Tag Archives: Meditation

Lotus Macramé

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The lotus flower is a symbol often associated with Buddhism or spirituality in general. One of the characteristics associated with this symbol is that of purity and the ability to maintain its beauty in the mud.

For me lotus symbolically represents inner growth and everything related to study and practice and the wall hanging you can see in photo it’s my special lotus.

What does inner growth mean to me?

It means looking inside me, discovering my vocation and my talents and bringing them to light with awareness and intentional actions in everyday life learning to “make a difference”.

The path of inner growth is a path that concerns all people (women and men) in different ways, none is excluded. There is always a moment in life that takes us on a journey deep within ourselves.  There are those who travel daily in their inner world , others who cyclically lose their way and then find it again, and others who realize the strength of the path of inner growth only when a tragedy happens. To each his own path, to each his own way.

Joy : a macramé tale

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Joy is a macramé wall hanging symbol of my “key word”. 

The story of this macramé concerns the integration between the way of awareness and the way of creativity and it is a coaching exercise about vision.

Having a keyword that can represent your direction means having a clear vision of your life.  Before choosing and formulating a goal it is fundamental to do a deeply work on oneself (better with a life coach) and discover the direction that guides our choices. In this way, the keyword becomes a reminder that helps us not to get lost on the path or that helps us to find the right way when we lost it.

It may be difficult to reduce one’s own direction to just one word, but the goal is to be able to refer to a fixed point. It is a matter of finding an evocative word that can represents for us a lifestyle and meaning. Obviously it is a word that can change with time and experience.

 I usually use collages for this practice, but this time I translated it with the macramé technique using cords and colors.

The wall hanging that you can see in photo is the representation of my key word JOY and the sentence you read below is the reminder that is hidden between the knots. 

The key to self-care is hidden in joy.

Chair meditation

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Last article of our journey in the posture meditation: how to meditate on a chair.

First of all it’s important to remember that meditating sitting on a chair does not take anything away from the practice compared to meditation with legs crossed or on your knees. I often encounter, in fact, the limiting belief that meditation sitting on a chair is a postural adaptation that takes away part of the meaning to the practice.

What really can do the difference in your practice is the comfort of the position. A meditation practice performed in an uncomfortable position for your body is counterproductive to the practice itself.

The best meditation is the one you do in an optimal postural condition because it allows you to contact yourself in peace.

How to practice meditation on the chair:

  • Be sure to keep your back off the back of the chair and your feet on the ground (without shoes, if possible).
  • Leave your arms soft and place your hands on your legs finding a position that allows you to let go of tensions in your shoulders.
  • Your back is straight, but not rigid, and the diaphragm area is free.
  • Be careful with your shoulders: do not approach your ears, leave them soft and open as much as necessary for you.
  • Do not close the throat with the chin towards the chest and do not arch the neck.

The characteristic of this position compared to the previous two , kneeling and crossed legs, (see previous articles) is mainly in the support of the feet on the ground. In this case the feeling of rooting on the ground, which comes from the contact of your feet with the floor, can be an additional point where to focus attention during practice.

Once you choose the best position for your body, it’s time to learn “to be with what’s inside and outside of you” one breath after another.

I hope I have helped you with these short articles on posture in meditation in finding your position and choosing to start meditating.
If you want I remind you that you can start by listening to this short guided breath practice: IT’S TIME TO BREATHE

It’s time to breathe

Where do you start when you want to listen to the body? I always start with breath. Breathing is the first step Breathing is one of the main “tools” that you can use to listen to yourself in depth. It’s just watching your breath that you will begin to know your essence deeply, in a…

by Barbara Boschi

RECAP OF OUR JOURNEY OF MEDITATION

Meditation and posture

Can posture during meditation make a difference? Absolutely yes! Posture in meditation has a purpose and should not be underestimated. With this first article, I want to introduce a series of articles that will cover the meditation posture. For the next 3 weeks we will make a journey together in the discovery of positions in…

by Barbara Boschi

Sitting meditation

In this article I will focus on the sitting position that is most frequently used to represent a person in meditation. I refer to the sitting position on the ground with the legs crossed and the lotus flower position. Meditation sitting on the ground with legs crossed. Sit on the floor without a pillow and…

by Barbara Boschi

Kneeling meditation

We continue our journey dedicated to the deepening of posture in meditation: let’s explore, in this article, the position with the legs bent to the ground, on their knees. After focusing on the most affected areas of the body during sitting meditation, and after considering the cross-legged position, this article is about the kneeling position.…

by Barbara Boschi

Foto di Florencia Viadana su Unsplash

Kneeling meditation

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We continue our journey dedicated to the deepening of posture in meditation: let’s explore, in this article, the position with the legs bent to the ground, on their knees.

After focusing on the most affected areas of the body during sitting meditation, and after considering the cross-legged position, this article is about the kneeling position.

This position is often used by those who practice Zen meditation or by those who practice martial arts. The most noticeable body difference compared to the cross-legged position concerns the hips. In this case your hips are less stressed for opening and flexibility.

How to sit on your knees to meditate:

To sit on the ground on your knees on a hard floor can be painful. Use a folded blanket or a thin pillow to “soften the floor”. Once you have prepared the ground, get on your knees, with the butt resting on the heels, slightly spread the knees between them (about the distance of two fists) keeping your back straight.

If this position creates pain in a part of your feet you can put a pillow between your feet and the ground. If you feel tension in your legs, you can put a small cushion between your butt and heels.

On the market there are also very low wooden benches used precisely to improve the comfort of this position.

And arms, where do I put them? This is a question that often recurs when you are learning to sit and meditate. In this case, the arms can be left soft, with hands on the legs, so as to keep the shoulders relaxed.

If you have problems with the joints of the knees, both this position and cross-legged, can cause pain and discomfort. For this reason, in the next article I will cover the topic of meditation on the chair.

See you next friday!

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Sitting meditation

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In this article I will focus on the sitting position that is most frequently used to represent a person in meditation. I refer to the sitting position on the ground with the legs crossed and the lotus flower position.

Meditation sitting on the ground with legs crossed.

Sit on the floor without a pillow and cross your legs softly or one in front of the other. Watch what happens to your back: does it curve? Is there enough space for the diaphragm or does it feel crushed? Observe your knees: are they on the ground or not far from the ground or are they raised to the point of exceeding the height of the pelvis?

If your knees are significantly raised from the ground and your back tends to bend, this position to be held even for three minutes becomes very uncomfortable.How can you solve this problem?  Using the pillow to “lift” the seat and make sure that your knees unload the weight on the ground and do not exceed the height of your hips.

There are several pillows for meditation but you can create your own without much expense and with the right height for you, using the pillows you have at home or some folded blankets. The height of the pillow is the one that will allow you to stay in this position in a comfortable way and allow you to free your breath, keep your back straight but not rigid and relax your shoulders. The higher the cushion, the more your legs will drop to the ground and your back will be straight without effort. Drop your soft arms on your legs and choose the position you prefer for your hands.

Meditation in the lotus flower position

If it is tiring for you to stay in the cross-legged position do not continue reading, because the lotus flower position is even more complex. It consists in crossing the legs carrying the left foot on the right thigh near the groin and the right foot on the left thigh near the groin.This position is indicated for those who have good elasticity and are already trained. Also in this case, however, do not put yourself in this position without having done a minimum of warm-up, otherwise your joints in the long run may suffer.

For this time I stop here, the next article will be dedicated to meditation in the kneeling position. See you next friday !

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Meditation and posture

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Can posture during meditation make a difference? Absolutely yes! Posture in meditation has a purpose and should not be underestimated.

With this first article, I want to introduce a series of articles that will cover the meditation posture. For the next 3 weeks we will make a journey together in the discovery of positions in meditation and the differences between them.

Why should I write about it in a blog dedicated to creativity and fiber art? Because meditation is one of the doors to creativity and it is important to understand how to experience it better. My aim is to help you understand which sitting position is best for you and what you need to bring your attention.

Let’s start!

When you meditate your body helps you to connect with your center, if it is in a favorable condition, otherwise the greater the time you will have tingling, itching and pain!

When talking about meditation usually appears the image of a figure sitting cross-legged. If this is a comfortable position for you, there is no problem, but if it is unthinkable for you to sit in this position for more than three minutes, then you may think that meditation is not a practice for you. Nothing could be more wrong!

Everyone can approach meditation, but it is important to know the position before starting.

Meditation posture: the areas of the body.

Before going into the merits of each position, to which I will dedicate specific articles, I want to start to point out, on a general level, the areas of the body that you need to observe when you decide to sit down to meditate.

Keep these areas in mind as you read the next articles.

Back: You need to find a sitting position that allows you to keep your back straight (but not stiff) effortlessly. The diaphragm, muscle “elected” for breathing, must be free and not closed from the position.

Head, neck, chin: keep the chin away from the chest so as not to “close the throat”, similarly do not aim up the chin not to arch the neck. To find the right distance try to make some movement with your head up and down.

Eyes: you can choose to close your eyes to have a greater connection with yourself and less distractions, but you can also keep your eyes open while keeping your attention inside. Your eyes can be directed to a distant point on the floor or on the horizon.

Shoulders: shoulders should be away from the ears and sufficiently relaxed.

Arms and hands: The arms will adjust according to the sitting position you choose and the position of your hands. I will dedicate a specific article to this topic in which I will also talk about the use of the hand position in meditation.

For this time I will stop here, in the next article I will treat the sitting position with crossed legs.

P.S. In these articles I will refer to the practice of meditation in general without going into detail of the different styles and different schools of thought.  The focus is on the body and posture.

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Focus Catcher Macramé

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Focus catcher is a macramé wall hanging created to represent the process of concentration linked to meditation and body awareness.

“I often have many ideas but not enough time and energy to realize them all and this creates a feeling of confusion in my head and a particular agitation in the body. “

Now I’ve learned that when I find myself in an excess of creativity I must sit down, take a breath and have a Body Scan practice. One breath after another I put my ideas in order and select only one to be implemented. I write down in a notebook some of them that I will review later, others I let go, it will be someone else who will realize them.

It was nice to symbolize the “focus” process as I meditate and to find the analogies with the knotting work of macrame. Macrame and many other handicrafts are often referred to as forms of meditation. These statements find me in agreement even if I recognize specific characteristics to both meditation and crafting. But it’s also true that there are many similarities between the practices of body awareness and the practices that express our creative side.

I have often turned the creation of a wall hanging into a journey within myself. Sometimes I start to discover some places of my inner world through knots, weaves and new patterns, other times I symbolically transform an awareness without using words (as in the case of the wall hanging that you see in the picture).

Focus embodiment

What is the use of training focus during a body awareness practice (often called body scan)?

Among the many benefits that I find in everyday life thanks to the practice of body awareness there is also that of training the ability to intentionally direct attention. Intentionally bringing attention to the breath or to a part of the body means shifting the focus from one situation to another.

Specifically in body practice, the aim may be to find a place of silence in the body where you can contact a little peace or recover your energy from a heavy day. Body practice has cascading effects on our daily lives and the seemingly innocuous training of directing attention to one part of the body can lead you to become aware of the usefulness of shifting focus to recover energy.


Let me give you some examples of what it means to “shift the focus”:

Shifting the focus from the outside to the inside, to recover energy through silence.


Shifting the focus from the inside to the outside, to contact the world through empathy and compassion.


Shifting the focus from the big to the small, to address the sense of helplessness.


Shifting focus from small to large, to realize that even a small step is important and can make a difference.

I could go on like this for many more lines, but I’ll leave it to you to find the other ways.
  Body listening practice (whatever methodology you’ve chosen) has an important impact in your life and in managing emotions: don’t forget it!

You have great power and great wisdom within you: use your power with awareness and listen to your wisdom.

It’s time to breathe

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Where do you start when you want to listen to the body? I always start with breath.

Breathing is the first step

Breathing is one of the main “tools” that you can use to listen to yourself in depth. It’s just watching your breath that you will begin to know your essence deeply, in a state of concentration and meditation

Your breathing changes, depending on what you’re doing: you’re breathing differently depending on your activities and the emotion you’re experiencing. Think, for example, about the difference in your breathing in a moment of agitation or a moment of calm, or think about how you change your breathing, the moment you are afraid.

Can you feel the difference and the consequences that these situations have on your muscles, your posture, your body?

It is also fundamental that you understand that there is no right way to breathe but there is your way of breathing in that moment and your personal history. For this reason, when approaching these practices it is important to maintain a great respect and an attitude of openness and trust. You are not performing any exercises or tasks but you are on the way to meet yourself and your inner landscape.

As you learn to take care of yourself by listening to your breath, your body language and your needs become clearer.

The path of bodily awareness helps you to make the choices in tune with your deeper and authentic feeling by becoming, in this way, your “bodily intelligence”.

If you want to start getting in touch with your breath, I created this short audio track to help you listen to your body while breathing.

Let’s take few breaths together!

Meditation and Relaxation

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Meditation and relaxation: two practices so similar and so different from each other.

As I wrote in previous articles, in this blog I want to tell the importance of manual creativity as a way of well-being and help you transform your hobby in a flow meditation.

Why is so important to me bodily awareness while you are creating?

The reason is that I have been involved in body awareness for almost 30 years as a therapist and I teach relaxation and meditation since 2010. In all these years I discovered and experienced that creativity is in the body and that you can really flow with it only if you listen to your body.

As listen to your body can be a deep journey into yourself, so can macramé and the creative path. Body learning is the most important tool you have at your disposal while working with your hands knotting and creating with macramé (or other manual techniques).

Meditation or relaxation which to choose?

In the common language these two terms are often used as synonyms. In practice, these two techniques are associated with each other. The confusion is easy and can only be clarified after trying both.

I always invite to try different styles and not to remain anchored to a single discipline. Through different experiences your body can experience different way of communication and listening.

There are different approaches and methodologies both in meditation and relaxation.

Some relaxation practices focus almost exclusively on the body and the perception of muscle tension (body scan) and others on imaginative ability. Some meditation practices work on the concept of here and now while others work on the concept of “here and elsewhere” (guided creative visualizations).

Every practice, whether meditation or relaxation, has the overall goal of connecting with yourself, with your inner world and with your inner artist.

Posture is an element that differentiates the two techniques and is not to be underestimated. The relaxation practices prefer the lying position while the meditation techniques is about sitting. There are exceptions, however.

Posture and any pain in the body could be one of the key points for choosing one technique over another.With my articles I will guide you to discover all the nuances of body listening and how this can be useful in your creative practice.

P.S. Listen to your body doesn’t mean necessarily do meditation or relaxation sometimes it’s about slowing down and breathing. Next week I’ll show you the importance of breathing with a free guided meditation.

Listen to your creative body

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“Listen to your body, create your life” is my motto, it represents both my profession and my approach to life at the same time. All the changes I have gone through have respected this steps: first I work on being (listen to the body) and then on doing (create your life) in order to be able to live mindfully.

What do I mean by living mindfully? Living mindfully means (for me) listening to my body, paying attention to my present with kindness and making space for joy.

The body is my starting point, my inner guide on this journey. I am constantly evolving and changing.

Getting in touch with yourself through the body means allowing yourself to discover your own essence. This is how I discovered macramé and started knotting. One knot after another I realized the deeply connection between mindfulness meditation and macramé.

Listen to your body, free your creativity and transform your life.

The most important step, the one that allows you to create the life you want, is what concerns your creativity.

Most of the time (not always) that you feel dissatisfaction in your life is because you are not expressing yourself freely and you are not using your creativity. You are not aligned with your deepest direction.

When you connect with your inner world through the body you connect with your talents and your inner artist.

By first learning to recognize your potential and then to have the courage to express it, you will be able to make the change you want and feel more in tune with life.

Through dialogue with the body you discover yourself and free your potential.It takes confidence, courage and patience.

It’s a gradual path that leads you to express yourself in the world. It is a journey that sets you free.

If you want I can help you discover how to listen to your body and transform macramé in a mindfulness meditation practice. In the next days I will write new articles about it and you’ll find a free guided meditation. Stay tuned!

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