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How Mindfulness Can Help Us in Planting a Seed and Growing New Habits


In this week’s Torah portion, Tazria-Metzora, we learn about different types of purification. It opens with purification for a woman after childbirth:

“Talk to the children of Israel and say; when a woman has delivered a child…”

The word written for delivered is תזריע, which means sowed or planted.

This word usually refers to plants, which form seeds in order to sustain their species

Rabbi Shimshon Rafael Hirsch explains that humans originate, grow, and exist like a plant, by spreading seeds.

Many mammals give birth to more than one baby at a time, whereas most humans give birth to one at a time.

And the process is long and intricate–from getting pregnant to growing and carrying the baby and birthing the baby.

Planting a seed takes time and patience.

We should keep this in mind when we want to grow a new habit in our lives.

Most of us want to take better care of ourselves by eating well, sleeping enough, exercising and learning mindfulness meditation. Easier said than done!

A garden isn’t created overnight, and neither is making a change or achieving a goal.

A garden needs care, attention and persistence. After you prepare the soil and plant your seeds, there’s still lots of work to do.

And your garden needs sun, rain, and good soil. You do your part and have some trust that nature will take care of the rest.

When it comes to starting a mindfulness practice, you have to be patient and trust the process. It’s not hocus pocus. Be open. Be curious. Be kind to yourself. Stick with it!

Write down a few small steps that you can take to start a mindfulness practice, such as sitting and observing your breath for five minutes a day, eating or drinking something mindfully, genuinely listening to someone when they are talking to you without distractions, or paying attention on a routine route that you drive or walk regularly.


What seeds will you plant? What steps will you take to nurture and tend the seeds you plant?

Join the next mindfulness course with Susie:


For a guided practice in English:


Hebrew/מדיטציה מודרכת עברית :






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Updated: Nov 2, 2024

What Mindfulness and Passover Can Teach Us About Freedom

The holiday of Passover, also known as the Festival of Freedom, commemorates our redemption from slavery. We were physically enslaved, which had an impact on our psychological freedom, and triggered a wide range of emotions such as fear, anxiety, despair, pessimism, and hopelessness. These feelings lasted long after the people were redeemed from slavery. To be liberated from oppression is the beginning of freedom, not its end goal. We became free from our Egyptian masters not only to be free but to become a nation and receive the Torah at Mt. Sinai.

The freedom of Passover is more than just the absence of bondage.

Thankfully, most of us have not been slaves, but we can identify with being enslaved by negative thoughts of worries, fears, and regrets.

We have the freedom to break free from negative habits and become our more positive and healthy selves.

Thoughts reinforce feelings and feelings reinforce thoughts, and we may not even be aware that we are in a cycle of negativity and stress.

We live with so many unhealthy habits, automatic reactions, distractions, and mistaken assumptions.

We have thousands of thoughts a day. How many do we let pass, and how many do we attach ourselves to, limiting our freedom to live? Changing our thoughts can change the way we feel.

Mindfulness brings conscious awareness to automatic reactions and behaviors, giving us freedom from our unhealthy thoughts by placing our attention on and observing our negative thoughts or feelings rather than getting caught up in them. We can start by first paying attention to our breath, which can regulate our response to stress and can reduce fear and anxiety by observing the pace of our breath. This enables us to become neutral observers of our inner experiences such as thoughts, sensations, and feelings, and observe whatever arises into our awareness without judgment and without trying to change what we are experiencing

We all have the potential for freedom from our unhealthy thoughts and behaviors, and we also have the freedom to choose how to react to external stimuli, as well as be kinder to ourselves and others.

So how can mindfulness practice help us to be freer?

Let’s try a mindfulness meditation practice with a focus on freeing ourselves from a cycle of negative thoughts and feelings.


Start by finding a comfortable place to sit where you won’t be disturbed. Checking in with your posture– your back is straight and your shoulders are relaxed.

Noticing points of contact that your body is making with whatever surface you’re sitting on. (pause)

Bringing awareness to your breath as you breathe in and breathe out. (pause)


Let yourself relax into this moment and this meditation.


And noticing any tension in your body. Bringing awareness to areas of tension might help soften those areas. (pause)

Can you try to be aware of whatever you’re feeling without judging it?


Neutral awareness means that we observe sensations, feelings, and thoughts without judgment and without becoming too caught up in them. When we’re stressed we might take it out on ourselves or others, something that could have a negative ripple effect like a stone dropping into a pool of water.

We practice noticing a thought or feeling without engaging in it and put a little distance between ourselves and the thought or feeling.

We can also say to our thoughts and feelings "I see you,” and simply observe

Notice how thoughts come and go. Let’s take a moment to try this. (pause)


Give the feeling some space and allow it to hang out a little and let it be.

Observe it some more. ( pause)


Observing leads to more awareness or insight and can change the way we react, which can bring freedom from unhealthy habits.

And awareness leads to learning more about your experiences (thoughts and feelings) and getting to know --and hopefully accept-- yourself.

If you get caught up in a thought or feeling or sensation while doing this practice, bring your attention back to the meditation when you notice it. (pause)


Is there any tension that you're noticing in your body? Can you imagine softening towards your body in your shoulders, jaws, and forehead?

How does this softness feel?


Can you smile at whatever you’re feeling?


When you notice a worry or fear or any negative thought or emotion that comes up. Invite it in. Don’t push it away. Be curious about it.

Say “I see you”

You are a curious observer.


Let go of the criticism and, frustration at yourself or others.


Imagine what it would be like to surrender and let go of our counter-productive thoughts. (Pause)

And while you’re doing this, add some self-compassion. Bring some understanding and care that you would show to someone else– towards yourself.

Imagine softening towards yourself….

When we pay more attention to our experiences, and become more aware and hopefully less self-critical, we open the door to greet whatever is there.


And that’s how we find freedom-- freedom to be more curious and open to our experiences, which can help us be more present in our daily lives – and that is true freedom!

Happy Pesach!


TO LISTEN TO THIS GUIDED PRACTICE:



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Updated: Jul 13, 2023

Mindfully Increasing Joy and Cultivating Happiness in the Month of Adar


The new month of Adar is upon us. And with it, the well-known expression “when

Adar enters, we increase joy.”

According to the Chassidic Rebbe, Chaim Elazar Spira, (Minchas Elazar)

Whatever we can do to increase joy - there is a mitzvah in doing so, and each person has to evaluate this according to his own heart and soul... It is a mitzvah, insofar as possible, to increase the mitzvah-related joy in his heart and in his affairs”


It's a mitzvah to increase happiness, but there's no guidebook.

“Everyone according to his own heart and soul “ is not exactly a how-to manual.


Happiness is something we can cultivate with practice!


In 2014, the United Nations General Assembly proclaimed March 20 to be the International Day of Happiness. It’s easy to understand why they see happiness as something to celebrate: Happy people are healthier; they get sick less often and live longer.

Happiness is not just a personal issue; it’s a matter of public health and national well-being.


Below are a few happiness exercises to get you started by the Greater Good Science Center in Berkley. They suggest several happiness practices to increase joy and well being. Here are a few for you to try:


1) Three Good Things exercise- Keep a journal and write down positive things from your day. At the end of your day, write down three things that were positive and made you feel good, including how they made you feel. For example, something kind a colleague or family member said to you, enjoying a cup of coffee, or something nice you saw while walking. And then briefly explain why you think each good thing happened-which focuses your attention on the sources of goodness that surround you.


Make some time for yourself to think about these good things.


2) Meaningful Pictures

Remembering positive events is not the only way to happiness– finding and appreciating meaning in our lives can also bring us happiness.

During the week, look for sources of meaning in your life such as family, friends, work experiences, and hobbies. Take about 10 pictures of things that are meaningful to you. At the end of the week, spend some time reflecting on them: What does each photo represent, and why is what was photographed meaningful to you?

Write down some of those thoughts if it’s helpful.


3) Use Your Strengths exercise- invites you to consider your strengths. It’s easy for us to focus on our weaknesses and things we don’t like about ourselves. In this practice, every day we choose one or more of our strengths or positive attributes during the course of a week. A few examples include curiosity, creativity, kindness, humor, and justice. You can choose the same strength or work on different ones.

We make a plan to utilize our positive attributes in a new way. For example,

creativity in a work project, or curiosity for our partner’s or children’s interests.

At the end of the week, write about what you did, how it made you feel, and what

you learned.

4) Random Acts of Kindness is doing something nice for someone else, just because you want to, with no ulterior motive. Being kind makes us feel better, and helps us

to thrive in our communities and societies.

It doesn't matter if we know the person or not.

Here are a few examples:

  • Giving compliments

  • Showing gratitude

  • Doing an act of service for someone else

  • Giving your time to someone else (volunteering)

When I was young, I admired clever people. Now that I am old, I admire kind people.

Abraham Joshua Heschel

For more happiness practices:

Practicing cultivating happiness is not meant to ignore or negate unpleasant things or annoyances that happen to us in life, but it can’t hurt to spend some more time appreciating and seeing the good in our lives.


The month of Adar is a wonderful time to cultivate happiness.


To learn about living mindfully and mindfulness-based stress reduction:


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