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A post shared by Waylon Lewis & Friends (@walkthetalkshow) on Feb 26, 2019 at 5:00pm PST

There is so much energy coursing through us all—all the time.

This is the energy of life.

The energy of being alive.

Just take a moment right now, and get quiet, and see if you can feel the space under your skin.

Can you feel that buzzing, that pulsing, that movement that is always moving through you?

This constant, dynamic movement of life is multi-dimensional. It is sensation, thought, and experience all wrapped into one, happening every single moment.

This is life.

And you are part of it.

Mindfulness and meditation are incredible practices designed to make us more aware and present to all of these goings-on. They are excellent practices that train us to increase our focus and attention, and help us learn to purposely navigate through this sometimes overwhelming multi-dimensional human experience.

Mostly, mindfulness and meditation are bringing positive effects to people who engage with these practices, such as reduced anxiety, greater ability to concentrate, and increased empathy.

However, as an instructor of mindfulness and meditation practices, one sad aspect I have observed is that many people feel that somehow they’re bad or wrong to constantly have so many thoughts, ideas, opinions, and impulses in their minds and bodies.

I know how it feels to be told that my personal inspiration is wrong.

One time, at my first meditation retreat, I told the teacher that I had this feeling that I wasn’t living up to my potential and that it haunted me. The teacher told me this was just ego, and I had to forget about it.

That was 10 years ago now—and I wasn’t able to forget about it.

There was an energy inside of me pushing me to do more—and I listened, sometimes reluctantly. I started a healing business, wrote a book, and have found an authentic path to being of service.

If I had chalked up that sense of inspiration and energy within me simply to ego, and something to disregard, I would have missed out on many special opportunities to learn and grow.

The human path is not passive. It is interactive. It is a relationship to everything going on.

It isn’t wrong at all to have these movements and impulses moving through us. It is the natural flow of life.

If you have ever been shamed for having a busy mind, I am sorry this has happened to you. I encourage you to find ways to release that shame and come into a friendly relationship with your own mind.

Because in my opinion, meditating isn’t about dismissing or avoiding the currents of words, images, dreams, and sounds that move through us; it is about embracing it all and making conscious choices about where we want to give our attention. Not every impulse or thought is something we want to follow. But some might be.

Just imagine if artists, musicians, poets, and novelists ignored their inspiration—it would be a boring, dull world, indeed.

Instead, we can think of meditation as a way to come into a conscious relationship with our thoughts, which could also be seen as coming into a conscious relationship with life itself.

The most important relationship of your life is the one with your own inner being.

Your own inner being is for you—to experience and enjoy and thrive with.

I hope you find a meditation practice that helps you strengthen this incredible relationship you are having—every moment—with all of your experience.