Thanks to all those who attended the last Cheaper Than Therapy workshop! From your real-time evaluations, it looked like all of the participants elevated their subjective mood and calmness scores. This is fantastic! Let’s continue practicing the skills and keep up the great work.
The next sessions are on Monday 11/25/24 and 12/2/24 in Santa Monica from 7 to 8:45pm. Get your tickets here on Luma. There is room for 20 people per session.
To recap, in the last session, we did:
• The physiological sigh: breathe in for a count of 4; hold briefly then sniff in more; exhale count of 8
• The hum-sau focus meditation: look up with eyes closed; follow feeling of breath; silently inhale “hum” exhale “sau”
• Haveng®: strong slow touch of shoulders to elbow 3x; rub hands 3x; fingers 3x across forehead, then cheeks; all while breathing slowly
• Tactical hugs: hold for 5 cycles of slow, synchronized breath with eyes closed focusing on sensation ~30sec
• Anchoring: set an anchor for safety; set one for pleasure
• Universal compassion visualization
In the next session, we’ll practice some of these and do some new ones. Seems like people were interested in learning self-hypnosis techniques, so we’ll do some of that, too.
In the meantime, here’s a resource list that you will find useful. All of them are dynamite. I have copies of most of these on hand at the workshop, or you can order them on your own.
• Coming Alive: 4 Tools to Defeat Your Inner Enemy, Ignite Creative Expression & Unleash Your Soul’s Potential, Phil Stutz and Barry Michels. Four techniques to rock your world and reset your brain. I’ll be teaching you one of them in the next session.
• Stress Reset: How to Soothe Your Body and Mind in Minutes, Jennifer Taitz. Great compendium of practices which I will be drawing upon in future workshops.
• Radical Acceptance: Embracing Your Life with the Heart of a Buddha, Tara Brach. This book is AMAZING. Absolutely best primer for a meditative practice. Tara is a phenomenal teacher.
• The 5 Hidden Love Questions: Radically Effective Strategies to Date Smarter, Own Your Power, and Flourish, by yours truly, Dr Ali “Victor” Binazir. Excellent resource for knocking off self-sabotage and embracing your true power.
• The Untethered Soul: The Journey Beyond Yourself and The Untethered Soul Lecture Series, Vol 5-8 in particular by Michael Singer (and his free podcast). This is the ultimate game-changer, and one of my top 5 favorite books of all time.
• Insight LA 10am Sunday service, 7pm youngish adults service, and Self-Realization Fellowship Lake Shrine Temple Sunday 11am service