Let go, lighten your load, loosen your grip

6 week course of guided meditation, contemplation, reflection, creative integration and insightful conversation - for those looking to drop unhelpful habits of overthinking and restrictive patterns of controlling life’s narrative

Tuesdays, May 20 – June 24, 2025, 60 minute classes. Live on Zoom 12.30-1.30pm ET / 5.30-6.30pm UK. With recordings

Do you yearn for a greater sense of mental ease, more moments of inner peace, freedom from internalised pressure and physical tension, and the ability to be more comfortable with yourself in stillness and silence? Many of us do – and yet for many of us, letting go of the mind’s incessant chatter does not always come easy. The good news is that it is possible – with practice, skilled guidance, and inspiration from those who have traversed and learned to manage the mental terrain.

This six-week course will introduce you to some simple, effective teachings and practices to help you lessen your reactivity and gain greater composure in moments where habitual responses of frustration, irritability, overthinking, judgement or critique might ordinarily arise.

Each week will see us focus on a different quality of letting go, inspired by a classic teaching from the Indo-Tibetan Buddhist practice of Mahamudra, which is based on the life and lessons of the great sage Tilopa, whose fundamental liberatory advice is contained in six essential instructions: don’t recall, don’t imagine, don’t think, don’t examine, don’t control, just relax.

We’ll dive into each of those six lessons, exploring the barriers we face, tips for overcoming those barriers, and practices through which we’ll formulate our own personal approach to each lesson, so that we can more easily integrate these ideas from a place of embodied experience.

You’ll learn core meditation practices that you can take into the rest of your daily life, including Tonglen (the breath-based practice of sending and receiving), open awareness meditation, tapping and shaking for energetic release and nervous system regulation, and nadi shodana (alternate nostril breathing).

Regular, repeated and consistent practice will help you to develop and strengthen your own practice so that it serves you long after you complete the course.

The effects of the practices will be deepened through dedicated periods for integration - I’ll offer you reflection/writing prompts which you can respond to through journaling/free writing, movement, more sitting time, doodling, or whatever mode of integration suits you best. This is simply a way to “sit with” the ideas and allow the practices to really settle into your whole being.

Week 1: Releasing old story lines

Week 2: Staying with the present moment
Week 3: Tending to the mind’s chattering nature
Week 4: Loosening the grip of analytical fixation
Week 5: Letting go of control
Week 6: Opening to rest

Each class will include time for individual and shared reflection and insightful discussion. You’ll have the chance to ask questions and receive support from myself, and from other participants (if desired – one of the community agreements that underpin this space is the practice of not giving unsolicited advice).

Investment - Pay What You Can (PWYC):

This offering is based on the Dharmic principle and practice of Dana, generosity and reciprocity. You are invited to Pay What You Can (PWYC) based on the suggested rates below. If your financial means are limited, especially where you yourself are in a caring role (whether professional and paid or otherwise), you are welcome to pay less than the stated sustainable fee. If you have greater means and financial comfort, and are able to pay more to help sustain this space, your contributions either at or beyond the supporter rate would most welcome.

Discounted rate for previous students: £150
Regular sustainable rate: £200
Supporter rate: £350

Bonus offering:

Paid subscribers to my Substack page, Get Real Be Free, will have additional exclusive access to a space for group online chat outside of our course time. I will also be on hand there to answer questions as they emerge for you in the week, in response to prompts and practice ideas that you’ll be encouraged to adapt and work with.

From July onwards, this chat will become a regular space for course participants and paid subscribers to exchange practice questions, challenges and insights. I also plan to hold monthly meditation and check-ins for paid subscribers from July. So join us, be part of something magical (where magic is the ripple effect we have on the world through intentional, creative action)!

Registration & payment:

Sign up by completing this short form. Information for payment (to be made in GP pounds) will be sent to you upon registering. Any queries, feel free to contact me directly.

Praise from former course participants:

“It is hard to sum up how deeply Aliya’s reflective circle touched me. Aliya held the space in a beautiful light way that always felt supportive and safe and welcoming. Don’t worry if you think that yoga, breathwork, meditation or writing aren’t quite your thing - or one isn’t. This is about so much more than any of those things - it is about giving yourself some caring attention.” Rakhee

“Aliya’s weekly sessions are thoughtfully curated and lovingly delivered. She creates an inviting space where I feel all of me is welcome. This writing circle has quickly become a sacred place for me to connect with sweetness and explore how exchanging words impacts each other’s hearts and minds.” MP Vare

"Aliya's reflective writing circle has been the highlight of my week for many moons now. I feel seen, uplifted, honored and held by the space Aliya creates. This is truly transformed my own practice in a way in such a profound manner. So grateful to have found Aliya and this reflective writing circle." Anonymous

About Aliya:

Aliya Mughal is a writing coach, book doula, meditation practitioner and spiritual caregiver with a lifelong devotion to the expressive arts. She creates supportive, warm and welcoming spaces in which people are actively encouraged to feel free to be their raw, unfiltered and messy selves – all within clear and caring boundaries that ensure her communities are experienced as safe, brave and pleasurable spaces to be.

Aliya’s practice has evolved and emerged from a long creative and spiritual lineage that draws on the work of poets, artists, yogis and Buddhist sages across time. Her work and teachings are informed and inspired by the Buddha Dharma, Daoism, Zen and Yoga. Her practice ethics underpin her life, which is based in rural Devon, where with her partner, cat and chickens, she endeavours to live a low-impact, sustainable life.

You can learn more about Aliya’s work, engage with her writing, and receive her contemplative teachings via her Substack page, Get Real Be Free, where she shares essays, teachings and insights about how to unbind ourselves from limiting narratives, express ourselves clearly and use our words wisely.