Ira Israel

"God has given you one face and you make yourselves another. You jig and amble, and you lisp, you nickname God's creatures and make your wantonness your ignorance." -- Hamlet, Act III, scene 1

As sentient beings we yearn to be loved unconditionally, and we were raised in a highly...

I have many clients -- mostly artists, musicians, filmmakers and writers -- who come to me with existential questions. For them, I compiled a list of tools for creating a meaningful life:

10. Be a citizen of the world. Know as much as possible about what is going on in...

A few months ago I received the following Facebook message from a guy I had never met and whose photo I did not recognize:

Hi Ira,
I'd love to get together with you for coffee or something if you have time. We seem to know a lot of...

"There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so." -- Hamlet, Act II, scene 2

I never realized what an idiot I was until I started meditating. Let me rephrase that: I never realized how limited my mind was until I tried practicing mindfulness meditation.

As...

Any time we wish something transpired differently in our lives, that engenders a resentment.

Whenever we hear the words "should have" or "should not have," that is the manifestation of a resentment.

For example:

"I shouldn't have been in that car accident."
"My wife shouldn't...

"No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it." -- Albert Einstein

Mindfulness meditation is simple to explain and difficult to practice.

A popular type of mindfulness mediation is when we learn to observe our thoughts. But what does it entail to be able to...

There is a wonderful sketch in Monty Python Live at the Hollywood Bowl where four Yorkshiremen are trying to best each other regarding who survived the most indigent and treacherous childhood. Douglas Coupland referred to a similar phenomenon that occurs at AA meetings as "onedownsmenship."

There is a...

When Cezanne prepared to paint a landscape he would look out at vast fields, hills, forests, and farms before him and arbitrarily choose a "frame." His painting would ultimately include a section of his expansive view within the left-right and top-bottom limits that held his canvas and he would exclude...

"I don't know who discovered water but I don't think it was a fish." --Marshall MacLuhan

Since the time of Hamlet -- "But two months dead, nay, not so much, not two" -- our culture has deemed that the bereavement period should last approximately two months. After that time, according...

Last Saturday on the adjacent mat was a pleasant Norwegian woman. After class she asked me if I liked the class and I responded affirmatively. I asked her if she liked the class and she replied, "I like this teacher because she always adds some spiritual stuff at the end."...

I moved to Rishikesh West a few weeks ago and decided to check out what the yoga scene had become in the five years since I left L.A. I refer to Santa Monica as "Rishikesh West" because on any given morning you can throw a stone and hit a bendy...