Yoga Kota Kinabalu: Mindfulness Bell - A 5 Minute Mindfulness Meditation

Friday, April 4, 2014

Mindfulness Bell - A 5 Minute Mindfulness Meditation

Mindfulness Bell Volume 1

"Relax! Meditation is easy! Let the mindfulness bell do the work for you!"

Mindfulness Bell Volume 1 is a powerful meditation tool that was created especially for people who want to practice mindfulness meditation, and it's one of our most popular downloads of all time. It features the sound of a specially selected meditation bell that will really help to clear your mind and guide you into a deep state of meditation.

Pure, Simple and Powerful

This recording contains nothing but the pure sound of a Tibetan singing bowl being repeatedly struck with a soft mallet.

This calming sound is a wonderful focal point for meditation. Simply absorb your attention in the sound of the mindfulness bell. No mantra is required, no special breathing techniques are needed, just let your awareness be consumed by the sound of the bell.

Your mind will become clearer and more calm with each and every bell strike, and as the bells fade into silence, your mind is given the opportunity to experience a very natural state of stillness.

This bell actually encourages your mind to become still and silent, but alert. This is mindfulness training at its best!

A relaxing way to practice mindfulness meditation

There’s something really nice about being able to meditate without having to worry about concentrating intensely or repeating a mantra.

Just let the bells do the work for you.

Their comforting, meditative sound will help you to anchor your awareness in the present moment so that you can move past mental noise and get in touch with that part of you that is already quiet and still. This really is a very effective way to meditate.

Try out 5 minutes of mindfulness

A word or two from the composer / producer

If there is one I learned while recording Mindfulness Bells Volume 1, it’s that meditation bells are not all equal!

I sampled dozens of different bells and eventually exhausted my own collection of over 65 different bells and meditation bowls before I found "the one". Just for fun, I decided to call him "Henry".

Meet "Henry", our perfect mindfulness bell.

Henry is almost one foot wide and he weighs 4 pounds. He is made from seven different metals and he was born in the Himalayas. He's a big boy, but he has a very calm disposition and he loves to sing in a deep, soft voice. Henry is the star of Mindfulness Bell Volume 1, but he promises me that he won't let all this sudden fame go to his head.

Each and every bell has its own unique sound. Some are quite unmusical, whereas others have harmonics that mingle beautifully. Some oscillate too quickly or in awkward patterns that are distracting, whereas others oscillate with a natural rhythm that is deeply relaxing. Some bells really clang when they are struck, others are too boomy.

Henry has all the qualities of a perfect mindfulness bell. He’s never shrill, clangy or boomy and when you strike him he sings effortlessly. His two most prominent harmonics oscillate with a low delta frequency of 0.5 Hertz, and at a delta frequency of 4 Hertz. (You can hear these oscillations pulsing away in the audio sample). Much like the effect of binaural beats, these oscillations are deeply relaxing and can actually help to guide your brainwave activity into a state of deep meditation.

It's easy to underestimate just how much thought and effort goes into a "simple" recording like this. As a music composer, a producer, and someone who is more than a little obsessed with sound quality, I spent a huge amount of time experimenting with different microphones and recording techniques before I captured the sound you hear in this recording. Following that, I spent another fortnight experimenting with the timing of the bells and mastering the final sound. It was a labour of love that I will always remember fondly.

What exactly happens inside Mindfulness Bell Volume 1?

Each time the bell is struck, it rings for about 40 seconds. During the first 5 minutes of this meditation, the sound never completely fades away; the bell is struck again before it fades to silence.

Slowly but surely the gap between each bell-strike is increased, allowing you to gradually experience longer and longer moments of complete silence.

By the 15 minute mark, silent spaces of around 15 seconds have opened up between each bell strike, and the overall volume has become a little quieter. By the 30 minute mark, these silent spaces have increased to 25 seconds and the volume is reduced just a little more.

If you choose to continue meditating for more than 30 minutes, you’ll find that each 40 second bell sound is separated by 40 seconds of silence.

In this way, Mindfulness Bell Volume 1 trains you to become more and more comfortable with the sound of silence, and more and more capable of achieving mental stillness on your own.

So what is your role to play in all of this? Just sit quietly and listen. If your mind wanders, simply return your attention to the sound of the bell - your reliable anchor to the present moment.

Track 1 - Main Meditation, 60 minutes
Track 2 - 5 Minute Mindfulness, 5 minutes
Artist: Christopher Lloyd Clarke
Delivery: Immediate MP3 Download - Worldwide
Price: $ 9.95
All prices are in Australian Dollars (ex GST)
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