Blog | Dr. Amy Johnson

Boredom

As I talk about leaning into what’s arising with so many people lately, a funny thing keeps showing up. They lean into what’s arising and realize that something their mind labels boredom is at the center. They see that their minds are flailing about, keeping habits alive, and working in overdrive to prevent them from feeling bored. Wait,

EP238: Welcoming What Arises Part 3: Q&A

In Part 3, I walk participants through leaning into what’s arising. I answer a lot of excellent, thoughtful questions about this process and everything that’s been shared so far. Participants share their experience and how this class has opened up so much for them already. And I talk about going right into the things we least want

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When Your World Feels Small…Say Yes

When I was struggling with anxiety, my world was tiny. I went to class, but only when there was an open seat right by the door. I can’t tell you how many times I walked by the classroom, saw that the only open seats were way across the room, and kept walking. I went to the grocery

EP237: Welcoming What Arises Part 2: How to do it

In Part 2 of the Welcoming What Arises series, we look more deeply at how to lean into what’s arising. There is no one way. It’s something we each experiment with and find our own way.But in this class, we look at breathing into the physical sensations of what’s showing up with curiosity, from an

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 1:32:20 — 84.5MB)

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A Step Behind or a Step Ahead?

When I talk about leaning into everything that arises with curiosity, it’s a little like watching a dramatic movie scene with no musical soundtrack telling you how you’re supposed to feel. The dramatic soundtrack may be playing, but your curiosity allows you to see that as a lens rather than as reality. When you’re exploring what’s arising

EP236: Welcoming What Arises Part 1: Why we don’t

In the next three podcast episodes I will be sharing the 3-part class I recently taught called Welcoming What Arises. Today’s episode shares Part 1 where I focus on why we don’t welcome what’s arising. I speak to the misunderstandings behind our habitual resistance and fear of feeling and the promise, power, and true freedom available

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The Tip Off

There is an incredibly clear way life shows you that you’re seeing things through a thick and biased filter of thought. It shows you through discomfort. When you’re feeling things like resistance, self-consciousness, guilt, regret, shame, or anxiety, you’re identified with experience as if it’s “yours”; as if you’re a separate “me” to whom life is happening. Rumi

EP235: It won’t work for me

An incredibly common thought that doesn’t look like a thought is, “It won’t work for me”. Whether it’s becoming free from a habit, anxiety, or some other type of personal change, or becoming a successful coach or being able to support others, have a successful business, or any other venture, I hear it all the

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 31:21 — 28.7MB)

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No Need to Devour

There’s a worm addicted to eatinggrape leaves.Suddenly, he wakes up,call it grace, whatever, somethingwakes him, and he’s no longera worm.He’s the entire vineyard,and the orchard too,the fruit, the trunks,a growing wisdom and joythat doesn’t needto devour.–This is How a Human Being Can Change by Rumi The worm doesn’t break his grape leaf addiction by cutting out

EP234: A coaching session on feeling tortured by your mind

Jackie feels like her mind is torturing her. She says it’s constantly telling her what a bad person she is and predicting a horrible future. When Jackie’s mind talks this way–which is often–entire days can be spent in what feels like depression and anxiety. As if that weren’t enough, Jackie experiences a lot of guilt