Dr. Nicole LePera

It's impossible to imagine the goal is to completely have a blank, quiet mind.

Usually, if our mind is blank and quiet, we're probably in a state of shutdown, which I spend a lot of time in myself.

So the goal is to develop awareness, which is kind of a living practice of meditation.

where we can choose what thoughts we're holding on to because our mind is powerful.

The more we're thinking a thought, the more we're continuing a feeling in our body.

But we can also choose the moments where our thoughts aren't helpful, where our body is giving us more information and then we could tend to that information.

I'm practicing still.

I'm still a work in progress because my protective habit for so long has been to dissociate or to disconnect.

Not surprising, right, that I pursued the field of clinical psychology where I can live in my mind.

I can understand things from a distant vantage point.

I still call it my spaceship.

that I go off onto.

And I go to my spaceship, and this is because I've observed my patterns, when what I'm feeling in my body is too uncomfortable.

I don't want to be in there, right?

The quickest path out is to distract myself with someone else, with the next achievement.

So for me, I'm still working on tending to my daily habits so that my body feels a safer place.

but also knowing that it's a choice for me to have those moments where I'm reconnecting.

Once I'm in my body, I'm still learning how to be present with uncomfortable feelings.

I struggle often to give language to what I'm feeling, especially when I'm in the moment of a feeling.

It sometimes takes me time to gain clarity on