Category: meditation

meditation, yoga

Step 98: 18 Minutes of Nothing

Christa Avampato

“Most of our obstacles would melt away if, instead of cowering before them, we should make up our minds to walk boldly through them.” ~ Orison Swett Marden, American author

Tracy is my favorite yoga teacher. She exudes this amazing feeling into every one of her students that lets us all know “I get you.” She’s undeniably, beautifully herself at every moment, and so she gives us the space to be who we are at our very core. She asked us how our training and teaching is going. One of my classmates mentioned that the meditation practice is a little rough. “Is it mind junk?” Tracy asked. “Yes,” said my friend. “Lots of mind junk.”

Tracy thought for a moment and then offered us all this advice. “Sit for 18 minutes a day.” Just sit there and tell yourself that there is no way you’re getting up until that 18 minutes is over. Your mind will reel for a bit. That’s okay. Let it reel. Let it tell you that this is a waste of time, that you have a million other things to do. And then just keep sitting there. The mind will think up excuse after excuse until it finally just calms down and accepts that it is going to have to wait.

Our greatest obstacles are not “out there.” They aren’t our jobs or our friends or family or relationships or neighbors or finances. Our greatest obstacles, the great big ones that get in the way and prevent us from radiating our beauty out into the world, are inside. We house those obstacles inside our own hearts. We can’t think our way out of them. The only way to remove them is to stare them down, and we stare them down by just getting quiet and sitting and being.

It will take some time. These obstacles have been a long time in the making. We have years of mind junk layered on top of them. We need to strip away that junk, let the obstacles lie bare in our hearts, pick them up, and move them out of the way. It’s a long haul. So just start. One layer at a time. One half of a layer at a time. Whatever you can do. Sit there for 18 minutes and just see what you find. It may turn out to be the 18 best minutes of your day.

The image above is not my own. It can be found here.

dreams, meditation, yoga

Step 81: The Hand You’re Dealt

Christa Avampato

“I never worry about the hand I’ve got because I know how lucky I am to have been dealt into the game at all.” ~ ME

Meditation is a fascinating thing. I’ve been trying to do a few minutes everyday, either right when I wake up or just before I go to bed. There are a few remarkable things that have been happening since I started this practice. I’m not sure that the correlation is 100%, but I have to think that the extra yoga and meditation has something to do with it.

First of all, I’m sleeping much better, perhaps better than I ever have. For a long time I’ve struggled with insomnia, and though it hasn’t effected my productivity or health, I have worried that it’s taking a toll on me without my knowing it. The fact that I can now sleep 7 hours at a clip is a miraculous thing.

My dreams are also unfolding in an interesting way – it’s as if I am being read a story in each one. These little pearls of wisdom like the one above are spoken to me in such a dramatic way that I remember them when I wake up. They are often embedded inside dreams where I am doing something that I think should scare me, but doesn’t. For example, last night I dreamed that I was back in my old apartment building where the fire happened. I ran into my old landlord who told me that there were some items in my old apartment that I should go get. So I walked up the stairs and found items for my altar – statues of Vishnu (the preserver), Ganesha (the remover of obstacles), and Shiva (the destroyer). Jewels, gold, and silver filled my old apartment. I collected them all, my arms overflowing, and walked out of the building into the sunlight.

It’s now been over 6 months since my fire, and I can’t help thinking that it was the very best and very worst thing that ever happened to me. To lose almost everything in one breath and to gain such an appreciation and gratitude for life in the next is a tough thing to reconcile in my conscious mind. In my subconscious, in the place of dreams, I clearly understand all of the gifts that the fire gave me. It was a bad hand to be dealt, but with a lot of help I made the most of it. In the end, I am really glad that I still get to be a part of the game.

The image above depicts Shiva, the Destroyer, dancing in a ring of fire, clearing away from our lives what does not serve.

calm, health, meditation, peace, stress, yoga

My Year of Hopefulness – Stop the World, I Want to Get Off

Christa Avampato
This week has been a roller coaster. My stress level was up and down every other hour, so much so that at one point I was physically dizzy. I was joking with my friend, Denise, who was having a similar week, that my theme song should be “Stop the World, I Want to Get Off.” Then she reminded me that should be the theme song not just this week but every week.

To reduce stress and keep myself in check, I practice yoga, run, meditate, and breath. I back away from stress slowly, keeping my eye on its source so that it doesn’t sneak up on me again for a repeat performance. I think of it as a very hungry grizzly bear, something to be handled with extreme care and to diffuse by almost any means necessary.

I keep looking for ways to cut stress from my life, as if it’s some disease. The moment it rears its ugly head I want to banish it. This week I tried to appreciate stress’s occasional appearance in my life. It puts a fire under me to get something finished. In my effort to diffuse stress, I actually max out my productivity to get the job done. Stress often leads me to some of my most creative work. (I wish some scientist would do a study on stress’s effect on creativity.)

This isn’t to say that I crave stress, seek it out, or love opening up my front door to see it glaring down at me. It’s true that when it arrives, I hang my head a little low and quietly curse under my breathe “not again!” However, after a minute or two, I sit up straight, roll-up my sleeves and get to work. In the case of stress, there’s no way past it except through it. While the temptation is to step off the stress merry-go-round, there are a lot of learnings and value to be derived from its occasional visit. Our challenge is to manage through it so that it doesn’t set up camp and make itself at home in our everyday lives.

books, clarity, culture, hope, meditation

My Year of Hopefulness – Law of Attraction

Christa Avampato

I love getting daily quotes, thoughts, intentions, etc. into my inbox. I’m a loyal e-newsletter subscriber. My friend, Ken, turned me on to one put together every day by a duo that offers workshops based on ideas behind The Secret. I’m not into going to workshops, though I’m enjoying the daily quotes. 


Ken reads the daily quote first thing in the morning and then when he gets home at the end of the day. He meditates on the sentiments and meaning offered in each, and tries to be mindful of it throughout the day. I’m not saying that this is a magic potion, though it does make me feel better to read these ideas and consider them in my daily life. At this point, positive reflection on our current situation may be the best remedy. It’s a technique worth trying. You can sign up for the daily quote emails at http://www.abraham-hicks.com/lawofattractionsource/index.php

As a sample of what’s typically on offer, here is the daily quote from today:
“You are on the leading edge of thought, taking thought beyond that which it has been before. Who cares what thoughts have led up to this. You’re standing in the fresh now, and many of the thoughts that you vehemently oppose are the very thoughts that have given you the desire that has attracted the clarity of where you now stand. No matter how awful you think they might be, all were of value in the evolution forward. Every one of them.

Excerpted from a workshop in Philadelphia, PA on Tuesday, April 14th, 1998

Our Love, 
Jerry and Esther”

calm, economy, meditation, stress, yoga

Getting quiet

Christa Avampato

I am a long-time subscriber to Yoga Journal. I read it cover to cover every month. One of my favorite sections is the 10 pose sequence that has a specific focus. This month, the focus is “Inviting Quiet”. What can I say? I like a challenge.


I am a talker, a chatty Cathy in some circumstances. On the Myers-Briggs test, a couple of things stand out as truly odd. I am OFF THE CHARTS on extroversion and ambiguity. Give me a situation that is mired in ambiguity and deals with boatloads of people, and I’m as happy as a mouse in a cheese shop. 

I like engaging with people about 95% of my waking hours. And then in the other 5%, I hide away from the world. It’s important to note that without that 5% of hiding away from all humanity, that other 95% of the time with them is far less enjoyable. So while this introspection is small in quantity, the quality is critical. Yoga generates this necessary high quality.

I think about this need for quiet, even in the loudest lives, as I make my way to work each morning. There is a very short walk from my office building to my subway line. It’s not pretty, but I use it to center myself at the start and end of my day. It’s my gateway between my working life and my personal life. It is especially important in this churning economy to spend some time getting quiet, calming down our nerves, and turning inward to remind ourselves of what’s important. Getting quiet, at least for a short time, may be our only avenue through the noise all around us.   
art, calm, career, encouragement, job, meditation, peace, work

Keep Calm and Carry On

Christa Avampato

My friend, Monika, graciously hosts group dinners at her home; a small group of us are hoping to make this a regular event with each of us taking turns with the hosting duties. Yesterday, I went over to Monika’s and we were taking turns trading stories about work when I noticed a poster she just had framed. It’s reprint of a WWII British propaganda poster that reads “Keep Calm and Carry On”. I figured if the British could keep their cool during such tumultuous times, I could certainly do the same. 


At the moment I am feel a fair amount of anxiety, more than I have felt in a long time. A lot to do and not enough time to do it. All day today I’ve been working, getting things in order, and I have been concentrating on my anxiety trying to figure out how to get it to dissipate. It really is like this knot in the very pit of my stomach, and it’s casing my muscles to ache, especially in my shoulders and neck. So I sat for a few minutes on my couch, and concentrated on just breathing, just being. And remarkably I felt better despite that I hadn’t gotten any further along than I was 5 minutes before.      

I realized how much time and energy I was spending being frustrated and irritated. How much effort I was putting into my disappointment. And it was clouding my ability to see this tremendous opportunity for growth and change that was being laid at my feet. Challenging situation, yes. Impossible to get through, of course not. It’s a moment when I am rising to my potential and then some. And that is something to be grateful for, if only I can remember to “Keep Calm and Carry On”. I just ordered my poster. Get yours at:  http://www.barterbooks.co.uk/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=32036