Balanced Mind With Julie Potiker

Julie Potiker leads this Metta meditation helping you bring love, compassion, positive energy and kindness to yourself and others. The meditation concludes with a reading of the poem, "Your Mind Feels Big Today", by Ying Choon Wu.   Your Mind Feels Big Today, by Ying Choon Wu You watch as leaves skate off on a gust of wind. When you were five, you galloped—because you were a pony; because the sun made streaks across the floor; because your legs could bend and lips could whinny; because your thoughts were always flowing, flying— tail and mane—through clouds and rainbows as you tied your shoes. And now you ponder metaphors. It’s August, and the clouds are fat like jellyfish, or cupolas. You see distant sky over rust-red hills. All your life, you’ve felt you’re headed somewhere. You watch two sycamore leaves turn cartwheels side by side along the sidewalk. You still have far to go.   Get the latest on mindfulness and meditation by subscribing to Julie Potiker's YouTube channel and Facebook page at Min

Sit back, close your eyes and feel your connection to everything around you through this guided meditation led by Julie Potiker. Julie completes the meditation with a reading of the poem, "Speaking Tree", by Joy Harjo U.S. Poet Laureate. (Tu'Bishvat is the New Year for the Trees in Israel)   Speaking Tree, by Joy Harjo Some things on this earth are unspeakable:Genealogy of the broken—A shy wind threading leaves after a massacre,Or the smell of coffee and no one there— Some humans say trees are not sentient beings,But they do not understand poetry— Nor can they hear the singing of trees when they are fed byWind, or water music—Or hear their cries of anguish when they are broken and bereft— Now I am a woman longing to be a tree, planted in a moist, dark earthBetween sunrise and sunset— I cannot walk through all realms—I carry a yearning I cannot bear alone in the dark— What shall I do with all this heartache? The deepest-rooted dream of a tree is to walkEven just a little ways, from the place next to the doorwa

This guided meditation takes you on a journey through the galaxy, wherever you want to go, while in the safety of an orb. Julie Potker leads you through this guided meditation ending with a reading of the poem, "Singularity" by Marie Howe,which was composed in tribute to Stephen Hawking. SINGULARITY by Marie Howe Do you sometimes want to wake up to the singularity we once were? so compact nobody needed a bed, or food or money — nobody hiding in the school bathroom or home alone pulling open the drawer where the pills are kept. For every atom belonging to me as good Belongs to you. Remember? There was no   Nature.    No them.   No tests to determine if the elephant grieves her calf    or if the coral reef feels pain.    Trashed oceans don’t speak English or Farsi or French; would that we could wake up   to what we were — when we were ocean    and before that to when sky was earth, and animal was energy, and rock was liquid and stars were space and space was not at all — nothing before we came to believe hum

Use this guided meditation to heal the anger, sadness or confusion you may be feeling after watching the siege unfold at the U.S. Capitol. Julie Potiker finishes the meditation with a reading of  "The Cure of Troy", Seamus Heaney's version of Sophocles' Philoctetes. THE CURE OF TROYHuman beings sufferThey torture one another,They get hurt and get hard.No poem or play or songCan fully right a wrongInflicted and endured.The innocent in gaolsBeat on their bars together.A hunger-striker’s fatherStands in the graveyard dumb.The police widow in veilsFaints at the funeral home.History says, Don’t hopeOn this side of the grave…But then, once in a lifetimeThe longed-for tidal waveOf justice can rise up,And hope and history rhyme.So hope for a great sea-changeOn the far side of revenge.Believe that a further shoreIs reachable from here.Believe in miraclesAnd cures and healing wells.Call miracle self-healing:The utter, self-revealingDouble-take of feeling.If there’s fire on the mountainOr lightning and stormAnd a god sp

A gift for you on this last night of Chanukah. Julie Potiker leads this guided meditation where you'll visualize beams of love moving through your body to radiate, love, peace, ease.   Get the latest on mindfulness and meditation by subscribing to Julie Potiker's YouTube channel and Facebook page at Mindful Methods for Life. You can learn about mindfulness at www.MindfulMethodsForLife.com and also in Julie's newly released book, "Life Falls Apart, But You Don't Have To: Mindful Methods For Staying Calm In The Midst Of Chaos", available on Amazon.com. Her podcast is "Balanced Mind with Julie Potiker", available on iTunes, iHeart and other podcast platforms.

Visualize light, white light golden light to help bring healing to those around you - and also yourself. Julie Potiker ends this guided meditation with a reading of the poem, "Home Alone," by Innarenko.   Home Alone, by Innarenko My family's gone, there's no one home; It's only me - who's home alone. I should not hear a single squeak, There shouldn't even be a creak, So what's that thumping that I hear? It must mean one thing: death is near. "You're an adult, you'll be just fine", I tell myself as I dial "nine".. Was that a knock upon the door? My heart beats faster than before. I know it's closed, I've checked the lock, At least my killer knows to knock. I cannot sleep, though I'm in bed, I've made amends with God instead. If He decides that it's my time, Then this will be my very last rhyme. I hear a bang, and then a break, My head shoots up; there's no mistake! I turn my music volume high So I won't hear the way I die. I run upstairs, desk lamp in hand Over my head, ready to land.. And right before it

Connect to yourself and the world around you through this Metta meditation led by Julie Potiker. The loving kindness meditation concludes with a reading of the poem, "The Afterlife", by Billy Collins. The Afterlife by Billy Collins While you are preparing for sleep, brushing your teeth, or riffling through a magazine in bed, the dead of the day are setting out on their journey. They’re moving off in all imaginable directions, each according to his own private belief, and this is the secret that silent Lazarus would not reveal: that everyone is right, as it turns out. you go to the place you always thought you would go, The place you kept lit in an alcove in your head. Some are being shot into a funnel of flashing colors into a zone of light, white as a January sun. Others are standing naked before a forbidding judge who sits with a golden ladder on one side, a coal chute on the other. Some have already joined the celestial choir and are singing as if they have been doing this forever, while the less inventiv

Gratitude can help us navigate challenging times. In this guided meditation led by Julie Potiker we are reminded to give thanks to something that is always with us - our bodies. She completes the meditation with a reading of the poem, "Blessing for the Brokenhearted", by Jan Richardson.   Let us agree for now that we will not say the breaking makes us stronger or that it is better to have this pain than to have done without this love. Let us promise we will not tell ourselves time will heal the wound, when every day our waking opens it anew. Perhaps for now it can be enough to simply marvel at the mystery of how a heart so broken can go on beating, as if it were made for precisely this—as if it knows the only cure for love is more of it, as if it sees the heart’s sole remedy for breaking is to love still, as if it trusts that its own persistent pulse is the rhythm of a blessing we cannot begin to fathom but will save us nonetheless.   Get the latest on mindfulness and meditation by subscribing to Julie Pot

Your guided meditation practice - is a moment of self-care. Join Julie Potiker as she leads you on a journey through your senses where you'll embrace the world around you. The meditation concludes with the reading of the poem, "The Chairs That No One Sits In", by Billy Collins. Sit back, relax, enjoy.   “The Chairs That No One Sits In” by Billy Collins   You see them on porches and on lawns down by the lakeside, usually arranged in pairs implying a couple who might sit there and look out at the water or the big shade trees.   The trouble is you never see anyone sitting in these forlorn chairs though at one time it must have seemed a good place to stop and do nothing for a while.   Sometimes there is a little table between the chairs where no one is resting a glass or placing a book face down. It may not be any of my business, but let us suppose one day that everyone who placed those vacant chairs on a veranda or a dock sat down in them if only for the sake of remembering what it was they thought deserved to b

Be still. Breathe in and settle the chatter in your mind - through this guided meditation led by Julie Potiker.   Get the latest by subscribing to Julie Potiker's YouTube channel and Facebook page at Mindful Methods for Life. You can learn about mindfulness at www.MindfulMethodsForLife.com and also in Julie's newly released book, "Life Falls Apart, But You Don't Have To: Mindful Methods For Staying Calm In The Midst Of Chaos", available on Amazon.com. Her podcast is "Balanced Mind with Julie Potiker", available on iTunes, iHeart and other podcast platforms.

In this guided meditation, Julie Potiker helps you navigate through a season of uncertainty by finding refuge in grounding. She finishes the meditation with a reading of the poem, "Blessing in the Chaos", by Jan Richardson. Blessing in the Chaos by Jan Richardson To all that is chaotic in you, let there come silence. Let there be a calming of the clamoring, a stilling of the voices that have laid their claim to you, that you have made their home in you, that go with you even to the holy places but will not let you rest, will not let you hear your life with wholeness or feeling the grace that fashioned you. Let what distracts you cease. Let what divides you cease. Let there come an end to what diminishes and demands, and let depart all that keeps you in its cage Let there be an opening into the quiet that lies beneath the chaos, where you find the peace you did not think possible and see what shimmers within the storm. Get the latest by subscribing to Julie Potiker's YouTube channel and Facebook page at M

Many of us can't wait until 2020 is over. So much stress and uncertainty this year between the Coronavirus pandemic along with the added stress of election season. But, what if 2020 is the most important year of them all? Join Julie Potiker as she leads an election grounding meditation where you are encouraged to "be the change". It concludes with the reading of the poem,  "What if 2020 isn't cancelled", by Leslie Dwight. What if 2020 isn’t cancelled?⁣What if 2020 is the year we’ve been waiting for?⁣A year so uncomfortable, so painful, so scary, so raw — that it finally forces us to grow.⁣A year that screams so loud, finally awakening us from our ignorant slumber.⁣A year we finally accept the need for change.⁣Declare change. Work for change. Become the change. A year we finally band together, instead of⁣pushing each other further apart.⁣⁣2020 isn’t cancelled, but rather⁣the most important year of them all.”⁣ Get the latest by subscribing to Julie Potiker's YouTube channel and Facebook page at Mindful Method

Relax to this loving kindness meditation with Julie Potiker. The meditation concludes with the poem, "To Be Hopeful in Bad Times", by Howard Zinn. “To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.  What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places—and there are so many—where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.  And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.” – Howard Zinn Get the

Enjoy this Sukkot guided visualization led by Julie Potiker for the Balanced Mind Meditation Center. Sukkot, also known as the Feast of the Tabernacles, is a week long Jewish holiday. The meditation ends with the poem "Sukkot: The Heart of the Sukkah", by Lesli Koppelman Ross.   Sukkot: The Heart of the Sukkah let the walls of my heart be easily moved as the walls of the Sukkah that sway in the wind let the roof of my heart be porous to tears as the roof of the Sukkah that lets in the rain let the space in my heart be open to guests as to Ushpizin who pass through each night let the beat of my heart be a vital reminder that life here is transient – a temporary dwelling let the walls, left unsealed, and the roof, with its lattice, frame the cracks that will let in the light   Get the latest by subscribing to Julie Potiker's YouTube channel and Facebook page at Mindful Methods for Life. You can learn about mindfulness at www.MindfulMethodsForLife.com and also in J

Take a moment to discover compassion for yourself and for others. It's especially important as we work to navigate through our new normal - dealing with the Coronavirus pandemic. Julie Potiker leads you through this compassion meditation and ends with a poem of hope, by Celeste Snowber, "Bodypsalm for Uncertainty".   May the plans you cancel return you to another life the one waiting as a patient lover wondering when you will arrive to the shore of your inner ocean. In the midst of restrictions – self-isolation and social distancing take some ingredients for the journey probiotics for the soul the curiosity for small things quince and daffodil blooming sipping tea slowly the free range of kindness daily practices of breathing deep reading poems and calling a friend Drink in kindness and compassion as you live in a time of not-knowing become intimate with shadow live creatively in dangerous times alive to what comes a meditation on wonder calling you to soften to the unknown.   Get the latest by subscribing to

Forgiveness is the focus of this meditation coinciding with Yom Kippur, also known as the Day of Atonement. Join Julie Potiker as she helps you release resentment and anger towards others and yourself...through forgiveness. The meditation finishes with the beautiful sound of the Shofar. Get the latest by subscribing to Julie Potiker's YouTube channel and Facebook page at Mindful Methods for Life. You can learn about mindfulness at www.MindfulMethodsForLife.com and also in Julie's newly released book, "Life Falls Apart, But You Don't Have To: Mindful Methods For Staying Calm In The Midst Of Chaos", available on Amazon.com. Her podcast is "Balanced Mind with Julie Potiker", available on iTunes, iHeart and other podcast platforms.

In this guided mediation you'll find yourself rooted in the earth, grounded, calm. Julie Potiker completes the meditation with a reading the poem, "Blessing of the Senses", by John O’Donohue.   Blessing of the Senses: May your body be blessed. May you realize that your body is a faithful and beautiful friend of your soul. And may you be peaceful and joyful and recognize that your senses are sacred thresholds. May you realize that holiness is mindful, gazing, feeling, hearing, and touching. May your senses gather you and bring you home. May your senses always enable you to celebrate the universe and the mystery and possibilities in your presence here. May the Eros of the Earth bless you.   Get the latest by subscribing to Julie Potiker's YouTube channel and Facebook page at Mindful Methods for Life. You can learn about mindfulness at www.MindfulMethodsForLife.com and also in Julie's newly released book, "Life Falls Apart, But You Don't Have To:

Whether you're personally affected by the wildfires in Northern California or overwhelmed by witnessing the loss and suffering it's causing, this guided meditation can assist you in dealing with the devastation. Julie Potiker helps you visualize a "cloud blanket" of care, hope and love, and then wrapping it around the neighborhoods, towns, landscape and animals affected by the wildfires. Julie finishes the meditation with a look at the majestic Redwoods, with the written words from John Muir, Henry Ward Beecher, and also a Chinese proverb. John Muir: "A few minutes ago every tree was excited, blowing to the roaring storm, waving, swirling, tossing their branches in glorious enthusiasm like worship. But though to the outer ear these trees are now silent, their songs never cease." Get the latest by subscribing to Julie Potiker's YouTube channel and Facebook page at Mindful Methods for Life. You can learn about mindfulness at www.MindfulMethodsForLife.com and also i

Visualize yourself on a mountain, surrounded by nature and using your all of your senses to breathe in the experience all around you. Julie Potiker takes you on this grounding journey ending with the poem,"When I Could Do Nothing", by Jane Hirshfield. The poem comes at a time when many of us are attempting to navigate our lives during a pandemic. This meditation was led virtually for the Balanced Mind Meditation Center. Today, When I Could Do Nothing Today, when I could do nothing, I saved an ant. It must have come in with the morning paper, still being delivered to those who shelter in place. A morning paper is still an essential service. I am not an essential service. I have coffee and books, time, a garden, silence enough to fill cisterns. It must have first walked the morning paper, as if loosened ink taking the shape of an ant. Then across the laptop computer — warm — then onto the back of a cushion. Small black ant, alone, crossing a navy cushion, moving steadily because that is what it could do. Se

In this guided meditation, Julie Potiker leads you through a beautiful, peaceful garden where you immerse yourself among flowers and nature. This meditation is an homage to Ayya Khema, who lived until 1997. She was a Buddist teacher who helped provide opportunities for women to practice Buddism. She founded several centers around the world. This meditation was led virtually for the Balanced Mind Meditation Center. Get the latest by subscribing to Julie Potiker's YouTube channel and Facebook page at Mindful Methods for Life. You can learn about mindfulness at www.MindfulMethodsForLife.com and also in Julie's newly released book, "Life Falls Apart, But You Don't Have To: Mindful Methods For Staying Calm In The Midst Of Chaos", available on Amazon.com. Her podcast is "Balanced Mind with Julie Potiker", available on iTunes, iHeart and other podcast platforms.