Hi friends!
Yesterday in our monthly Home Base Hangout, one of our community members said her experience of meditating was like being in the middle of a ten-ring circus. Lists, worries, distractions, compulsions, convictions – all of these separate acts clamouring for her attention.
She dealt with it by … not dealing with it. Instead, she envisioned herself as a ring leader standing in the middle, letting all of it simply happen. Which of course, paradoxically, helped her feel less stressed and more settled.
“Standing in the middle of all of this” is actually a Pali word in Buddhism: tatramajjhattatã. How great that’s even a word! It describes a state of balanced equanimity that ultimately leads both to more grounded autonomy, and more capacity to move smoothly between perspectives.
Above is a guided meditation about being in the middle of everything, initially recorded for Dan Harris’ excellent app.
Enjoy!
Jeff
A few quick notes—
The next Do Nothing Project (DNP) live meditation is Sunday, May 31 at 8pm EDT. Link here. The DNP is for paid subscribers three times a month, and free for everyone the first Sunday of the month. If the cost of a subscription is not accessible to you, full scholarships are available at info@jeffwarren.org. Replays are archived on Monday morning.
New to Home Base? We have over 75 free guided meditations in our audio library, over 60 extended meditations, over 365 meditations on YouTube, and a growing number of community practice videos. New writing, new audio meditations, and new live community gatherings happen every week.
Home Base is best experienced on a web browser (laptop or mobile), NOT the Substack app. The app is great for finding new authors who have much to say, and, like any social media platform, it will suck out your eyeballs and, eventually, your brain. Plus the more pubs you subscribe to (they automatically offer these after you sign up), the more Substack will flood your inbox. To manage Substack emails and notifications, read this.
Did you find me on Calm or Happier? While the meditations I made for the apps live on in perpetuity, I no longer record new meditations for them. My latest work happens here; becoming a paid subscriber is the best way to support that work. If you found this meditation and post helpful, but becoming a paid subscriber isn’t an option, you can also …
Meditate, Relate and Creatively Self-Regulate
July 16-19, 2026
Art of Living North Carolina
This retreat is about not being the only weirdo in the room. Everyone here will be the weirdo in the room! Including your two teachers, Jeff Warren and Ofosu Jones-Quartey (Born I). What unifies us is the sense that our brains are wired differently, and those differences have brought both real challenges and real creative opportunities.
