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Meditation Teacher Training – November 2024 Online

The Integral Yoga Institute of San Francisco is offering a Meditation Teacher Training (Yoga Alliance Hours: 105 and Integral Yoga® 300-hour Program) starting November 14, 2024 taught by Swami Ramananda and Diana Meltsner and guest teacher Rich Panico M.D. The IYI is...

Reflections on Prayer

It takes a long time to learn how to pray just for the sake of praying and not for anything else, not for our own selfish desires. The reason that we obtain little satisfaction from our prayers is that they are not really sincere attempts to touch God. When we begin...

Integral Yoga Guided “Om” Meditation

Integral Yoga teacher Zac Parker leads a short guided meditation utilizing the mantra Om. This mantra is considered to be the primordial sound of the universe, representing the essence of existence and the ultimate Reality. When meditating on Om, practitioners feel...

We Are All Parts of a Whole

In the last ten years my work has been made much easier by the progress made in the fields of Neuroscience and Epigenetics. Following a great deal of scientific experimentation, significant evidence has materialized to show how the brain works and how meditation...

The Practice of Trataka Meditation

There are so many methods of meditation and Trataka meditation is among them. Even though you might have an image in your mind of what meditation is, there are actually so many ways to meditate. You can try out all the different types to see what works best for you....

Carrying Inner Peace Out into the World

It is a tradition in Integral Yoga that after daily meditation we repeat Shanti mantras, or peace prayers. These prayers are a beautiful way to end one’s formal meditation sitting and are a spiritual support in that they are affirmations of peace. The Yoga tradition...

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How Meditation Helps

How Meditation Helps

People used to think that Yoga only meant standing on the head and doing some breathing techniques. But a very important practice is meditation—working directly with the mind. After all, the body is only a concrete expression of the mind. If you change the mind, you...

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How to Meditate

How to Meditate

Learning to meditate can be overwhelming for some. The mind can feel less like a place of quiet refuge and more like Times Square. In this video, you can follow along with Yoga master Sri Swami Satchidananda's instructions (read by Saraswati Ishaya from the booklet,...

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Why I Hate Meditation

Why I Hate Meditation

I have a friend who has told me, on multiple occasions, that she cannot meditate. Up to this point, I have failed miserably to convince her otherwise. I have used all the best quotes, like the old Zen saying, “You should sit in meditation for twenty minutes every day,...

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Meditation in Action

Meditation in Action

Continuous meditation is meditation in daily life. It reminds me of the well-known tea ceremony in Japan. It’s a way of welcoming a guest into your home. And when the guest comes, you just give them a cup of tea, which we normally do, but in Japan, giving a cup of tea...

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Learning the Method of Direct Inquiry

Learning the Method of Direct Inquiry

It’s nearly impossible to calm the waves of the mind completely, but we can learn to dive under them. You don’t have to make all the waves calm. The Bhagavad Gita says that the mind gets tossed like a boat on the surface of wavy water. It’s very hard to keep the mind...

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Faith and the Crystal Clear Mind

Faith and the Crystal Clear Mind

In children, the mind is pure. It is the world that goes in and contaminates our mind, otherwise, the mind is always plain and pure, like a crystal. No mind is bad, no mind is dirty; it’s always crystal clear. But it is the proximity of the mind to other things that...

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The Undisciplined Mind

The Undisciplined Mind

A disciplined mind is your beautiful friend and a fantastic instrument. You’ll not only win God, you win everything, because when you automatically win God, you win the whole universe. An undisciplined mind can cause you to run here and there, chasing desire after...

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Who Needs Meditation?

Who Needs Meditation?

Who needs meditation? Not those who meditate the moment they sit and close their eyes. If you are already restful and peaceful, why meditate? Meditation is a sort of medication that is needed only when you feel sick. It helps those whose minds are restless. So don’t...

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