Talk 13: Balance Striving and Being

Talk 13: Balance Striving and Being

Author: Meditation and mindfulness daily practice to remain interested in, and remember, being present in every day life and living October 3, 2014 Duration: 22:37
The huge question of how to balance our striving in meditation practice opens a whole lot of possible things to say. In this talk however one very important point is made that before trying to work all that out, it is crucial to fully explore and surrender to single moments of allowing everything to just happen. And these moments should be kept separate from any plan, including how good it would be to do this! Including how to sustain it in time, how to stay with it, or how it relates to everyday life. Keep these special moments separate from all plans as much as possible. Then, we will be more open to the important two aspects of the rest of the question. 1. We have a planning and orienting energy, and it's there for a reason, and it can and should be used in some measure to go about our life, if it is arising for us. But we get out of balance when that energy captures our attention. 2. We don't have to figure out that balance by ourselves, life itself will show it to us and life itself will move us down the proper course. If we are open to it that may happen easier. But if we are not open, life will bite us until we get what it is telling us.

Finding a consistent space for quiet reflection can be a challenge, but I Should Be Meditating with Alan Klima offers a direct and practical path back to the present moment. This isn't about achieving a perfect state of silence, but rather cultivating a daily practice of mindful curiosity. Alan provides guided mindfulness meditations that feel like conversations with a knowledgeable friend, blending direct instruction with thoughtful discussion. You'll encounter fresh perspectives on foundational techniques-breath awareness, body scans, and loving-kindness-along with subtle tweaks and surprising approaches that can reinvigorate a routine practice. The podcast serves as a gentle, recurring nudge to remain interested in the texture of everyday life, whether you're new to meditation or have been sitting for years. Each session is designed to be a tool for personal investigation, helping to dissolve the distance between formal practice and simply living. Tune in for a blend of calm guidance and insightful talk that makes the intention to be present feel both accessible and deeply worthwhile.
Author: Language: en-us Episodes: 84

I Should Be Meditating with Alan Klima: Guided Mindfulness Meditation and Discussion
Podcast Episodes
22 Breathe into Your Emotional Core [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 0:00
Use this guided meditation to contact the layer of basic, innocent sensitivity with which we receive all the echoes and reverberations of emotion in our body.
21 Mindfulness of Thoughts [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 19:54
Wandering thoughts can be part of the meditation. Then there is no such thing as distraction! Just as important, with this noting thoughts mindfulness practice we can get increasingly clear on understanding the nature of…
20 Breathing into Your Presence guided meditation [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 25:27
Another favorite back again in a new form-- whole body breathing. And here breath meditation and the recognition of simple presence are combined in this guided audio that is a great initiation into simply being.
Talk 3: One Technique or Many? [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 26:27
Fresh perspectives are great for practice. Variety can be a spice of Meditation! This talk explores the meaning of "meditation techniques" and shows how a variety of ways of attending to our experience is immensely helpf…
18 Exploring Sensations of Change in the Body [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 22:31
This guided meditation teaches a valuable tool for seeing the motion and change in body sensations, and is worth practicing often as a way to enter into a more comfortable relationship with sensation as well as explore a…
17 Mindfulness Games [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 31:12
Playing with meditation is a natural way to stay engaged, and in these exercises you can play along with Alan at knowing and noticing thought and recognizing our awareness itself. Rather than trying to figure it out, bet…
16 Letting the Breath Go guided meditation [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 0:00
There are not only two kinds of breath: deliberate and automatic. There is a whole spectrum between and in fact our understanding of intention is much better felt, sensed, and experienced than defined in words. This brea…
Talk 2: Face the Suffering or Turn to Joy? [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 0:00
The idea can reach a meditator that we must stare straight into suffering without flinching, and also not be attached to pleasure. This is usually not a skillful idea and is not good for mindfulness practice. In this tal…
14 Awareness of our Inner Mental Attitude [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 0:00
This lesson and guided meditation practices the art of checking our inner mental attitude. It is a good lesson to go through at least once to investigate our awareness of something intimate and powerful, that colors our…
13 Feel What You Feel guided meditation ISBM [not-audio_url] [/not-audio_url]

Duration: 0:00
Delve into the intimate and subtle feelings of the heart region, use the breath to explore and bring to light what it is that we are feeling. A simple and fundamental pointing to what meditation can be: actually feel wha…