The Wise Counsel meditation is one that works based on the idea of projection.  Often many people have great advice for others but when it comes to giving themselves that same level of good counsel, it just isn't happening.  The wise counsel meditation is a contemplative practice that allows you to speak in your mind with someone you respect and whose advice you would willingly follow. It allows you to imagine and respond to the words you know another would speak.

Now that you’ve been meditating for a while, it’s time to bring the awareness you have been using to label your thoughts and emotions to the speech you use when you aren’t sitting on the cushion. The assignment this week is to bring mindfulness into your spoken words.  Specifically, you are doing this to see the speech that is helping or hindering you. 
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Select specific times to bring awareness to your speech this week. Use the same double-labeling process as with your thoughts and feelings. Observe the words you use and your way of relating to the people around you.

​Today is full of sorrow. The largest mass shooting in modern history in our country has just happened and many of us are mourning.  50 LGBTQ people were killed and many more were injured at a night club in Orlando. The victims were predominantly Latinx because the night was Latin-themed. Many people are hurting, angry, and trying to mentally make sense of what has happened. 

In the class I cover assertiveness in, I will sometimes play a game to test each members ability to not be passive. We have three ways of communicating when there is something we want: Passive, Assertive, and Aggressive.

The passive person relies on being nice and will often not directly state their needs. Instead, they rely on indirect communication and implied meanings to get what they want. They ask more than they tell. And, they often hope the other person will figure out what they need without them ever having to directly state it.

Often times, emotions are seen as reactions to the world around us and not as things that can be consciously chosen or selected.  There are a few meditations I work with which are about being able to choose the emotion we want (or even need) to feel.  The inner sanctuary meditation is among them.

​This meditation is designed to create a sense of calm, safety, and emotional warmth.  It uses a method acting technique to bring up a past setting where all of those emotions already exist.  You are still working with reactions on a certain level but you are choosing to what and how you react.  By strengthening your mental image of your inner sanctuary and working with this meditation over time, the positive emotions associated with it become more easily recalled.