Mindfulness Exercises, with Sean Fargo
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© 2025 Mindfulness Exercises, with Sean Fargo
Description
Practical, trauma‑sensitive mindfulness for everyday life — and for the people who teach it. Expect grounded guided meditations, evidence‑informed tools, and candid conversations with leading voices in the field.
Hosted by Sean Fargo — former Buddhist monk, founder of MindfulnessExercises.com, and a certified Search Inside Yourself instructor—each episode blends compassion, clarity, and real‑world application for practitioners, therapists, coaches, educators, and wellness professionals.
What you’ll find:
• Guided practices: breath awareness, body scans, self‑compassion, sleep, and nervous‑system regulation
• Teacher tools: trauma‑sensitive language, sequencing, and ethical foundations for safe, inclusive mindfulness
• Expert interviews with renowned teachers and researchers (e.g., Sharon Salzberg, Gabor Maté, Byron Katie, Rick Hanson, Ellen Langer, Judson Brewer)
• Clear takeaways you can use today—in sessions, classrooms, workplaces, and at home
Updated 2-3x weekly. Follow the show, try this week’s practice, and share one insight in a review to help others discover the podcast.
Explore more resources and training at MindfulnessExercises.com and the Mindfulness Meditation Teacher Certification.
204 Episodes
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A quiet room, a slower week, and a simple question that matters: what truly makes someone ready to teach mindfulness? While recovering from COVID, I took time to reflect on the difference between healthy hesitation and unhelpful overconfidence—and why the best teachers often start from humility rather than hype. We walk through a practical rule of thumb shared by senior mindfulness teachers: when invited to teach, thoughtful caution can signal integrity, while quick certainty can reveal a mi...
Pressure doesn’t have to crush you; it can refine you. George Mumford—renowned mindfulness teacher to championship teams and communities far from the spotlight—joins us for a deeply practical journey through presence, performance, and the courage to be yourself. We open with a simple “arriving” practice that resets the nervous system, then build on the five superpowers that underpin lasting change: right effort, concentration, insight, trust, and mindfulness. George is clear-eyed about motiva...
We share simple, grounded ways to feel anger, sadness, depression, and fear without judgment, then channel that energy into healing and meaningful action. We also invite you to a live online retreat with practices, Q&A, and resources to support resilience. • naming natural emotions after a public tragedy • why feeling is essential for healing • mindful steps for anger, sadness, depression, fear • opening within your window of tolerance • resources from Sharon Salzberg, Gabor Maté, Rick H...
Your mind drifts the moment you sit to breathe, and that’s not a problem to fix—it’s the raw material of practice. We unpack why a healthy brain loves to roam, how the default mode network fuels both distraction and creativity, and why chasing an empty mind sets you up for frustration. Instead of fighting thoughts, we show you how to work with them using a simple cycle: notice, note, and return. We walk through grounded metaphors that make mindfulness feel tangible: watching thoughts float p...
Anne Cushman explores how mindfulness and creativity feed each other through guided practices, research insights, and lived stories. We trade perfection for presence, play with color and movement, and learn to follow the thread of aliveness into honest work. • opening space through breath and softening • honoring life as inherently creative • reconciling the teacher and the artist selves • lessons from Spirit Rock creativity retreats • research on focus, divergence and resilience • embodimen...
We explore a nuanced look at mindfulness: its benefits, the ethics behind how it is taught, and the critiques around commercialization and depoliticisation. William Edelglass helps us test the line between personal practice and social change with clear questions, research, and examples. • Angela Davis’s question about mindfulness and injustice • critiques of commodification and the mindfulness industrial complex • instrumental use versus ethically grounded practice • popularity of apps, corp...
The ground keeps moving, but our old habits try to pretend nothing has changed. In this mini episode, James Baraz talks honestly about what this moment is saying to us: we’re not separate, our choices echo, and we can learn to respond with more care than fear. James Baraz's website: https://www.awakeningjoy.info/ Starting with a simple practice—paying attention—we trace how mindfulness exposes the threads that bind our lives together, from family routines to global supply chains.&n...
We explore mindful self-discipline as a blueprint for freedom, not a joyless grind. Through aspiration, awareness, and action, we show how to beat engineered distraction, strengthen willpower, and make steady progress without shame. https://mindfulnessexercises.com/podcast • self-discipline linked to higher happiness and smoother daily life • attention economy pressures and engineered distraction • definitions of self-discipline, willpower, habits, motivation • decision fatigue evidence and ...
Former Buddhist monk and Mindfulness Exercises founder Sean Fargo explores what full acceptance really means in mindfulness and meditation—meeting fear, anxiety, judgment, and resistance with embodied awareness and self-compassion. https://mindfulnessexercises.com/podcast/ Drawing on years of teaching across prisons, hospitals, classrooms, and companies, Sean translates Buddhist psychology, trauma-sensitive mindfulness, and practical nervous system regulation into simple moves you can use tod...
Former Buddhist monk and Mindfulness Exercises founder Sean Fargo lays out a clear, compassionate roadmap for teaching mindfulness and meditation — with confidence, credibility, and heart. https://mindfulnessexercises.com/podcast/ Drawing from his journey (from cloistered practice to prisons, clinics, classrooms, and companies), Sean distills what actually works so you can help others be more present, resilient, and self‑compassionate—without overcomplicating the practice. In this episode, yo...
When I first started teaching mindfulness, I thought I had to sound wise, calm, and enlightened — like a “real” teacher. But one unexpected moment — in a tiny community room in Berkeley — changed everything I thought I knew about guiding others in mindfulness. In this episode, I share the hidden truth I discovered after years living as a Buddhist monk in Thailand and training more than 30,000 mindfulness teachers around the world:that teaching mindfulness is actually much simpler than most of...
In this Mindfulness Exercises Podcast episode, Sean Fargo sits down with Mark Walsh, founder of Embodiment Unlimited, to explore the profound connection between mindfulness, embodiment, and trauma-informed coaching. Mark is a leading voice in embodied mindfulness, known for blending humor, honesty, and heart-centered awareness into the worlds of coaching, somatic psychology, and body-based transformation.Together, Sean and Mark dive into practical, embodied tools for: Reconnecting the body an...
In this episode of Mindfulness Exercises with Sean Fargo, Sean explores how mindfulness can transform the way we set and communicate boundaries. Saying “no” doesn’t have to come from guilt or fear—it can arise from awareness, care, and self-respect. Sean guides listeners through a 10-minute meditation to sense the body’s inner “yes” and “no,” offering practical scripts for real-life situations and trauma-sensitive tips for mindfulness teachers, therapists, and coaches. Listeners w...
In this episode of the Mindfulness Exercises Podcast, Sean Fargo talks with Dr. Stefanie Broes, founder and CEO of Moonbird, about how tactile, screen-free technology can help us reconnect with the body through mindful breathing. Moonbird is a handheld device that literally breathes with you—expanding and contracting in your hand to guide calm, slow breathing for stress relief, better sleep, and heart-rate-variability (HRV) coherence. https://www.moonbird.life/ Sean and Stefanie explore the s...
In this episode of the Mindfulness Exercises Podcast, Sean Fargo explores how to lead trauma-sensitive body scan meditations with compassion, choice, and safety. Designed for mindfulness teachers, coaches, therapists, and wellness professionals, this session offers practical tools for guiding clients who may carry trauma in their bodies. Discover how to balance awareness with grounding, introduce choice and agency, and cultivate safety in every meditation experience. Sean also walks you throu...
When pain shows up in practice, it can feel overwhelming but it can also be a doorway to deeper awareness. This is an excerpt from our Community Gathering wherein a student opens up about the challenge of neck pain becoming overwhelming during meditation. Rather than offering a quick fix, Sean Fargo invites a gentler approach: turning toward discomfort with curiosity and compassion instead of resistance or judgment. This conversation is a reminder that pain in meditation isn’t a barrier to pr...
In this powerful conversation from the Mindfulness Exercises Podcast, Sean Fargo speaks with Julie Lythcott-Haims — New York Times bestselling author, activist, politician, and former Stanford dean — about how mindfulness can help us face shame, rewrite old stories, and create space for authentic belonging. Julie shares how she first discovered mindfulness in her 30s, how body awareness helped her get out of her own way, and how storytelling became a tool for healing unprocessed pain. She ref...
At some point in practice, many of us wonder: Why does it feel like I’m not growing anymore? In this excerpt from our Community Gathering Q&A, a student opens up about reaching a plateau after years of mindfulness and healing work. Sean Fargo offers a compassionate reframing that feeling stuck is not failure, but often a sign that something deeper is asking for attention. Along the way, he shares practical ways to soften this stuckness — from grounding in nature, to seeking help and...
In this episode of Mindfulness Exercises, Sean Fargo and Loch Kelly explore the essence of effortless mindfulness—a direct shift into awake, loving awareness that doesn’t rely on heavy concentration. Loch shows how quick “glimpses” can reset us, how flow isn’t the same as hyper-focus, and how using visual, auditory, or felt cues helps mindfulness land in everyday life and teaching. Whether you’re a mindfulness teacher, therapist, coach, or a practitioner navigating stress or attention c...
In this episode, Sean Fargo explores the deep relationship between mindfulness and concentration — two practices that are often taught separately but in reality support and sustain each other. Drawing inspiration from his teacher Ajahn Chah, Sean reflects on how concentration serves as the foundation that allows mindfulness to stay steady with the unfolding present moment. Through personal stories from his years as a Buddhist monk and practical concentration exercises, Sean highlights h...
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