoy them where possible, and also navigate them with calm strength. The triangular breathing provides a structure to cultivate these qualities deliberately in a structured way.
 
Once you know how to breathe in squares and triangles, you can create your own mindful flow practices to build the qualities and capacities that you wish to develop in our life and work. I like to combine qualities together into polarities that balance and complement each other. From the above examples you can see:

  • Relaxed and focused
  • Adventurous calm

 
There are many, many variations that I have used over the years:

  • Engaged detachment
  • Humble self-assertion
  • Gentle courage
  • Serious lightness

And so on…
 
The great thing about meditating with squares and triangles is that you have one technique, with many variations. So, you can create variety and stimulation in your practice, whilst at the same time keeping it basically consistent and ‘the same’.
 
Related reading:
Using mindful flow to train in strengths-building
Adventuring with attention (What is a Meditator?)
Meditation wings – Five foundational meditation polarities

 
© Toby Ouvry 2025, 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

Upcoming classes & workshops

Ongoing on Tuesday’s & Wednesday’s (live & online), 7.30-8.30pm – Weekly integral meditation classes

Starts Tuesday 11th & 12th November, 7.30-8.30pm – Going beyond your limitations, tapping into your hidden strengths – Meditating with your bright shadow, a 6-week course

Starts Saturday 15th November, 5.30-6.15pm SG time – Bright shadow meditation Deep-dive – A 5 session practice series
 

21 Nov & 28th Nov, 8am-12pm – The wisdom of Zen meditation practice retreat & course, levels 1&2

Saturday 22nd November, 9am-12.30pm – Meditations for Developing the Language of Your Shadow Self Workshop

Saturday 29th November, 7-9pm – Living Life From Your Inner Center – Meditations for Going With the Flow of the Present Moment

Saturday 13th December, 9am-12.30pm – Psychic & Psychological Self-defence half day workshop

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Integral Meditation Asia

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

Categories
Energy Meditation Inner vision Integrating Ego, Soul and Spirit Life-fullness Meditating on the Self Meditation and Psychology Mindful Confidence Mindful Self-Leadership Motivation and scope Shadow meditation

Why we may repress our strengths – six reasons

“What are the ways in which I have been underestimating myself? And what is one small thing I can do today to grow into my strengths and true capability?”

Dear Integral Meditators, 

This week’s article looks at different reasons that we repress our strengths, and invites awareness of how we might start to step into these hidden capacities within us. 
If you enjoy the article, then do check out the upcoming Tuesday & Wednesday series, as well as the Saturday Deep-dive sessions on bright shadow meditation practice starting mid-November.

Also, I have a Special coaching offer: 15% off of all 1:1 shadow coaching sessions with Toby up until End November 2025. You can click the link for more details.
 
In the spirit of growing our capacity,

Toby


Why we may repress our strengths – six reasons
 
In shadow meditation we may hear quite a lot about why we would repress the ‘dark’ side of ourself, parts of us that we are afraid of or that we loathe. Look slightly deeper into shadow work and we start to see that we repress our strengths, good qualities, and talents equally strongly. Why is that? Here are six reasons:
 

  1. They may cause us pain – for example if we open to the power of our compassion, it may make us ‘vulnerable’ to or overwhelmed by the sufferings of the world.
  2. They are associated with our fears or perceived ‘bad’ qualities – For example we may associate our sense of personal power and leadership capability with being angry or dominating
  3. We are simply unfamiliar with them – For example if we have a creative talent, but come from a non-creative family, it may be beyond our idea of what we think we can or could be
  4. They run counter to our instincts or habits – For example if we are an introvert, but are potentially witty and entertaining, we may admire others with those skills, but not consider it something that we could be
  5. We associate the quality with a negative figure from our past – For example we may repress our potential for emotional care due to having had a smothering mother
  6. If we fully own and express this quality, we will stand out – or be mocked, or thought of as unconventional, or be judged in some way

 
From these six examples we start to see that it is very easy, and understandable to underestimate ourself and what we are capable. Sometimes it can be as scary or even scarier to open to how ‘big and bright’ we can be as it is to confront the dark monsters within. A further point that shadow work helps us to understand is that sometimes the dark shadows within us hides or conceal bright secrets. As with point 2 above, its easy to label something within us mistakenly, and unwittingly pay the price!
 
A short mindful question to conclude: What are the ways in which I have been underestimating myself? And what is one small thing I can do today to grow into my strengths and true capability?
 
Related articles: Id to ego, It to I; The essence of shadow integration
The bright shadow, the one who can do what you cannot do
 



Upcoming series’  on the shadow & the golden shadow

Starts Tuesday 11th & 12th November, 7.30-8.30pm – Going beyond your limitations, tapping into your hidden strengths – Meditating with your bright shadow, a 6-week course

Starts Saturday 5.30-6.15pm SG time – Bright shadow meditation Deep-dive – A 5 session practice series


Special coaching offer: 15% off of all 1:1 shadow coaching sessions with Toby up until End November 2025

In a sentence: Shadow coaching shows you how to spot your shadow self. It offers practical and accessible methods for helping to release the energy within you that has been trapped in your shadow self, so that you can live your life at its fullest, deepest potential.

 


Upcoming classes & workshops

Ongoing on Tuesday’s & Wednesday’s (live & online), 7.30-8.30pm – Weekly integral meditation classes

Ongoing Tuesday & Weds September, 7.30-8.30pm, – Integral Meditation from the Perspective of Zen – A 10 week series

Ongoing Saturdays 5.30-6.15pm – Zen meditation Deep-dive – A 10 session practice series

Saturday 25th October, 9am-12.30pm – Finding Freedom From What Holds You Back in Life: Practical meditations & techniques for working with your shadow-self

Starts Tuesday 11th & 12th November, 7.30-8.30pm – Going beyond your limitations, tapping into your hidden strengths – Meditating with your bright shadow, a 6-week course

Starts Saturday 5.30-6.15pm SG time – Bright shadow meditation Deep-dive – A 5 session practice series

21 Nov & 28th Nov, 8am-12pm – The wisdom of Zen meditation practice retreat & course, levels 1&2

Saturday 22nd November, 9am-12.30pm – Meditations for Developing the Language of Your Shadow Self Workshop

Saturday 29th November, 7-9pm – Living Life From Your Inner Center – Meditations for Going With the Flow of the Present Moment

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Integral Meditation Asia

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

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A Mind of Ease creative imagery Insight Meditation Integral Awareness Integral meditation training pages Meditation and Psychology Meditation Recordings Meditation techniques mind body connection Mindful Self-Leadership Mindfulness One Minute Mindfulness Presence and being present Primal Spirituality Zen Meditation

Scratching out your name card, & other gateways to Zen

“What might happen if you temporarily put down your identification with the job title that you carry on your name card, you just scratched it out for a while?”

Dear Integral Meditators, 

 On the 23rd of August I led a Zen meditation on the ‘Man or woman of no rank’ at the One Heart open day. This theme is one of what I like to call ‘the gateways of Zen’, you can listen to the meditation we did by clicking on the link.
 
In the article below I talk a little about the idea of the person of no rank, and share a short story related to it. If you enjoy the meditation & the article, then do consider participating in the Zen sessions that start this week, weekdays, or Saturdays, or both. You can participate in person, online or via the recordings!
 
In the spirit of label-less-ness,

Toby

PS: Full details of all events in September below article!


Scratching out your name card, & other gateways to Zen meditation
 
What might happen if you temporarily put down your identification with the job title that you carry on your name card, You just scratched it out for a while?
What would happen if you did something similar with other roles that you identify with;

  • Your family roles as a parent, child, or sibling?
  • Your identification with gender roles, nationality of culture?
  • Your age, your personality ‘type’?
  • The story that you carry around with you almost all the time?
  • What if you even forgot your name?

 
To put down your labels in this way is to become a ‘man or woman of no rank, and is one of the gateways to Zen. The traditional story below illustrates this quite vividly.
 
Zen Story: The Governor’s Card
 
In the city of Kyoto, there lived a great Zen master called Keichu. He was the head of Tofoku, a huge cathedral in the city. Keichu held sway over his jurisdiction and was well-respected for his astute perceptiveness.
When Kitagaki took over as the Governor of the city of Kyoto, he heard much about Keichu’s wisdom. Deciding to pay his respects, Kitagaki called upon Keichu one evening. Upon reaching the cathedral, Kitagaki presented his business card to Keichu’s attendant and asked for an audience with the Zen Master. The attendant asked Kitagaki to wait and went inside to give the card to Keichu.
“Master, there is someone here to see you,” the attendant announced.
“Who is it?” Keichu asked.
The attendant gave Keichu the Governor’s calling card which read: Kitagaki, Governor of Kyoto.
“I have nothing to do with this fellow!” bellowed Keichu, throwing the card in disgust. “Tell him to leave right away!” he said, turning to the attendant. The attendant picked up the calling card and dashed to the hall where Kitagaki was waiting. “My apologies, dear Sir,” he said. “The Master does not wish to see you,” he told the Governor, remorsefully returning his card.
Kitagaki was startled. He took his card and was about to leave when he read the words on his card. Realizing his folly at once, the Governor took a pencil and scratched out something from his card. “That was my mistake,” he told the attendant, giving him the calling card again. “Would you please be kind enough to ask your Master one more time?”
The attendant returned to Keichu’s chamber and handed him the Governor’s card again. The card now simply read: Kitagaki. The Governor had scratched out the words, ‘Governor of Kyoto.’
Keichu read the card and his eyes lit up.
“Oh, it is Kitagaki? Yes, I would like to see him now; send him in please!” he told his attendant.
And that’s how the Governor of Kyoto got an audience with the Zen Master Keichu.
 
Related reading: Becoming a man or woman of no rank
Meditation spaghetti western style


© Toby Ouvry 2025, 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 & workshops

Ongoing on Tuesday’s & Wednesday’s (live & online), 7.30-8.30pm – Weekly integral meditation classes
 

Tuesday 2nd & 3rd September, 7.30-8.30pm, & then weekly – Integral Meditation from the Perspective of Zen – A 10 week series

Saturday 6th September, 5.30-6.15pm, & then weekly – Zen meditation Deep-dive – A 10 session practice series

Saturday 20th September, 5.30-6.30pm – Autumn equinox balancing & renewing meditation

Saturday 20th September, 9am 12.30pm – The Six Healing sounds: Qi gong for Self-Healing & Inner Balance Workshop

 17 Oct 2025, 8am-12pm & 21 Nov 2025, 8am-12pm – The wisdom of Zen meditation practice retreat & course, levels 1&2

Saturday 29th November, 7-9pm – Living Life From Your Inner Center – Meditations for Going With the Flow of the Present Moment

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Integral Meditation Asia

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

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Awareness and insight Insight Meditation Integral Awareness Integrating Ego, Soul and Spirit Life-fullness Meditating on the Self Meditation and Psychology Mindful Confidence Mindful Resilience Mindful Self-Leadership

Being self-determining vs receiving help

“I am not the center of the universe; but I am the center of my universe”

Dear <<First Name>>, 

This week’s article explores the relationship between mindful self-responsibility & receiving help from others. Another way of thinking about this is the interface between your intra-personal dynamic (relation to self), & your inter-personal dynamic (relation to others & the world). I hope you enjoy it! 
 
In the spirit of self-determination,

Toby


Being self-determining vs receiving help
 
You are not the center of the Universe, but you are the center of your life
 
I’ve written quite a lot in the past about becoming a self-determining entity. Self-determination means recognizing that you are the most powerful force in your life (not in the universe, just your life!), and to take ownership of that power. This then enables you to direct your life creatively toward the good. It means recognizing two positions that help to balance each other:

 
Becoming self-directed
 
‘No one is coming to save me’ is one of my ‘quotes to live by’. I find that in difficult situations, stopping looking outside of myself for help and just focusing on what I can control, and what I can do for myself is both calming and empowering. It is not a shutting off from outside help, it is just a clear recognition that it’s really my job to look after my life and its direction. It’s not:

  • Not my Mum’s job
  • Not my partners
  • Not my business-partners
  • Not my children
  • Not my friends
  • Not my boss’s
  • Not my employees

It’s my job and responsibility to work through and work out the challenges in my life to the best of my ability, and I do in fact have some ability!
 
Although no one is coming to save me, many people may like to help!
 
Becoming self-directed means that we are not looking for someone outside of ourself to save us, and we are doing what we can to move forward in our life challenges. The paradox of this is that, when other people see us being like this, it is an attractive quality. People tend to like and even feel inspired by others that they see being pro-active, intentional, and taking responsibility for themselves. Consequently, even though we may not be asking for help, quite often we find friends, family and colleagues offering help and assistance freely and happily. So, there is a virtuous cycle that gets established between being self-determining and receiving help.
 
Abandoning your power, cutting yourself off from assistance?
 
There are two ‘extreme’ positions that we are trying to avoid here:

  1. Being a victim, not trying to help ourselves effectively, and over-asking, or expecting others to solve our challenges
  2. Becoming so narrow in our sense of self-determination that we cut ourself off from the assistance of others, even if it is freely offered, and would be of help to us

Being self-determining doesn’t exclude ever asking for help, or accepting it when offered. It just means that we are taking solid responsibility for ourself, and being personally pro-active. Becoming self-determining even includes getting good at asking for help when appropriate.
 
In conclusion then, being a self-determining person, and receiving / asking for help can be seen as complementary capacities that when put together make our life both easier and fuller of creative potential!
 
Related article: Becoming a Self-determining entity – Five stages to mindful self-leadership
 © Toby Ouvry 2025, 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 & workshops

Ongoing on Tuesday’s & Wednesday’s (live & online), 7.30-8.30pm – Weekly integral meditation classes

Ongoing Tuesday & Wednesday’s weekly, 7.30-8.30pm – Embodied Transformation – An integrative introduction to Tantric meditation

Ongoing on Saturdays weekly, 5.30-6.15pm – Embodied Transformation – Saturday Tantric deep-dive meditation sessions

Saturday 16th July, 9am-12.30pm – Breathwork Workshop – Improve physical health, wellbeing & inner peace though deep breathing

Saturday 23rd August, 3-4.30pm – One Heart Open Day: Sound of Zen meditation with singing bowls

Tuesday 2nd & 3rd September, 7.30-8.30pm, & then weekly – Integral Meditation from the Perspective of Zen – A 10 week series

Saturday 6th September, 5.30-6.15pm, & then weekly – Zen meditation Deep-dive – A 10 session practice series

Saturday 20th September, 5.30-6.30pm – Autumn equinox balancing & renewing meditation

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Integral Meditation Asia

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

Categories
A Mind of Ease Awareness and insight Inner vision Insight Meditation Integral Awareness Integrating Ego, Soul and Spirit Life-fullness Meditating on the Self Meditation and Psychology Meditation techniques Mindful Resilience Mindful Self-Leadership Presence and being present

Inter-connected or over-connected?

“Reduce your device time & increase time spent enquiring into interdependence to go from feeling ‘over-connected & lonely’ to ‘Inter-connected & supported’”

Dear Integral Meditators, 

I’ve recently facilitated some corporate workshops on ‘Digital Detox for Corporate Professionals: Reclaiming Focus and Productivity’. Creating this workshop & seeing people’s response to it has really opened my eye’s to how chronic the problems around overuse of devices are for us these days. In the article below I explore a simple flip to go from ‘over-connected, overwhelmed & lonely’ to ‘inter-connected & supported’. I hope you enjoy it!
 
I’m almost completed with the new meditation programs starting in August/September, you can see the full line up in the Whats On section beneath the article.
 
In the spirit of connected,

Toby


Inter-connected or over-connected?
 
What is my relationship to the world? Is a question is one worth asking yourself and seeing what sort of answers and perceptions come back to you. Your sense of your relationship to the world is fundamental, it forms the basis of most of your other perceptions, choices and experiences in life. For many people, the temptation is to experience ourself as someone coming into life from the outside, an outsider who dies not belong, and has to ‘fight’ to earn their place. Life is a battle to belong, rather than an enjoyment of your sense of already belonging.
A ’flip’ that I continue to enjoy is that of being born from life, rather than into it. To quote from a previous article on the subject:
 
“Our relationship to it is like that of an apple or a leaf to an apple tree. The apple emerges from the Life of the tree itself, not as something separate from the tree. The life of the tree gives rise to the apple. The apple arises from the tree itself, in the same way that the tree came from the life in the apple that it grew from.
You are like the apple being born from the apple tree. The life in you is a part of Life, you are an expression of Life, and Life is you.”
 
Being ‘born from life’ gives us a sense of effortless belonging, which is a great and un-lonely place to begin feeling into our connection of self-to-world.
 
Observing interdependence – Inter-connected & supported
 
We can strengthen our sense of feeling connected to the world by seeing, through contemplation, the way in which we are all interconnected. There are innumerable ways in which we can do this, to give three short examples:

  • I am writing this article on my parents dining table. To be able to use this table I rely on the carpenters that made it, the wood supplier, the trees it came from (and by implication the forest, not to mention my parents’ hospitality!
  • I can do the same thing with the computer that I am writing on; so many people involved in the supply chains that put the machine together, created the software and so forth, for me to then buy and use relatively effortlessly
  • I’ve just finished a coffee whilst writing. Again, to get the coffee to me relies upon the water from the tap, the coffee supply chain, the supermarket, the coffee plant, the land that the coffee plant grew on…

In any aspect of my life, if I start to look at the interdependence that doing what I am doing relies upon, my wisdom-eyes open, and I start to see how intimately and fully I am connected to everything else in the world. From this comes gratitude of course, but also a fundamental reduction in my loneliness. I am always inter-connected, and in this way never alone in a lonely way!
 
Over-connected & lonely
 
The above two states of being and feeling interconnected contrast sharply with the experience of many people who are what you might call ‘over-connected’ through their phones and being online all the time. Our devices enable us to be ‘connected’ and ‘in-touch’ all the time, however this experience paradoxically leads many to feel lonely, left-out (and afraid of being left out), isolated and yet compulsively over-connected.
 
A few practice points:
 

  • Reduce, and manage wisely the amount of time you stay connected to the world through your devices
  • Use the amount of time you save from reduced device time to develop the wisdom of interconnectedness and belonging outlined in sections one and two of this article. This wisdom does not need to be hard work, it’s really just about grounding yourself in the recognition of it. Your inter-connection is fed easily and gently by the recognition!

© Toby Ouvry 2025, 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 & workshops

Ongoing on Tuesday’s & Wednesday’s (live & online), 7.30-8.30pm – Weekly integral meditation classes

Ongoing Tuesday & Wednesday’s weekly, 7.30-8.30pm – Embodied Transformation – An integrative introduction to Tantric meditation

Ongoing on Saturdays weekly, 5.30-6.15pm – Embodied Transformation – Saturday Tantric deep-dive meditation sessions

Saturday 16th July, 9am-12.30pm – Breathwork Workshop – Improve physical health, wellbeing & inner peace though deep breathing

Saturday 23rd August, 3-4.30pm – One Heart Open Day: Sound of Zen meditation with singing bowls

Tuesday 2nd & 3rd September, 7.30-8.30pm, & then weekly – Integral Meditation from the Perspective of Zen – A 10 week series

Saturday 20th September, 5.30-6.30pm – Autumn equinox balancing & renewing meditation

Follow Toby on: LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram

Integral Meditation Asia

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