Resources
resources for beginners and experienced students
getting started
This page was created with intention—to support you in cultivating a steady, nourishing relationship with meditation and inner stillness.
Inside, you’ll find resources to help you begin (or deepen) your practice. Whether you're just arriving to the path or reweaving a familiar thread, these tools are offered to guide you in creating an embodied, consistent connection with your inner world.
Each button above will take you directly to what you need. Trust what draws you.
Where do I start?
It’s a worthy question—and the truth is, the simplicity of meditation can feel strangely uncomfortable at first.
Learning to sit in stillness, to dip into wordlessness, may stir anxiety or restlessness. You might feel like you’re doing it wrong because the volume of inner chatter seems too loud.
This is entirely natural.
Be the Witness
Rather than strive for an ideal, begin by simply observing.
Notice what arises. If you can observe a thought, you are not the thought.
Thoughts are like echoes—creative impulses shaped by old patterns and belief systems embedded in the subconscious. As you watch them with gentle curiosity (not judgment), you’ll begin to see their themes. This witnessing is the first liberation.
In time, you’ll come to recognize that thoughts are informational codes—scripts that help shape experience. Yet you are not the code. You are the stream of conscious presence aware of it all.
Anchor in the Body
What anchors you in the now is sensation.
With each inhale and exhale, let your awareness settle into the body—into breath, into the alive intelligence of sensation. This is where your true self resides.
The more you return to this, the more the mind softens its grip.
A Simple Practice
Take a few minutes each day to arrive:
Be still—consciously. Physical stillness shifts the brain’s rhythm and opens you to subtler dimensions of awareness.
Witness the mind. Let thoughts appear like waves. You need not change them—just see them. If no thoughts arise, notice that too.
Stay attuned to your body. Feel rather than think about your experience. Sensation is the gateway to presence.
In the final moments, place your attention in your heart center. Let gratitude rise—not as a performance, but as a remembrance. The grateful heart sits nearest to the mystery.
“The ego conceals, whereas awareness reveals.”
— David R. Hawkins
Your Body
The mind and body mirror each other—when one is balanced, so is the other. To create a safe container for your mind to unfold, begin by offering your body a space of comfort and ease.
This requires little effort: choose a posture that feels supported—whether sitting on a chair, the floor, or a cushion.
Allow your spine to lengthen naturally, gently rising through the crown of your head. Let your shoulders soften and melt away from the ears.
If you slump or slouch, the mind may drift or slip into sleep. An aligned body supports awake presence.
Your Breath
There’s no need to overthink or control your breath. Simply breathe deeply and deliberately.
With your inner gaze, observe the breath as it enters your body and flows out again.
If your mind feels like a carnival of activity, simply notice it without attachment or judgment. Let it be as it is.
Meditation isn’t about control—it’s about acceptance. Accept yourself exactly where you are, then gently guide your awareness back to the natural rhythm of your breath.
“For some people it feels good to close their eyes while meditating. For others, a soft, open gaze helps them feel more present. Feel free to experiment to find the way that is best for you.”
Your Emotions
Strong emotions move through the body in natural waves of sensation. Often, the energy of emotions spins stories that the mind clings to, stirring agitation.
What’s remarkable is that emotions rarely last longer than 90 seconds—yet it feels longer because we resist them.
When you allow emotions to flow through you like energetic waves—without resistance, obstruction, or avoidance—they naturally dissolve.
It is the holding on or pushing away that causes emotions to chase us and demand our attention.
When a strong emotion arises, listen deeply to your inner body. Where do you feel it? Go there. Be present with it. Stay with it.
Let the emotion be what it is—separate from the stories your mind wants to attach.
Notice what unfolds.
Your Environment
Silence is deeply restorative, though for newcomers it can sometimes feel unfamiliar or uncomfortable.
Gentle music, binaural beats, or the soothing voice of a skilled guide can enrich your meditation experience. If you’d like to try a free recording, [CLICK HERE].
Creating a sacred physical space—a meditation altar—is a beautiful way to support your practice.
Your altar can hold items that personally resonate with you and help you visually and energetically connect to your most authentic self. Crystals, flowers, candles, incense, photos, deities—design it with intention and love.
Sometimes, these outer forms gently awaken inner qualities of reverence, peace, and presence..
“Don’t force yourself to sit longer than you are comfortable with. Give yourself permission to start small—perhaps 10 minutes. Increase the length of your meditation sessions as you evolve with your practice.”
how to use the recordings
Choose a time when you won’t be disturbed for about 40 minutes.
Lie down on your back, placing a pillow under your head for support. If needed, rest a pillow or bolster beneath your knees. Cover yourself with warm clothing, and use an eye mask if you wish to block out all light.
Let your hands rest gently by your sides, palms facing upwards. Keep your legs hip-width apart.
Close your eyes and allow your body to fully relax. Stay gently aware of my voice throughout the practice as best as you can.
The key is to maintain a relaxed awareness of the instructions while your body naturally moves into a deep state of rest—even sleep.
A powerful element of this practice is the Sankalpa—a heartfelt intention or resolve. Read below to learn how to use your Sankalpa to unlock the full potential of your practice
The foundation: Sankalpa
During the practice, you will be guided to mentally repeat your sankalpa three times — near the beginning and again at the end. It’s important to use the same sankalpa each time you practice, as this repetition focuses your energy and deepens the intention.
The sankalpa is repeated mentally three times when your brain is predominantly in alpha waves — a state when the mind is calm, receptive, and open to new information. At this time, the analytic mind quiets, allowing your sankalpa to be absorbed directly into the subconscious — the realm where all your belief systems and internal programming reside.
The key is to stay awake and aware as your brain shifts into these quieter states and your body moves toward sleep. When your awareness no longer clings to the senses or body, it gains incredible power. Wherever you consciously place your attention, energy flows.
Through this practice, you access your own operating system — the subconscious mind — where you can gently update or rewrite outdated patterns and beliefs that no longer serve you. But this requires training yourself to remain present and aware within these subtle inner states.
Examples of Sankalpa:
I am healthy in mind and body
I am free
I am confident
I am valued
I am true to myself
I am peaceful
I am kind
I am compassionate
I am awakened to my authentic self
I am self-realized
I am radiant
I am a creator
I am happy
I am safe
I am self-loving
I am abundant
Sankalpa: Encoded Destiny — Your Resolution in Life
This is perhaps the most transformational aspect of Yoga Nidra. You step through the gates of your own creation story and choose to embody an attribute of your destiny. Your sankalpa is like a seed, holding the full potential of what it may grow into.
During Yoga Nidra, as you track time through quieter brain states, you enter expansive levels of consciousness where your mind is most receptive. This openness shifts internal patterns, which then ripple outward to transform your external reality and perceptions.
Secrets to Making Your Sankalpa Effective:
Burning Desire — You must genuinely desire its realization.
Relaxed Focus — Your mind must be calm and concentrated on the sankalpa (quiet analytic mind/alpha waves).
Present Tense, Positive, Concise — State your sankalpa in the present tense (e.g., I am…), using positive, simple language.
Feel It Fully — Connect with the truth of your sankalpa through your heart and as many senses as possible.
Consistency — Use the same sankalpa repeatedly until it naturally unfolds in your waking life.
Understanding Brain States
Throughout our natural wake and sleep cycles, the brain moves through distinct states, each linked to different experiences.
Low Beta State: This is when we are focused and engaged in the world around us, using our five senses to make sense of reality. Here, we solve problems creatively, analyze, reason, make mindful decisions aligned with our goals, and sustain attention.
High Beta State: In this stressed and anxious state, we feel overwhelmed and trapped by fear-based programming rooted in past conditioning. Our perception narrows, preoccupied with time, details, and obstacles. This is the state where healing is blocked; the mind is limited and reactive.
Theta State: Experienced during dreaming, the theta state connects us to the vast, multi-dimensional realms of the subconscious and unconscious mind. The outer physical world fades away, and timeless inner landscapes emerge, often felt as scattered and confusing dreams.
Delta State: This is the deep, dreamless sleep where the body fully rests and renews.
The Alpha Brain State: The Gateway to Healing and Transformation
The alpha state is perhaps the most magical and least consciously cultivated. All spiritual traditions recognize its power and build their practices around accessing it.
In alpha, the body is deeply relaxed—often at the edge of sleep—while the mind remains tranquil and awake. This is the state where healing is permitted. Awareness detaches from identification with any form or thought, allowing you to witness your beliefs and conditioned patterns without attachment.
With the analytic mind quieted, you gain access to your subconscious operating system, where you can consciously edit and update limiting programs to align with your true self.
This state reveals your authentic self—beyond personality and environment—and is the optimal space for reprogramming and profound healing.
Because we are conditioned to lose consciousness as the body relaxes deeply, few of us experience ourselves as unbounded consciousness. Practices like Yoga Nidra skillfully track and extend time in this 'no-time' alpha state, offering a doorway to subtler realms of existence.
Naturally, we cycle through alpha as we fall asleep and awaken. Yet, without training, we often miss the opportunity to maintain awareness during these sacred transitions — moments ripe for conscious co-creation of reality.
Imagine how different life could be if we fully understood and used these natural cycles to shape our reality in alignment with our dreams and deepest aspirations.
“To be awakened across all states of consciousness is self-realization.”
The 5 Koshas
Ancient wisdom teaches that we are multi-dimensional beings, naturally gifted with the capacity to experience awareness across different energetic layers of existence. Traditional yogic philosophy invites us to expand our consciousness and awaken to these five fields—known as the Koshas—to truly know thyself.
“Human beings consist of a material body built from the food they eat. Those who care for this body are nourished by the universe itself.
Inside this is another body made of life energy. It fills the physical body and takes its shape. Those who treat this vital force as divine, experience excellent health and longevity because this energy is the source of physical life.
Within the vital force is yet another body, this one made of thought energy. It fills the two denser bodies and has the same shape. Those who understand and control the mental body are no longer afflicted by fear.
Deeper still lies another body comprised of intellect. It permeates the three denser bodies and assumes the same form. Those who establish their awareness here free themselves from unhealthy thoughts and actions, and develop the self-control necessary to achieve their goals.
Hidden inside it is yet a subtler body, composed of pure joy. It pervades the other bodies and shares the same shape. It is experienced as happiness, delight, and bliss.”
First Body — Annamaya Kosha (Physical Body):
The densest part of our being, composed of matter as we commonly understand it.
Second Body — Pranamaya Kosha (Energy Body):
The vital life force that animates and holds the physical body together, governing biological processes and breath.
Third Body — Manomaya Kosha (Mental/Emotional Body):
The field that directs our senses and reflexes, guiding sensory input and motor activity. It shapes our emotional responses and thoughts.
Fourth Body — Vijnanamaya Kosha (Intellectual Body):
Encompassing higher mind, discernment, free will, and conscience, this sheath governs our reactions and conscious choices in the world.
Fifth Body — Anandamaya Kosha (Bliss Body):
The subtlest veil between ordinary awareness and our true, blissful essence. This kosha is experienced as deep joy, delight, and pure happiness.
Each kosha is a sheath or layer—kosha means “sheath” in Sanskrit—nestled intricately like a luminous web of pure intelligence, weaving together the full spectrum of our existence.
“The evolution of your personal journey
to enlightenment involves exploring the 5 koshas.”
awareness vs. visualization
AWARENESS
Awareness is the simple, profound act of observing our experience—every fluctuation, sensation, and form that arises within our consciousness—without interference or manipulation.
This witnessing capacity is a hidden dimension of our intelligence, quietly residing beneath the surface of everyday thinking. It is always present, though often unrecognized.
Far from being numb, indifferent, or cold-hearted, this aspect of ourselves that observes is deeply compassionate and peaceful. It holds space for all polarities—the dualities of life such as loss and gain, fame and shame, success and failure—as expressions of the same underlying energy. Neither side is better or worse; they are simply different faces of consciousness itself.
The lower mind naturally casts experience into opposites, categorizing moments as painful or pleasurable. Our deeper work is to transcend this dualistic lens, moving toward higher states of consciousness where all experiences, when held without judgment, become opportunities for growth and expansion.
It is the judgments and meanings we impose on experience that create mental suffering.
Thus, if we can simply be aware—truly aware—of any part of ourselves (thoughts, emotions, personality patterns, behaviors, energetic states), we create the space for transformation. We cannot change what we do not first see.
In Yoga Nidra, we train ourselves to track time in pure presence—pure awareness—free from judgment, labels, categorization, analysis, or reasoning. This pure attentiveness arises when the analytical mind quiets, and the illusion of separation or duality dissolves.
VISUALIZATION
Visualization is an active engagement with our experience through focused intention. It is the conscious shaping and creative manipulation of our inner world—using the powerful gift of imagination to intentionally cultivate positive states.
Through visualization, we can picture ourselves in vibrant health, harmony, and wellbeing—or, if unconscious, we can equally imagine states of dis-ease and disharmony. It is a choice, often made beneath the level of awareness, wielded by the creative power of the mind.
Mastery of the mind involves accessing our higher intelligence centers to deliberately generate health, positive relationships, and wholeness. When we deeply believe in the reality of what we visualize, the brain adopts this as truth, reinforcing the neuronal pathways that support and embody this vision.
Yet, the untrained mind frequently perpetuates suffering by unconsciously rehearsing fear-based and limiting patterns. We forget that we are not defined by these restrictive programs or low-vibrational thought forms. When we identify with these inner narratives, we effectively instruct the mind-body system to continue manifesting those experiences.
There comes a moment in the practice when we are gently guided to engage our higher creative centers—to consciously visualize. This invitation reveals the immense power we hold when we learn to consciously wield our inner faculties—our very own superpowers. After all, everything manifested in form today was once a seed of intention, a conceived idea that lived first in the unmanifest.
Both the cultivation of pure awareness and the art of visualization are essential and complementary. Knowing when we are simply witnessing with non-judgmental presence, and when we are actively shaping and manifesting our experience through visualization, deepens our mastery and empowers our creative potential.
releasing stored impressions
Every experience we have lived—both in this lifetime and in simultaneous lifetimes—is energetically recorded and stored within our memory, held deep in the subconscious and unconscious realms of our existence. Because all is interconnected through the Law of One, our subconscious mind can also be understood as embodied within our physical body. In this way, the body itself becomes the living archive of our life’s creation story.
At any given moment, our conscious awareness can only hold about 5 to 7 pieces of information. So, what happens to the vast amount of data outside of this conscious focus? It imprints itself into the subconscious field.
We may assume that because we are unaware of certain childhood experiences, they no longer affect us emotionally. Yet, the subconscious mind operates beyond linear time—in a state of “no-time.” This means that the beliefs and patterns we formed through early experiences continue to influence us in the present moment, regardless of our conscious recognition. While our waking mind moves through linear time, the subconscious remains always active and present.
Therefore, unconscious conditioning continues to shape our perceptions and actions unless we bring awareness to it. Without healing and releasing these stored, latent energetic impressions from the unseen realm, we cannot fully align with our higher nature.
During Yoga Nidra, by tracking so much time in the timeless space of “no-time,” we access the deeper recesses of the mind. Here, we can gently explore and allow unlived experiences—manifesting as images, colors, archetypes, or sensations—to surface without identification, resistance, or judgment. This allows the trapped energy to move and flow again. In a relaxed state of awareness, this process of liberation becomes possible and transformative. Ultimately, it frees us from karmic debt and clears our perception, allowing us to embody a purer expression of our divine self.
belief systems
Our perceptions and beliefs shape how we make sense of the world around us. From a very young age, we absorb and learn ways of being that form an internal map of reality—a framework within which we remain confined. Our core beliefs about who we are and why we exist are often reflections of the major influences in our early environment, and not limited solely to this lifetime. Science, religion, culture, society, family, teachers, and mass consciousness all contribute profoundly to how we interpret our world.
Beliefs function as filters that shape how we receive information, perceive our options, and relate to ourselves and others. Much of our suffering arises from believing false thoughts—ideas that generate feelings of separation, unworthiness, and fear. Often, these limiting beliefs are not even truly ours but inherited or absorbed from external sources.
By consciously identifying and reprogramming these core limiting beliefs, we can dissolve self-imposed barriers and realign both our inner and outer experience with fresh beliefs that invite a more fulfilling life.
Freedom from conditioning is possible—if your belief system allows for it. This has been understood in wisdom traditions for millennia, and now science is beginning to affirm this truth.
The first step in elevating one’s belief system is to identify these core beliefs—many of which are unconscious and difficult to bring into focus alone.
"Until you make the unconscious conscious, it will direct your life and you will call it fate." ~ Carl Jung