We always have the same sort of question come up at the end of a silent retreat - how do I integrate all that we have experienced into daily life? How do we stay motivated?

Having pondered this many times in the last five years and gone through phases of inspiration as well as utter dryness - a few recommendations:

1. Clarify why you want to practice.

See if you can take that aspiration beyond ‘meditation is good for me’ or ‘it makes me feel better/high’. What’s really there? A longing for freedom from our neuroses? A desire to break through the surface of things and live with depth? An aspiration to live with an open heart? Peacefulness? Contentment?

2. Have a space set up just for you.

Maybe light a candle, incense. A flower. A picture of someone/something that inspires you. Choose a comfortable cushion, chair or stool that becomes your meditation seat.

3. Figure out what time of day works best for you to meditate.

Not everyone is a morning person. In fact I prefer to have a shorter meditation in the morning and a longer one in the evening. I generally wake up with a bit of a cortisol spike and spend a large part of morning meditations calming my mind. In the afternoon or evening, I tend to drop more easily into depth.

4. Listen to or read something inspiring everyday.

I usually have 1-2 people on the go who help crack me open. At the moment it’s Tara Brach and Richard Rudd. Sometimes it’s Chögyam Trungpa, Carl Jung. It’s Rumi, Jeff Foster and Nisargadatta Maharaj always. Countless others - but find out what resonates for you. If you’d like any suggestions let me know 😊

5. Let meditation be an exploration.

A curiosity. Don’t get too dogmatic about a technique. At some point, the object of concentration (e.g. breath, mantra, or visualisation) must drop away - only then does it starts to get interesting, and free! So experiment. Ask yourself - what’s alive, now? Go deeper inwards. See where that takes you. As if you’ve never looked before at what it is to exist, now.