Rory Kinsella Meditation

I’m delighted to be now offering private and group meditation trainings in Bronte, as well as one on one coaching and mentoring for existing Vedic Meditators.

Get in touch to find out more, including a full list of offerings.

Send me a DM or get in touch through the website to discuss how we can work together.

I specialise in working with high-functioning overthinkers.

Join me for a Blue Mountains weekend retreat!

Looking to escape the city for a weekend and dive deep into what meditation has to offer?

Join me Aug 15-18 for a long weekend in the Blue Mountains and come back feeling refreshed and rejuvenated.

For those who have already learned to meditate, there will be a Rounding program to give you up to six months’ benefit of regular meditation.

And for newbies, there will be a learn to meditate course.

Also enjoy delicious healthy food, spa treatments and an opportunity to dive into Vedic knowledge as it applies to whatever you have going on at the moment.

Click through to find out more!

Pic from the last retreat I attended – with Light Watkins in Mexico over New Year this year.

Vedic Meditation retreat | New South Wales | Vedic Meditation | Learn to meditate in Sydney | Rory Kinsella Meditation Join me on retreat for some deep rest and rejuvenation.

Sleeping or meditating?! It's often hard to tell if we or other people are meditating or sleeping.

Take this picture – Max looks like he's meditating, but he's actually sleeping (or is he?!) 🤣

Deep meditation and sleep can be hard to differentiate because when we go deep in meditation, we move beyond thought into a place of inner silence where we're not aware of what's happening.

Because we're beyond thought, we can't have thoughts like "look at me, I'm beyond thought!", so our subjective experience can be similar to us having been unconscious or in deep sleep.

And we can appear to others as if we're sleeping as our head might be rested forward.

As a teacher, I tell students the sure way to tell if you're sleeping is if you're snoring or drooling!

The more experienced we become as meditators, the less we care about whether we were in deep meditation or "just" sleeping.

Either way, we're allowing our minds and bodies the deep rest they need. One is not "better" than the other and we get whichever one we need in that moment.

If your body is craving sleep and you close your eyes to meditate, you'll sleep. And afterwards, you'll feel in a much better position to tackle your day.

Salt and pepper calameowri 🦐 😻

But you go ahead – be my guest! It’s just not my bag anymore.

I prefer my sleep and lack of hangovers – no judgement, just preference.

Drop a ❤️ in the comments and share this if you agree.

🤯 🙏

I love nothing more than getting feedback like this!

These are from the first cohort of 100 Days to Sober Freedom for High-Functioning Professionals who reached 100 days just before Christmas.

If you’d like to feel like these people, sign up to join the next cohort, which starts THIS SUNDAY.

Enrolments are only open twice a year so don’t miss out.
Stress will cease to be an issue, your sleep will improve, and you will have your best revenue month ever, if you’re like Lindsey from LA!

Your sleep will be at least twice as good (according to 90% of participants), 10 times better according to one of them!
And you’ll save at least as much as the program costs, four times the cost for at least two of the participants.

The program is designed to work with busy schedules (with times that work for Australia, the UK, and US) and I ensure complete privacy and discretion for those who don’t want to shout about what they are doing.

Link in bio to Sober Freedom. Starts Sunday – registrations closing soon. Book now!!

Particularly uncool in Dry January.
What’s the most toxic way someone has tried to pressure you into drinking when you were trying to stay sober?
A client told me once about how a "friend" had taken her glass of alcohol free wine, poured it out and replaced it with regular wine 🤯

It’s a much stronger position to say you *are not* drinking, if that is your plan. You don’t need to go into any details or explanations, just say you’re not drinking tonight and leave it at that.

Most people will be content as soon as they themselves have a drink, regardless of whether you join them or not.

Good luck with Australia Day, Aussie Dry Jan people. The last hurdle!

Wondering where to take things after Dry January? Check out my 100 Days to Sober Freedom program starting Feb 4 – link in bio.

I'm often like this with exercise – I know it will give me energy, but it's hard when I don't have the energy to start. It's the same with meditation.

Don't let not feeling like it be an excuse – it's designed to put you in a better mood afterwards, even if the beginning can seem busy and not very meditative.

If you find it hard not to treat meditation like a test you probably also think your mind is too busy to meditate. I've put together a free five minute exercise to see if that really is the case. Maybe meditation can work for you after all? Link in bio.

It was six years ago today that I had my last drink.

At that point, I'd been moderating for a couple of years but would still find myself on a huge binge once a month or so, a habit I couldn't seem to shake.

Alcohol had played such a big role in my life up to that point though that I hadn't even considered quitting completely.

I initially gave up only for a week over New Year at a meditation retreat then decided to extend it and do Dry January.

I'd never felt this good in the first week of January and wanted to see if the feeling would last.

There were a few difficult points in that first month, mostly around the social awkwardness of often being the only person not drinking (Dry January is not a big thing in Australia as it’s summer!). But once people got used to it, things got easier. 

After Dry January, I wanted to make the feeling last so set another goal of 100 days, and apart from a few occasions where it was harder not to drink – a an Australia Day boat party and a ski trip to Japan – it was mostly a relief not to have to drink.

That’s how I started to think about it. The previous times I’d tried to stop drinking for a month, it was a case of not “getting” to drink.

But now I re-framed it as not “having” to drink. I no longer “had” to try to moderate on nights out or to suffer through needless hangovers. 

If you’re ready to try something new and want to see what it feels like for yourself, I’m running an online Dry January program starting on January 1.

Participants will spend a month working on healthy coping mechanisms like meditation and delving into their drinking triggers and beliefs so that they can get in control of their drinking and break old habits. Link in bio for more info.

Pic: Fake meditating in the Swiss Alps in the summer – on the sofa or propped up in bed is where you’ll usually find me, much more comfortable than a rock! 🙏

Once you're done with the festive indulgence, could be time to take a break for January? If so, see how much easier it is to cut alcohol out when you meditate.

Hint: Don’t double park.

Something it took me a few years to learn is that moderating alcohol is actually way harder than giving up completely.

One reason is that the version of you with intentions to moderate is not the same you who has had three or four drinks.

Another is that any alcohol in your system from yesterday or even a few days ago is dragging you down at the same time as presenting itself as the solution to your problems.

But moderating is an important stage of most people’s sober journeys, so it helps to know how to be more successful when moderating.

Swipe through for my top five tips from having helped hundreds of people reduce their alcohol intake with meditation over the last five years.

If you’re keen to give moderation a go this September, join my brand-new [Meditate & Moderate: 30 Day Experiment for Overthinkers](https://www.wisemonkeyway.com/moderate) program. You’ll get great advice, a month of meditations and live coaching & community – all of which will help you make a lot more progress than you likely would on your own. More info on link in bio.

I'm a sucker for a fake meditating pic. Give me a mountain, a rock to sit on, a lens to capture it and I'm happy.

This isn’t fake as in AI-generated, but as in I'm not really meditating. Instead I’m sitting uncomfortably in a culturally-accepted meditation pose, worried about how my hands will look and whether I’ve successfully neutralised my resting b***h face. It’s performative meditation.

This was in the Swiss Alps recently with the Matterhorn in the background. Not pictured is the swarm of tourists that appeared out of nowhere with Toblerones in hand to have their picture taken on the random rock I'd somehow just turned into an attraction.

Why fake meditating? Because real meditating is not glamorous or photogenic. Real meditating is getting back under the covers with bed head to stay warm after doing your teeth in the morning. Real meditating is finding an empty meeting room at work before a big presentation. Real meditating is sneaking in ten minutes during the trailers at the movies so you don’t lose your streak.

Next week marks nine years of me real meditating twice a day. And the benefits of that?

There are many, but one key one is no longer needing alcohol to manage my stress or unwind. And no longer having my energy or sense of wellbeing dictated by how long it’s been since my last hangover.

If your drinking is something you're reassessing at the moment, I've just launched a new meditation-based program which might help: 100 Days to Sober Freedom for High Functioning Professionals.

It's specifically aimed at professionals and business owners who are time-poor and know they could do better in all areas of their lives without alcohol. Find out more – link in bio – early-bird pricing ends this Sunday, so don’t hang around!

Maybe when I hit ten years of meditating, I'll finally overcome my fake meditating pic addiction 🤷‍♂️.

I'm a sucker for a fake meditating pic. Give me a mountain, a rock to sit on, a lens to capture it and I'm happy.

This isn’t fake as in AI-generated, but as in I'm not really meditating. Instead I’m sitting uncomfortably in a culturally-accepted meditation pose, worried about how my hands will look and whether I’ve successfully neutralised my resting b***h face. It’s performative meditation.

This was in the Swiss Alps recently with the Matterhorn in the background. Not pictured is the swarm of tourists that appeared out of nowhere with Toblerones in hand to have their picture taken on the random rock I'd somehow just turned into an attraction.

Why fake meditating? Because real meditating is not glamorous or photogenic. Real meditating is getting back under the covers with bed head to stay warm after doing your teeth in the morning. Real meditating is finding an empty meeting room at work before a big presentation. Real meditating is sneaking in ten minutes during the trailers at the movies so you don’t lose your streak.

Next week marks nine years of me real meditating twice a day. And the benefits of that?

There are many, but one key one is no longer needing alcohol to manage my stress or unwind. And no longer having my energy or sense of wellbeing dictated by how long it’s been since my last hangover.

If your drinking is something you're reassessing at the moment, I've just launched a new meditation-based program which might help: 100 Days to Sober Freedom for High Functioning Professionals.

It's specifically aimed at professionals and business owners who are time-poor and know they could do better in all areas of their lives without alcohol. Find out more on the link in the comments – early-bird pricing ends this Sunday, so don’t hang around!

Maybe when I hit ten years of meditating, I'll finally overcome my fake meditating pic addiction 🤷‍♂️.

I’m excited to announce my brand-new offering: 100 Days to Sober Freedom for High-Functioning Professionals. Does this sounds like you? Slide through for details and then follow link in bio.

When I speak to people about drinking, they often say the same thing.

They’ve had some success with moderating or abstaining in the past but have reached a hurdle at some point and slipped back into old ways.

If this rings a bell, it’s OK – you’re not broken or doomed to repeat the same patterns forever.

You just need to approach things in a different way – to try a different recipe.

My recipe for staying committed has three main ingredients. Swipe through to see them >>.

I'm a sucker for personality tests – I’ve even got people to do them on dates.

But, as a drinker, they got me all wrong.
Myers-Briggs is the gateway drug of personality tests and it led to many others for me.

But it would class me as an extravert because my drinking made me behave like an extravert.

Having done the test since quitting drinking, I know I’m really an introvert and my results were heavily skewed by me being a drunk extravert.

**Binge extravert**

As a binge drinker, my answers would skew me towards extraversion, although I really like nothing more than curling up at home with a cat and a good book.

When I first stopped drinking in 2017, I embraced my long-neglected inner introvert.

I relaxed at home on the weekend, spent time with my girlfriend and avoided many social events.

But over time, I realised the introversion would go too far if I didn’t actively temper it.
Without rowdy nights out and without a natural inclination to reach out to people socially, I found it helped me stay social if I commit myself to things.

I would say yes recurring activities like squash. And I also committed to group activities and courses because I knew the group component would be good for me, even if it wasn't always my natural preference to seek out group things.

Over the years I've found that group courses have been great opportunities for social connection – yoga courses, meditation courses, creative writing courses, NLP – I’ve met great, likeminded people on all of them.

As a sober introvert/drunk extravert, these were particularly good opportunities to connect with people away from drinking. And they allowed me to balance my natural introversion when I’d removed my drunken solution to that life problem.

If you think you would benefit from this kind of healthy connection, why not join (or rejoin if you’ve done it before!) our Live Online Group starting this Sunday and find your tribe away from alcohol.

Link in bio.

Before I quit drinking for good in 2017, I was in a bargaining/moderation phase for four years – yep, four years.

During this time, I knew that drinking as much or as often as I had been wasn’t good for me, but it still hadn’t occurred to me to consider quitting completely.

In this phase, I found it easy to abstain from drinking on my own, but struggled in social situations.

If, like me, you find it harder to say no when you’re with friends, colleagues or family members, here are five tips to make things easier.

If you’re looking for more successful strategies for quitting or moderating your drinking, join one of my Wise Monkey Way programs.

Spots are filling up fast for our April live online group program. Link in bio.

We’re almost ready for our New Year Challenge to begin this Sunday! A couple of spots have opened up if you’d like to join. Here are six reasons to join this live online group program. 

Today marks five years since I stopped drinking. I didn’t reach a traditional rock bottom but instead wanted to feel as good as I did sober more often – without the hangover troughs and lack of energy and motivation that went with the drinking. Here are my five top benefits from five years off the grog.

In the Wise Monkey Way we do things differently to many other programs for quitting or moderating drinking.

Instead of stopping drinking and white-knuckling it, we prioritise meditation first and then see how that affects our drinking.

When you’re calmer and more relaxed naturally, you’ll find you have less reasons or compulsion to drink.

In November this year, the first live online group of the Wise Monkey Way came to their one-year anniversary of starting the course.

From the wary faces at the beginning, unsure of what they were getting into, to today has been such a journey.

Read four quotes on how they have been doing.

If you’re ready to make a lasting change in your relationship with alcohol, join the next Live Online Group program starting on January 8.

With the holiday season almost upon us, it can be tough to stick to your goals around both drinking and meditation.

Holidays and even weekends are generally harder to fit meditation in than weekdays, even though we might think it would be easier. Here are some tips on how to stick to your meditation and how to moderate your drinking over the festive period.

Forget Cyber Monday, say hello to Sober Mondays!

One of the main reasons I quit drinking nearly five years ago was because I was sick of feeling sick every Sunday and sapped of energy and creativity from Monday to Wednesday. Sunday would be a 1/10 on the life-satisfaction scale and it would slowly climb through the week until it came crashing down the following Saturday or Sunday morning.

Instead of the boom or bust approach to happiness, I found that without alcohol I could maintain a much more consistent equilibrium through the week. Yes, there wouldn’t be the raucous highs of Saturday night (many of which I couldn’t remember very well anyway) but gone also were the soul crushing lows of the hangover.

If you’re ready to try a more sustainable approach to happiness than alcohol, I’d like to invite you to join my January live online group course for Wise Monkey Way: Meditate More, Drink Less. There are just a few days left to claim an early bird spot.

What I found – and many of my course participants find too – is that when I had got myself sorted mentally through meditation, my compulsion to drink gently faded away.

If you book into the New Year Challenge now, you can access all the course content early to start preparing and a 40% discount.

Early bird ends this week – get in quick!

Link in bio.

Why limit dry to July? Keep that sober clear head more of the time and with tasty alcohol-free beers (and this sweet beanie they sent me!)

I'll be heading for our nation's capital to teach Vedic Meditation this March.

Stop dabbling with meditation and learn a technique you can stick with.