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Ancient yogis described the Anahata (heart) chakra as the energetic center of love, compassion, empathy and joy. Modern science can now measure beyond the heart's electrical component: the heart's electromagnetic field with SQUID technology (superconducting quantum interference devices). This field is bigger than the one produced by the brain and can be measured up to 3-5 ft away from the body. Furthermore, the heart has 40 thousand neurons that communicate with the brain very closely. Researchers are now looking into the relationship between heart, mind and emotions, and how they self-regulate to achieve heart-brain coherence, it's benefits and how to achieve it. Here is a good article about it: The Heart's Electromagnetic Field Is Your Superpower.

Mindfulness-based therapy has been well known to help anxiety symptoms. A meta-analysis from 2010 reviewed 39 studies, and a total of 1,140 participants, confirm this. About 4% of the population (roughly 320 million) experience anxiety. What really got my attention while learning about this topic was a large-scale study by researchers from Harvard Medical School and the University of Queensland published in September 2023. They concluded that one out of every two people worldwide will develop a mental health disorder in their lifetime. This is half of the population! If there is anything that we can do to proactively improve our mental health, it makes sense to make room for it in our busy lives. 

Metta means loving-kindness meditation. Sometimes we forget to be compassionate and kind to ourselves and forget how much we love others. This recording on my SoundCloud is just a reminder of how good it feels to acknowledge that. 

This yoga nidra journey begins with centering our minds, acknowledging the external stimuli and letting go, focusing on the present and inward. Thinking of an intention we move forward with a body scan and breath work. Once body and mind are relaxed, a visualization takes us to love and kindness towards ourselves and others. Body and mind will be in stillness and slowly we come back to awaken the body. 

Many of us fall in love with yoga after joining a flow or vinyasa class. With time and curiosity, we learn that there are 8 limbs of yoga which include ethics, mindfulness, meditation, breath work and much more. Michael Stone, a Canadian author, wrote The Inner Tradition of yoga. This book summarized very well for me what the goal of yoga is and how I can get there. 

This topic would be a good group workshop. Email me if you are interested and I will schedule. In the meantime I will leave you with an exert from the book: "Yoga is the science of studying the way we perceive and construct our experience in order to bring about fundamental shift in perception".

Dr. Huberman's podcast has an episode on meditation or non-sleep deep rest (NDSR), which is an umbrella term and yoga nidra is one of these type of meditations. It turns out that there is strong scientific evidence about how the brain changes during meditation and after a long term meditating. Similarly, how meditation improves focus, sleep quality, mood, pain, stress and anxiety. 

There are some interesting studies from other scientists that discuss the benefits of meditation for co-management of anxiety and depression. Here is an example. 

I often found myself spending time learning how to be happy. I have found a way to manage this with yoga psychology. Here is my take of what has worked well for me, acknowledging that we are all different and what works for me may not work for others.

For most part (and with exceptions) happiness comes from our perception of the external world, how we react to it and the consequences of our actions. Yoga has helped me look closely to my perceptions and response to external situations and how to better react to them. Likewise, accept that life comes with suffering and happiness at the same time but suffering can be managed.

At the end, it depends on what happiness means to you. I will leave you with an interview that brings a fresh perspective. Mo Gawdat was the CBO at Google X and currently looks at scientific literature to understand happiness. 

Mantra is a word, phrase, or sound that is repeated silently or aloud during meditation as a focal point to help concentration and minimize wondering thoughts. A mantra is usually meaningful for the practitioner and frequently originates from the yoga philosophy. I would like to share my mantra with you: 

Om, Lokah, Samastah, Sukhino Bhavantu

May all Beings everywhere be happy and peaceful, and may my life contribute to this happiness and peace.

When we embark in the yoga journey, we know we will be life-long learners. So far, I have experienced yoga nidra as the middle ground between feeling relaxed and asleep. It's stillness and feeling of wellness while being mostly conscious because I can follow how I feel and react to stimuli. i disconnect from the external world and look inward for restoration for my mind and body. i focus on the present, with awareness and gratitude. In the long term, I noticed that I am able to identify when my mind and body need some care. I am mindful of the good things I feel in my life. I enjoy the present more and feel stronger when managing life challenges. 

I will leave you with this quote for now: "yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery, today is a gift, which is why we call it present" - Bill Kane. 

I wondered what happiness is and what I can do to boost it. I wished there was a closet that I could just open to find happiness items. I started looking at the research literature, books and interviews to realize that it’s all about the simple pleasures of life: social connection, purpose and goals, meditation, physical activity, acts of kindness, leisure and self-care.  

There is nothing stopping me from having that closet and I started pursuing simple things. I am ready to share meditation with you and strengthen human connections.

Scientists tell us that our biology has not evolved as fast as we need to adapt to modern life. That may explain why I follow a cycle of fatigue, depression and somatization in the name of career and financial progression. Nothing wrong with having career and life goals but given my enthusiasm, willingness to take on challenges and learn new things, I often end up ignoring early signs of burnout. By the time my body and mind speak up, it's too late. My biggest concern is the long-term effects of chronic high levels of cortisol, mainly metabolic and cardiovascular disease. I rather prevent the preventable. 

Time was my currency. Time spent without being "productive" was a waste. Life thought me that health is a better currency. Besides sleeping, exercising and eating healthy, yoga has giving me the tools to learn to do nothing and think nothing. Just be in the present, letting my mind and body recover. I have noticed the change but there is still a lot to learn. 

About 10% of adults worldwide experience chronic insomnia from which 5-10% use medication. I wanted to look at available evidence and found a literature review and meta-analysis from 2019. The researches looked at 18 trials with a total of 1654 participants, finding that mindfulness meditation is as effective at managing insomnia as other sleep treatment, and much better than nothing. If some of you are dealing with insomnia, short or long term, you can be confident that meditation some yoga practices can help (e.g., hatha and nidra). 

Wonder if the chakras have an equivalent in modern anatomy? so do I. Let's start with the third eye chakra which is located in the forehead and represents enlightenment and the gateway to higher consciousness.  The pineal gland is there and produces melatonin which regulates our circadian rhythms (internal clock). 

The solar plexus is a conglomerate of nerves that manage the functions of various abdominal organs. This chakra is associated with the metabolism (like the digestive system) and transformation. The throat chakra is located where the thyroid gland sits. This chakra is related to communication and truth. The heart chakra is related to both, nerves and a gland. Same with the other chakras, they are well aligned with our anatomy. It is very impressive how well ancient humans knew the body and its functions. 

Wouldn't be nice if we had a super strong immune system, like super human? if so, could meditation enhance it? Meditation and mindfulness are a huge component of yoga. I wanted to see what the evidence shows. I like systematic reviews with meta-analysis (if possible) because it brings a larger body of scientific evidence, thus with a bigger sample size and hopefully more suitable for generalization to a larger population. 

A systematic review of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) published in 2016 looked a the relation between mindfulness meditation and the immune system. 20 RCTs were included with a total of 1602 participants. Even though the researchers found some association with immune system improvement (less inflammation, more defense, enzyme activity against aging), the studies were focused on particular populations or disease type and couldn't generalize the findings.