Hay House Radio Episode Recap
- Episode Name: “Zen and the Art of Healing”
- Live Broadcast: August 22nd, 2016 at 3:00 pm Pacific Time
Episode Replays: Mondays at 11:00 pm Pacific Time / 2:00 am Eastern Time and Sundays at 2:00 pm Pacific Time / 5:00 pm Eastern Time
Episode Summary Re-cap
How do you relax enough to allow your healing to begin?
Join us as davidji reveals how to channel your inner calm so that your body receives the signals it needs to rest, rejuvenate and heal. Stress is the biggest hurdle to good health. Learn how to let it go so you can thrive!
Special Guest: davidji. davidji is an internationally recognized stress-management expert, corporate trainer, meditation teacher, and author of the critically acclaimed and Amazon #1 Bestseller, destressifying: The Real-World Guide to Personal Empowerment, Lasting Fulfillment, and Peace of Mind; and Secrets of Meditation: A Practical Guide to Inner Peace & Personal Transformation, winner of the Nautilus Book Award.
He is credited with creating the 21-day meditation process, which spawned hundreds of 21-day meditation experiences & challenges around the world. Often referred to as the Velvet Voice of Stillness, he can be heard on more than 500 guided meditations, available on iTunes, Amazon.com, HayHouse.com, GooglePlay, Spotify, Pandora, SoundCloud, & on davidji.com.
After a 20-year career in business, finance, and mergers and acquisitions, davidji began a new journey to wholeness, which he found through meditation. He apprenticed under Drs. Deepak Chopra and David Simon, serving as the Chopra Center COO, Lead Educator and then as the first Dean of Chopra Center University, training more than 200,000 people to meditate and certifying more than 1,000 meditation teachers.
He has since left the Chopra Center to travel the world teaching the practical integration of meditation, mindfulness, conscious choice making, and ancient wisdom into our real-world, modern-day experiences. For more than 12 years davidji has helped thousands of people around the world to be more reflective and less reflexive, make better decisions, sleep better, enhance their relationships, experience abundance, and live a purpose-driven life.
davidji is a certified Vedic Master, and every month, throughout the world, he hosts empowerment workshops, life-change immersions, exotic spiritual retreats, and teacher trainings.
He has a passion for working with those in high-pressure situations, including members of the military, special forces, law enforcement, business leaders, and those in crisis.
He is the developer of the Blue Courage Awareness Training curriculum, which empowers police throughout the U.S., and teaches them present-moment life tools in their quest for safety, nobility, resilience and guardianship. His teachings on stress release, conflict resolution, and mindfulness are now practiced in some of the largest precincts and police academies in the country.
Join the davidji Meditation Community and receive tools, tips, techniques, and free, weekly, guided meditations.
Listen to davidji’s Hay House Radio Program: LIVE! from the SweetSpot
Upcoming Events with davidji:
Zen & The Art of Healing: Tips for destressifying
Tips from davidji’s book, destressifying:
Stress is in the eye of the beholder. It’s all in the interpretation. How you respond to stress determines if it will have a detrimental effect on your health. Since more than 80% of illness and disease stems from stress, it can be so empowering to know that we can change our response to stress and become more resilient.
Become aware of the 4 main needs that everyone has. We get stressed when our needs aren’t met:
- Attention – being seen and recognized.
- Affection – a pat on the back, love.
- Appreciation – we all want someone to say “nice job!”
- Acceptance – wanting to belong
no equipment needed…If you don’t have your needs met, how do you respond? Many people respond with a fight or flight response. Fight or flight diverts your sympathetic nervous system from digestion, immunity, hormone balance and instead, sends it to your extremities so that you can run from danger. So your vitality is hijacked. When this stress is chronic, it sets up a cascade that can lead to illness, anxiety, depression, insomnia and more.
The good news is that you can bring your body, mind and spirit back to health and vitality by simply slowing down. As davidji said – “no equipment needed!”
Choose a Pattern Interrupt
Stop and be aware of how you are interpreting stress. How do you respond when your needs are not met? What if you stopped and took a few breaths, got quiet, then responded from that still place?
Choose a Point of Focus & Slow Things Down
We used chocolate to do a 5-minute mediation, taking each bite very slowly. This was a wonderful focal point because we used all of our senses and slowed everything down. One or two bites were more satisfying than eating a whole chocolate bar because when you eat slowly and mindfully, you give your taste buds – and all of your senses – a chance to send signals to your brain.
- Chocolate has been shown, in many studies, to reduce stress and stimulate the reward brain chemical called dopamine. This can bring a feeling of deep satisfaction. When you choose a healthy, dark chocolate, you are giving your body magnesium, which most people are deficient it. This kind of gives the brain a nice reboot, along with reducing stress and calming the body and mind.
- Choosing a healthy chocolate is important. Studies show that dark chocolate is best. You might look for chocolate that does not have refined sugar or other chemicals you can’t pronounce. We used a dairy-free, vegan organic chocolate called Lulu’s chocolate, which uses low glycemic coconut palm sugar. This can help to keep your blood sugar levels stable, which is key for keeping you focused on your goals (stable blood sugar leads to better willpower and decision-making!).
- Chocolate is often thought to open the “third eye chakra” or 6th chakra, which refers to the pineal gland. There is some truth to this as studies show that magnesium-rich chocolate can combat overly high levels of calcium that can lodge in the brain and create memory issues, Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. This makes chocolate a wonderful accompaniment to meditation!
- You don’t have to use chocolate! You can use a strawberry, other foods or even your breath. Choose a focal point that works for you. See below for more.
Tips to Fit Meditation into Your Life
Start Your Day by Connecting to Stillness and Silence
This can set the tone for your day. From the moment we come out of the womb to the moment we take our first breath, we are in a world of activity. When you connect to stillness and science, you connect to the space between your thoughts, words and actions, allowing them to be more conscious and nourishing. This allows you to trust that you have the answers – you have what you need within.
Meditating or simply becoming aware of your breath or a point of focus, allows your brain to tap into your inner wisdom. In this way, we can be more purposeful, rather than knee-jerk in our reactions.
Everything Starts with Awareness
Become aware of the present moment for 16 seconds. Choose something simple that you are annoyed about. Maybe it’s a person or situation, nothing too deep, just choose something. Now close your eyes, take a long, slow deep breath in for 4 counts, hold it there and continue to witness it for 4 counts. Now, exhale for 4 counts and hold the breath out for 4 counts, watching it and witnessing your breath as you exhale. In those 16 seconds, you were not thinking about that irritation! Just by shifting your attention into the present moment, you are able to focus your attention on it. This point of awareness allows you to bring more ideas in.
Focus on Your Breath
We don’t breath enough! Try this exercise: take a breath in, hold it for 4 counts, then release and hold the out breath for 4 counts. On your next breath, inhale and hold for 5 counts. Then exhale and hold the out breath for 5 counts. Repeat with 6 counts in and out, then 7 counts in and out. This is another great breathing technique to connect you to stillness. You are meditating! You can do this at your desk, in the car (with eyes open, of course!) or any time of day to reboot.
Use Your Phone or Computer for Sending Love and Positivity
Thinking of you and sending love…Stop for a minute and send a text to someone. Maybe someone you haven’t spoken to in awhile or have had a fight with. A message like, “Thinking of you and sending love.” Something as simple as this can send a ripple effect of love and positivity into the world.
Recognize that There is No “Perfect Way”
Choose whatever type of meditation works for you, music, breathing, walking in nature – just give yourself time to be in stillness. Everyone has thoughts. If you are meditating and a thought comes in, notice it and trust that this is okay! See if you can go back to your focal point.
Notice What it Feels Like to Slow Down
We often think we have to do more. What would it be like to slow down? Experiment with slowing down and being aware of everything. Stop multi-tasking and do one thing at a time. See how that feels. Over time, you may even notice you get more done or make better choices by slowing down.
Nutritional Supports for Reducing Stress & Getting Still and Grounded
- Vitamin B Complex – Your B vitamins are the first vitamins that get dumped when under stress. If you become deficient, you can feel even more stressed, depressed, wound up or overwhelmed. This can set the stage for mood issues or addictions. A good natural vitamin B complex, like PerfectSupplements.com Dessicated Liver or Innate Response Vitamin B complex can help. Some people may need to look at higher doses of certain vitamins that get deficient under chronic stress, addictions or digestive issues, such as vitamin B12 (like Seeking Health brand Active B12, methyl folate (active folate, like Seeking Health Optimal Liposomal 5-MTHF or Thorne 5-MTHF) and vitamin B6 (e.g., Pure Encapsulations P5P 50, which is an active form of B6).
- Minerals – minerals are your anti-stress nutrient of choice! If you are low energy, tired and wired or you find yourself stressed more than ever over small things, minerals are an easy way to come back into balance. You can put ¼ teaspoon sea salt into a cup of water and drink that (add lemon if you like) or use a liquid mineral supplement like Anderson’s Sea MD or ConcenTrace.
- Keep your blood sugar stable – Listen to your body for how hunger shows up for you. Some people have lost their connection to their natural appetite. If this is you, davidji’s chocolate meditation is a great way to learn to eat your meals mindfully and bring back your rapport with your natural appetite and your body’s experience with food. If you keep your blood sugar stable, it’s easier to focus on your goals. This means you can make a commitment to meditation, awareness, slowing down, using pattern interrupts and stick to them more often! Blood sugar levels are your body’s built-in willpower system. When blood sugar goes too low, we lose steam to get what we want done in the world. If this sounds like you, here’s a great blood sugar balancer recipe.
Listen Again!
Hay House Wisdom Community Members can listen to this show again anytime, and you can download and podcast this and over 10,000 archived audios from your favorite authors.
Tune in Next Week
Tune in next week to Loving Yourself to Great Health, Jessica Ortner, best-stelling author of The Tapping Solution for Weight Loss & Body Confidence, will join me as we discuss How to Make Every Day an Adventure in Happiness so you can stress less and enjoy life more!
JOIN ME EVERY TUESDAY AT 12PM PACIFIC
Latest posts by Heather Dane (see all)
- Listening to Your Gut and Heart - April 24, 2019
- Breaking Through Resistance: Following Creative Energy - April 16, 2019
- Love Intuition: Follow the Energy to True Love - April 10, 2019