Creating Sustainable Happiness

In this first teaching session you’ll learn that when making any change in life, obstacles are inevitable, so it’s important to build resiliency from the get go. I’ll talk about what makes us resilient, bring you through an experience, teach you the three factors that support sustainability and why mindfulness is the fundamental strength to support positive change, resiliency and sustainable happiness.

In this meditation session you’ll jump into your first practice to play with the first foundation of sustainable happiness – mindfulness. As you strengthen mindfulness you’ll get better and better at waking up to what matters in the day. You’ll sense into a relaxed presence, feeling more grounded, calm and in control. The practice of mindfulness allows you to get better at coming down from your mind and you’re your life. Just stay curious, see what you notice and like an instrument, continue coming back to refine your mind and then bringing into your daily life.

In this meditation session you’ll settle into the second practice of mindfulness. You’ll continue to play around with mindful awareness and deepen this foundational strength that is essential for sustainable happiness. You’ll notice that I use the word playing intentionally as you’re just settling into being curious and aware of your experience.

In this teaching session you’ll learn about the second foundation of sustainable happiness - the science and experience of heart. With any change you want to make, obstacles are inevitable. The obstacles can often lead to self-criticism and doubt which causes us to give up. This track will explore the science and practice of self-compassion to bring us back into balance, give us the courage to overcome obstacles and also make the joys in life that much greater.

In this meditation session you’ll learn how to put tuning your heart – the second key to sustainable happiness – into practice. You’ll start with mindful awareness of breath and then tap into your heart by visualizing someone you care about and uncovering kind intentions that will flow to them and to yourself. In the process you will be strengthening your mind and heart which will be a great support to you in the journey ahead.

In this meditation session, you’ll learn a four part practice I call SAFE that will allow you to step-by-step find a way to settle into what’s uncomfortable and send a signal to your brain that you are not only safe, but confident too, strengthening your innate resilience. One of the greatest obstacles to sustainable happiness, or really to most things we want to do in life, is difficult emotions. The previous meditation gave you some experience with warming the heart, this meditation builds on that practice, giving you the ability to feel stronger as you go.

In this teaching session, you’ll build upon the previous experiences tuning your mind and heart and now learn about the science, psychology and practices that support what I call the X Factor in sustainable happiness – human connection. You’ll hear about the science of human connection, the costs of modernity and the importance of shaping our environments to play on our brain’s implicit decision making and make this all easier.

In this meditation session, you’ll bring your mindfulness and heart into putting the science of human connection into practice. Science shows that the following meditation when practiced over and again can cultivate a sense of positive social connection and even have positive neurobiological impacts. In this meditation, you’re going to be expanding your practice from session 5 on tuning your heart and sending friendly wishes to a loved one, a friend, a neutral person, a difficult person and expanding out to all people. When we feel more connected, we feel happier. Remain open and curious and you are also welcome to experiment with soothing touch during the practice if you like.

In this final meditation session, you’ll learn to practice balance. This practice will integrate what you’ve learned with the strength of your awareness, the caring and courage of your heart, and your sense of connection with others around you. Now, you’re going to expand from there into a sense of connection with all of things…this sense of connectedness is at the source of enduring well-being. Connection leads to balance and balance leads to happiness.

In this final session, you’ll learn how to bring all of this off the mat and create a sustainable happiness toolkit. I’ll bring you through 5 simple steps that give you a roadmap on how to bring all of this into your daily life.You’re going to need something to write or type on, if this isn’t available, you can reflect on the instructions in your mind. I’m going to give you some instructions and then you’re going to pause the audio so you can reflect on these instructions. When you’re ready you’ll restart it. I’ll remind you about this as we go. As you bring this into your life, you’ll build awareness, overcome challenges and continually strengthen sustainable happiness. Allow this not to the beginning of the end, but the end of the beginning for you.