*slide background image by richard fraser, getty images

week one

Here we are, in the first week of our challenge! I wanted to start the challenge with the simplest approach to meditation in my mind, and in future weeks we can pull out some more bells and whistles. Here is this week’s meditation challenge invitation. Sometimes, less IS more!

• 7 minutes: Guided Meditation & Sama Vritti Pranayama

  • Today, we will be practicing an equal fluctuation breath-pattern as our gateway to meditation. Feel free to do the first few days of the week with the video I have recorded for you (right below this text), and maybe the last few days of the week you’d like to try this breathing pattern on your own.

  • Once you are done sitting and breathing, I would encourage you to spend just a few moments journaling or in quite contemplation. Even just writing one or two sentences on a piece of paper with whatever has come up for you in meditation can be helpful, and over the course of your meditation journey you can reflect back on your thoughts. I also know some of you love to journal, go wild! You can write as much or as little as you like.

  • Not sure what to journal about? You could journal about things you are grateful for, something you realized in your meditation, how you are feeling after meditating, something you are ready to let go of… just to name a few. In future weeks we will dive more deeply into the practice of journaling. For now, I don’t want you to worry too much about the results of meditation or the content of your writing. Simply practice, observe, and see what comes up for you.

  • Lastly, I want to acknowledge that learning to sit in quietude, practicing stillness, and even journaling can feel really awkward when you first start. If you feel strange at first, please stick with it and trust the process! We remember that meditation is a practice, it rarely comes naturally to people the first few times they try it. Over time benefits will emerge, you just have to trust.

week two

Congratulations on making it through the first week of the challenge! How was it for you? If your answer is “meditation is hard”… know that you are not alone in that feeling! This is definitely a practice that can bring up discomfort in the process of learning. This is why I am bringing you a short chat with a few of my top meditation tips and tricks. These are simple, easy-to-integrate habits/ideas you can hold around your meditation practice.

I was going to just leave it at that, but I couldn’t resist sharing another guided meditation with you from my membership library! This is a body-scan style meditation, and it is twice as long as the last one, so if you don’t have time for a full 14 minutes every day that is completely okay. You can do the guided meditation on the days you do have time, and you can always try working with self-guided meditation more on the days you don’t have the full 14 minutes to dedicate. We will dive more into cultivating a self-guided meditation practice together as well in future weeks, but the tips and tricks video could honestly help with this, too.

Happy meditating, see you next week!

week three

Wow y’all, we are officially halfway through our month-long journey! How is the practice going? This week we are taking a bit of a different approach. While the video is a bit long at 24 minutes, it isn’t a full 24-minute meditation. Class begins with more of a conversation around the benefits of a mantra and mudra practice, and then we carve out time to practice different mudras and a mantra to invoke the grounding energy of Ganesha. (So, yes, this is the deepest we have gone into yoga philosophy yet!) Once you have absorbed the information in the chat at the beginning, you can return to this video and fast forward to the actual practice portion. Or, you can practice these techniques on your own once you learn them as I mention in the video. Tune in, dive deep, and ground down in under 30 minutes of rich content.

I want to acknowledge that, while I do really encourage daily commitment, it is really okay if you haven’t been able to sit and practice every single day so far. Be kind to yourself as you are building this new habit. All good things come in time. Trust.

Next week is the final week of posting here! Since November ends a few days after the following week, I want to provide a little bonus content for you to round off the month. I will share one more meditation technique with you, as well as a video around crafting a self-guided meditation practice. Thank you for meditating with me.

Words for Ganesha Mantra (from video):
Om Gam Ganapataye Namaha

Meaning:

• Om = the great primordial sound of the universe, the force that connects us all

• Ganapateye = another word for Ganesha

• Namaha = offering salutations, honoring, etc.

  So this mantra can roughly translate to “I bow / offer salutations / honor Ganesha, the weighty one, the grounded one, the remover of obstacles”.

week four

Can you believe you are already reading the last post of our meditation challenge? It has been an absolute honor and privilege to be here with each and every one of you. I, for one, have felt such a benefit from being in this focused practice together all month. I am feeling grounded and centered, despite being in such a busy season of my life. My wish is for you to also feel some of this grounding, stabilizing energy.

You will see below that I have included some bonus content for you, since November has a few more days in it beyond next week. You will find a whopping three videos and a list of journal prompts in this week’s upload below! Enjoy a guided meditation (my favorite one of the whole challenge!), some thoughts around cultivating a self-guided meditation practice, those journal prompts, and a video to close out the challenge. Please do be sure to watch the closing video before this page moves to the membership at the end of the month!

If you enjoyed this challenge and want to keep access to these classes and 200 more, please feel free to send me an email at dulcinearosalie@gmail.com. I would be delighted to welcome you into my membership community. Please also email me or post on Instagram letting me know about your experience with this free course, I would love to hear.

With all my love,
Dulcinea

Journal Prompts for Writing Inspiration:
(as promised in the self-guided meditation practice video)

• What am I thankful for today?

• What is a thought that kept coming up during my meditation practice?

• What do I value, and how do I want to embody that today?

• What am I ready to release? What am I ready to call in?

• Write an affirmation: I am _____.

• Brain dump: write everything that is on your mind, as a way to quiet the chatter, and get those thoughts out of your head and onto the paper!

• How can I be more compassionate with myself today? With others?

• How can I be in service? How can I help the world around me?