Meditation around the world with Lauren Skae

Discovering meditation around the globe

Lauren Skae (@thezenblonde) is a writer, meditation instructor and currently travelling the world to discover different approaches to meditation. She travelled from Bali, India, Nepal, Korea, Thailand, Israel, Turkey to Ireland to discover the ancient secrets of meditation and mindfulness. Practicing in different traditions, she learns first-hand about the culture, traditions and religions. We talk about her travels and her discoveries in this episode.

The Podcast Format

I’m sitting down and having a chat with other meditators from around the world to talk about their practice, the lessons they have learned and what they want the world to know. From Zen, Christianity to Secular, all traditions have valuable insights and approaches to awareness, and in this podcast, we explore those with you.

Travelling across the world of meditation

Lauren shares about the compelling modes of meditation she encountered in her practice. She did a lot of contemplative practices like loving-kindness meditation. Within Tibetan Buddhism she fell in love with the practice called ‘Tonglen’. It is taking the loving-kindness practice to another level by breathing in someone’s suffering and transform it. Another one she found very helpful is contemplation of death. It sounds rather shocking, but in actual reality one learns to deal with their own passing and not carry along unnecessary stress in this situation.

“I’ve been studying meditation through the lens of various religious and yogic traditions. Really just diving into the different meditative offerings around the world. Because let’s face it, some people can’t sit like a Buddha and they don’t have the knees to do it.”

Dancing with the Dervishes

In Turkey, Lauren studied with the Dervishes and discovered whirling. As she describes it, meditation in motion. It is a dance where one whirls around for a very long time. The people involved in this dance called ‘Sema’, are meant to mirror the cosmos. The dervishes that are whirling are the stars, the dervish master is the moon and the monitor is the sun. A Sufi ceremony performed as a devotional act in Islam.

Contemplative practices in all religions

Laura talks about her lessons in these different religions. She was raised catholic, where the first time she meditated was with nuns. There is now a wave of secular mindfulness that has hit the mainstream. Most of it arises out of Buddhism, yet within any religious tradition there can be found meditative practices. She found wisdom in all of it, and is currently writing a book about her discoveries.

“It’s senseless for religions to fight. They have more in common than they don’t.”

Want to know more?

If you’d like to know more about Lauren Skae, go follow her on instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thezenblonde/

If you’d like to talk about this podcast or have comments and ideas, please let me know by joining our community here https://discord.gg/FKWFeYq
Simply use @christiaan or send me a DM! I would love to hear from you.

With warm regards,

Christiaan Neeteson

This podcast is available on…

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