Meditation
Meditation Classes & Workshops
Group classes, private instruction, and sessions for teams — online across the country, in person in Chicago. Taught plainly, by somebody who spends every working day helping people get out of their own heads.
Why I teach it
Hypnosis fixes a pattern. Meditation changes the weather.
The people who get the most out of hypnosis are usually the ones who have some baseline capacity to notice what their mind is doing. Meditation is how you build that — and it is the difference between a client who gets a good result and a client who keeps it.
So I teach it. Not as a philosophy, not as a lifestyle, and definitely not as a competition. Just the actual skill: put attention somewhere, notice when it leaves, bring it back, repeat. That is the whole thing, and it is harder and more valuable than it sounds.
Try it right now
Sixty seconds, before you read any further
Four counts in, four held, six out. Longer out than in, which is the part that does the work — a slow exhale is the one lever you have on your own nervous system from the outside.
Follow the circle. Expanding is the in-breath, still is the hold, shrinking is the out-breath. Do four rounds and notice whether the room sounds any different afterward. This is the whole of what I teach on the first night of a class, and it works in a stairwell before a meeting just as well as it works here.
Not a substitute for medical or psychological care. If breath work makes you lightheaded, stop and breathe normally.
What is on offer
Four ways to sit down
Group meditation, Wednesday evenings
A guided hour for anyone from complete beginners to people who have been sitting for years. Short instruction, a long guided session, and time afterward for questions from people who are relieved to hear that everyone else's mind wanders too.
$25 drop-in · 5-class pass $90 · unlimited monthly $70
The Blue Hour
The signature one. A long guided beach meditation, then a sound bath — singing bowls, chimes, and a gong — while you lie on the floor and do absolutely nothing. Leis optional but statistically popular. It is the most fun thing I do and it books out first.
$58 per person · first Saturday most months
One-on-one instruction
For people who want a practice built around their actual life rather than a generic one — a specific schedule, a specific set of obstacles, a specific reason they have quit three times. In person in Chicago or by video.
$145 per session · four-session starter $520
Corporate & team workshops
A session for a team that has started using the word "burnout" casually. Practical, secular, no incense, no asking anybody to share their feelings with their manager. People learn two techniques they can actually use at a desk, and then we do a real session together.
From $750 · half-day and series pricing available
For teams anywhere
What a corporate session actually looks like
Sixty to ninety minutes — on-site in Chicago, or over video for distributed teams anywhere — for groups from eight to about sixty. No mats required, no shoes off, nobody has to sit on the floor in front of their colleagues.
- Fifteen minutes of plain explanation. What stress does mechanically, why the usual advice fails, and what actually moves the needle in a workday.
- Two techniques they can use at a desk. One that takes ninety seconds, one that takes five minutes. Both usable between meetings, neither requiring anyone to look unusual.
- A real guided session. Twenty-five minutes, lights down, and for many people the first genuine rest they have had in months.
- Questions, and a one-page takeaway. Plus optional follow-up audio for everyone who attended.
A note on how this is framed. Corporate sessions are stress-management and focus training. They are not medical or psychological care, they are not a substitute for an employee assistance programme, and nothing in them diagnoses or treats anything. I say this to HR up front, in writing, and it has never once cost me a booking — it usually helps.
Popular add-ons
- A four-week series instead of a one-off — considerably more effective
- Custom audio recorded for your team, branded to your company
- A Blue Hour as an offsite or holiday-party alternative
- Lunch-and-learn format for hybrid teams, delivered over video
Questions
Before your first class
Everybody is bad at it, including people who have done it for thirty years. "My mind wandered" is not a failure state — noticing that it wandered and coming back is the entire exercise. The rep is the return, not the stillness. Most people quit because nobody told them that.
Meditation trains attention, generally, over time, with no particular destination. Hypnosis uses a focused state to aim at something specific — a habit, a fear, a night of sleep. They use overlapping machinery for different jobs. Plenty of my clients do both, and knowing one makes the other easier.
No. Chairs are fine. Lying down is fine for most of what we do. If your knees have opinions, bring them and we will work around them.
Not as I teach it. The techniques predate and outlive any particular tradition, and I teach them as attention training, not as doctrine. People of every faith and none show up and nobody is asked to believe anything.
You lie down and someone plays singing bowls, chimes and gongs while you do nothing. It is less mystical than it sounds and more pleasant than it sounds. In the Blue Hour it comes at the end, after the guided portion, which is when people are most able to enjoy it.