Hello there, and welcome to the Meditation Gym Blog!

In this episode of Meditation Gym, we explore how meditation can help us cultivate a kinder, more resilient inner world. Clinical psychologist Cameron Aggs introduces three powerful ways to think about meditation: 🔭 The Observatory – A space where we simply observe the mind in its natural state, noticing thoughts without judgment. 🏥 The Infirmary – A “time-in” space to process emotions and do our emotional laundry, helping us integrate and heal from the challenges of daily life. 🎭 The Studio – A place to train new psychological skills, like letting go of thoughts and developing self-compassion.

In this first installment, I provide a 12 point introduction  to a wonderful set of mindfulness metaphors, in which compare the task of living a human life to the complex task of sailing a ship on the open ocean.  The ship in this metaphor is You, and represents the reality that you wake up in your life (on your boat)  every morning. The external conditions such as the seas and the weather in the little model, are the life circumstances that you find yourself navigating from one day to the next. Now….  Isn’t it true that even if you wished you had a different boat and/or were sailing different waters? Yet nothing will change that you are on the boat you are on, and sail it you must, with the crew you have, with as much kindness and wisdom as you can muster? ….. And yet how to do that?