Author LL Kirchner talks about "overdoing" the mindfulness stuff and how she found her peace

The Storied Human (What is your Story?)

For author and screenwriter LL Kirchner, it's been a long journey to self-discovery and learning what works for her. Moved around a lot as a child, she coped by drinking and smoking at a young age. After a difficult divorce, she left her job in Qatar to go to an intensive yoga teacher training class in India. There, she quit smoking easily and learned a lot about Yoga and Hinduism. She wrote her first book -- American Lady Creature: (My) Change in the Middle East -- about being in the mideast and seeing blatant mysogyny and cognitive dissonance (she remembers seeing completely covered women walking by Victoria Secret ads). Upon returning to the U.S, she observed that women were not treated that much better here.
Struggling to find inner peace and meaning, she tried meditation and felt pressured to always try to improve on her mindfulness. Her second book is deeply personal -- Blissful Thinking - a memoir of overcoming the wellness revolution. It is the sweeping story of her search for nirvana that took her from university halls in the Persian Gulf to the streets of Manhattan to a sex cult in India. The book is available September 26, 2023 by Molina Books.

From her website: "Blissful Thinking is the true story of how one womans' search for wellness kept her spiritually sick."

Fearing a return to her addictions, she tried every spiritual journey she can imagine—yoga, chanting, the sex cult—to regain her trust in the universe. But she kept returning to toxic relationships, until finally she realizedthe gift her mother had always given her—hope.
Daring to challenge the popular thinking that meditation is always good and we must engage in constant "self-improvement" activities, she points out to us that it's really important to find what works for US, including the idea that not all types of meditation are good for you. And to remember that "you're really only as sick as your secrets."
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You can email LL at: [e-mail]
Follow her on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/llkirchner_/
Check out her website: https://llkirchner.com
LL offers a free workshop called "Unstick your Magic -- a creativity master class ," which is available when you pre-order Blissful Thinking:
https://llkirchner.involve.me/pre-order-workshop
To read a sample of Blissful Thinking:
https://llkirchner.com/free
This is also where you will find her meditation quiz that helps you discover which type of mediation fits you.
And finally, look for her novel coming soon called Florida Girls.
Books we mentioned in this episode:
The Grieving Brain** by Mary Francis O'Connor, Deana Gashman's piece on Time.com -- So sorry for your loss,
and Heartbreak by Florence Williams.

**Note-- Lynne got the name wrong of the grief book (it's not "The Brain on Grief").

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Original music "Saturday Sway" by Brendan Talian