PICK UP ONE SMALL STONE

From the April 2026 issue of Mamaroneck Living

The Spring Equinox is an invitation to pause and reflect. It invites balance. (The sun rises due east and sets due west on two days a year, the Spring and Autumn Equinoxes. Day and night are equal length on the Equinox.) It also invites connection to the wider web of life - to nature and to all the people who have celebrated the Spring Equinox for thousands of years, from Macchu Pichu to Cambodia to Ireland and more. This 17-minute contemplation practice is an invitation to

"You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection." — Buddha Before I had back surgery two years ago, I would have tried anything, ANYTHING to avoid surgery. Now, with 20/20 hindsight, I'm SO grateful to have had the surgery. But, the fact is I was a nervous wreck anticipating the surgery. As part of my panicked attempt to do anything other than surgery, I got on the phone and called around to every acupuncturist in the area. One acupun

Thank you to Mamaroneck Living magazine for publishing this article in their February issue. Download a PDF of the article here: Find two self-compassion meditations to practice here .

Self-Compassion is a really powerful way to help yourself (heal yourself) during moments of suffering. Our go-to behavior (I'll just speak for myself) might be to beat ourselves up when we make mistakes or things go wrong. But, in fact, negative self-talk and belittling actually keeps us small, scared, and unable to move forward. I have loved self-compassion as an antidote and a way to find resilience. The 3 components of self-compassion are: mindfulness, acknowledging common

"Biomimicry" is when humans mimic nature to invent solutions to our problems. A simple example is when George De Mestral, in 1948, noticed burrs stuck to his clothing as he walked through the woods and invented velcro. Mor Keshet ( https://www.morkeshet.com/ ) coined the concept of "emotional biomimicry," mimicking the metaphorical example of animals to better regulate our own emotions. For example, the snail carries her home on her back. She has enough within her, just as s

When we're busy (which is almost all the time), it's easy for our worlds to get smaller, more myopic. Stress pushes us into tunnel vision, which isn't the wisest or easiest place to live. Can we (and it's a real question - because it's not easy), take some time to "unplug" and give ourselves some space to reboot? Here's an 18-minute guided meditation , with a body scan, to give "unplugging" a try.

The "Alternate Sense Meditation" is a good tool to have in your toolbox for times of anxiety or overthinking. I recorded two variations...

We meditate not to get better at meditation, but to make the other 23.5 hours of the day more peaceful, loving, compassionate - "better," in whatever way that means to you. The practice of Loving-Kindness for Ourselves is a targeted practice for shifting our post-meditation experience. With regular practice, it starts to soften the way we interact with ourselves...and the whole world. Go to 4:23 to skip the intro and get right into the meditation.

This meditation uses Andrea Gibson's poem: All of my pain is a spider I've learned not to crush with the heel of my shoe but to guide...

Part of the beauty of meditation is that it is portable, flexible and always available. Yet, we can use rituals (doesn't need to be anything fancy) to help create a container for the experience, helping guide is into a state of "awakening to the present moment." Go to 3:23 to skip the intro and get right into the meditation.

Spring is a lot - beautiful and busy and...fill in the blank! It's a lot of stuff! This is a "yes and..." meditation that invites us to...

I hope you find this 25-minute mindfulness meditation helpful. Go to 3:27 to skip the intro.

Gratitude has a myriad of benefits: less stress less anxiety reduced depression better sleep improved relationships heart health Gratitude isn't something that some people are born with and other people don't have. But, gratitude IS something that some people practice -- and therefore have. To practice gratitude means to consciously articulate (aloud, in writing, or just in your head) what you are thankful for. Several meditations for practicing gratitude can be found at th

Meditation 1/6 on Cultivating Equanimity Equanimity is about "learning how to surf," to borrow from Jon Kabat-Zinn's quote "You can't...

15-minute RAIN meditation RAIN meditations are a tool for processing strong emotions. The acronym stands for Recognize, Allow,...

19-minute guided meditation for Spring, growth, and "new beginnings" John O'Donohue's poem "New Beginnings " starts this guided...