Brad Blanks/101.1 CBS-FM
Now, she is a mother of one and home-schooling like most parents around the world during this lockdown. I asked her how she handled the homeschooling and she said, “It’s hard, it’s a lot of bandwidth."
I zoomed into her house to chat about a documentary she produced with Deepak Chopra, The Mindfulness Movement. Jewel has been practicing meditation and mindfulness since her early days when she lived in her car in the San Diego area in the early '90s. This documentary gives some great insight into her belief in staying centered, a spiritual toolkit she feels has helped her over the years. You can learn about her story and this mindfulness process on her website.
I asked her if she thought there was a cure in actually sitting still. She replied, "We all have a brain, our brain processes information through feedback, and with no clue that the amount of distraction we are suffering from neurologically is causing our brains to wire in a very specific way. All meditation is being constantly present.”
Our interview quickly took a twist when she challenged me to meditate with her. “I'm going to make you do it, shut your eyes, unlock your jaw, and breathe out your mouth.”
“Let’s do it” I exclaimed and shut my eyes, I slowly breathed in and out, and when I came out of my satisfying meditative state I was in a little shock that I had meditated with the wonderful Jewel.
One of her biggest hits was the song "Hands." I asked her about how fitting the meaning of that song is today and she replied, “It’s been a trip with 'Hands,' during 9/11 it became an anthem, and now seeing it circulate again, so touching, I wrote that while I was homeless, really scared, it was my first mindfulness exercise!”
Looks like it’s worked for Jewel. Time for me to do more of this meditation thing. The lightheadedness felt great!
You can see the documentary at TheMindfulnessMovement.com and follow Jewel’s toolkit to mindfulness at JewelNeverBroken.com.