2. What you need to know about clean beauty with Arden Martin

Arden: (00:00)
When people hear the word natural, they think plants, health, this must be good for me. And technically all natural really means is something that’s not manmade, something that comes from the earth, right? But the truth is, although most of the time, natural and organic is best, natural doesn’t necessarily mean safe.

Hope: (00:21)
Do you wanna wake up feeling like you’re stepping into who you’re meant to be into the best possible version of you? What if I told you that the key to your best life, health and happiness are all around you? You just have to find what works for you.

Hope: (00:34)
I’m Hope Pedraza and I believe that there isn’t just one way to live a healthy and meaningful life, and that all you need is a little inspiration to make changes that last from the inside out. Each week I’ll be sharing tangible tips and inspirational interviews to help you on your journey. These are the steps to take to improve your life and live with purpose. This is hopeful and wholesome.

Hope: (00:55)
Thanks so much for joining today. I’ve got a great interview with Arden Martin today. Arden is the owner of a meditation studio in Manhattan, and she is also a consultant with a beauty counter, which is a line of clean and safe beauty products and self-care products. She’s kind of on the front line of what Beauty Counter is doing to create a movement in the beauty industry, to create an industry with cleaner and safer ingredients. She talks a lot about the importance of education in self-care products, what ingredients we should be looking out for, what ingredients we should avoid. She actually even talks about brands that are deceiving you and the products, the ingredients that they’re putting in their products, and how to find safer brands and safer ingredients in the products that you’re using. I think you’re gonna learn a lot in this episode. We even talk about meditation and about her meditation studio and what meditation has done in her life.

Hope: (01:43)
Enjoy this episode. There’s some great takeaways in this episode just in terms of self-education on how you can buy cleaner products and maybe even start your own meditation practice. Y’all enjoy. Okay, y’all, let’s get going. I’m excited to bring on Arden today, and me and Arden are gonna talk about this little brand you might have heard of called Beauty Counter and all about clean beauty and being mindful in our beauty and meditation and all kinds of fun steps. So thank you so much for joining me today, Arden.

Arden: (02:11)
Thank you for having me. I’m really excited.

Hope: (02:14)
Yeah, me too. So perhaps there might be one that one person listening who’s never heard of Beautycounter, but just for everyone’s sake, can you tell us a little bit about Beautycounter and then what you do with this company?

Arden: (02:27)
Absolutely. So Beautycounter has evolved over the past seven years that it’s been a brand, but it really is more than just a brand.

Arden: (02:37)
It’s a movement. So Beautycounter is really here to disrupt the beauty industry. And if you’ve heard of it, you probably know that we make products, we make clean products that are safer for people’s health, but our products are actually only a third of what we do as a company. So Beautycounter actually has three pillars. They are education, advocacy, and product. So really first and foremost, what we wanna do at Beautycounter is help people be more self-sufficient in taking their health into their own hands. You may or may not know that the personal care industry is virtually unregulated at this time in history. So the, the legislation around personal care products and cosmetics actually hasn’t been significantly updated in about 82 years.

Hope: (03:32)
Wow.

Arden: (03:32)
The last major law wasn’t passed or was passed in 1938.

Hope: (03:37)
Gee .

(03:38)
Yeah. So since then, over 80,000 chemicals have come onto the market.

Arden: (03:45)
If you think about, you know what a huge industry beauty is, there’s always new products, always innovation happening. And so new chemicals are being used all the time. And the reality is we don’t have safety data on the vast majority of those chemicals. And over the years there have been many instances when certain products used both professionally in salons and also just in the regular market. Things being sold in stores have been found to be harmful for human health. And I’d be happy if you like to go into detail about some of those cases you do. Um, one of them is the Brazilian blowout, so there’s about 40% formaldehyde in that formula.

Hope: (04:28)
Gosh.

Arden: (04:30)
So that was really affecting the health of the salon workers,

Hope: (04:34)
uh, yeah. .

Arden: (04:36)
who are getting the treatments, right? Yeah. Because it’s something you have to get consistently. You can’t just get it one time. I’m pretty sure I’m not an expert in that. Yeah. So the Brazilian blowouts were a big issue. And then I don’t know if you’ve heard of when Hair care?

Hope: (04:49)
I think so.

Arden: (04:50)
Um, so that brand has been linked to permanent hair loss and there have been thousands, literally like 22,000 or so complaints to the FDA about how the product has been affecting people’s health. And because of the way the legislation is right now, the FDA doesn’t actually have the authority to do anything about products that have been shown to be harmful. They can do an investigation, they can request that a company takes their products off the shelf, but they can’t actually mandate a recall or act on anything that.

Hope: (05:24)
No way. That’s nuts.

Arden: (05:27)
It really, really is. Our system is totally archaic and it hasn’t caught up with, you know, where beauty has gone over the past 82 years. So the way it stands right now, we can’t actually trust that the products being sold to us are safe for our health. And not only that, it’s not just the health of the consumer, but also the health of the environment. A lot of chemicals and ingredients used in personal care products are harmful for the earth. If you think about a lot of sunscreen ingredients have actually started to become banned in places like Florida and Hawaii because the oceans are there and a lot of those products, because they’re finding their way into the ocean water, the sunscreen over time, it’s damaging the coral reefs. Right. And then one other health issue many people don’t know about is the health of the people along the supply chain.

Arden: (06:18)
The people who are responsible for making these products that we use every day. And one thing that Beautycounter is doing on their advocacy team right now is helping to get more transparency with their MICA supply chain. So MICA is, um, a mineral that’s used to make products shimmery. So it might be found in like your sparkly eyeshadow or anything to make your skin glow. Mica is actually a very well-known industry that is corrupt and there’s a lot of forced and child labor happening along the supply chain. So Beautycounter has done some unprecedented work to trace the sourcing of their MICA and make sure that they’re supporting the communities that are actually in the mines digging it out. So I could go on and on, but it goes without saying that Beautycounter is about so much more than just making products for North American to use.

Arden: (07:15)
So we advocate for safer legislation around personal care products because that’s what’s going to ultimately affect the whole market and all of the people who are purchasing products for themselves. And then we’re also providing a safer alternative in the products that we make. And then finally we’re educating. So we want people to know this stuff since they can’t count on the market to provide safe products for them quite yet, we’re moving in the direction with all of our advocacy work toward this being the norm for people is to be able to trust that their products are safe. But we’re not quite there yet. So in the meantime, education is really important and I’m happy to be here right now doing a little bit of that.

Hope: (07:54)
Yeah, no, for sure. And it fascinates me. It’s just crazy how, how backwards this is like with, I mean, you’re putting it in your skin, which is the biggest organ in your body. And I don’t know whether like that connection is lost. Like people aren’t thinking, oh, what I put in my skin is going into my body and it should be like, there should be rules about what can be in those products. It’s crazy.

Arden: (08:15)
It’s interesting because we, we think of the FDA being this, this entity that regulates what’s being sold to us. Right? Right. Because they do have a lot of authority with food and agriculture. So we just kind of assume that they can regulate the beauty in too. And for whatever reason they can’t right now.

Hope: (08:31)
Yeah. Yeah. And I think it’s not enough People know that. Like I know, I didn’t know until fairly recently and I discovered Beauty Counter a while back and I had, I had no idea that they, I mean basically you just put whatever you want and you know, all these products. I, people just don’t know that. So what, what has been y’all’s, what kind of leeway have y’all had in, in terms of legislation? Like have y’all had any breakthroughs there?

Arden: (08:55)
Yes. So the thing about our justice system and our government is it’s very slow moving.

Hope: (09:02)
Mm-Hmm.

Arden: (09:02)
Right? So there has been advocacy going on for years to try to get new legislation passed, to have more oversight on personal care products. And it just moves really slowly. And the bill could get passed in one committee and then not move through to the next, or it could, you know, get voted on in the Senate but then have to go to the house and then, you know, ultimately the president has to sign all of these things into law. Right? So it’s a really long process and it’s something that we just have to, we have to continuously and tirelessly advocate.

Arden: (09:33)
But there have been some good breakthroughs. Recently, California is working on the Toxic Cosmetics Act, which should help to regulate some more of the products that are out there right now. The Natural Cosmetics Act was recently introduced to Congress and this is a really big one because it’s going to finally give the FDA some power to define the word natural. So this is a really good thing for people to know. The word natural when it comes to personal care products, skincare, cosmetics, deodorant, toothpaste, it’s completely unregulated. Skincare, cosmetics, deodorant, toothpaste, it’s completely unregulated. So it’s basically just a marketing term. When people hear the word natural, they think plants. Mm-Hmm. health, you know, this must be good for me. Mm. And technically all natural really means is something that’s not manmade. Something that comes from the earth. Right. Poison ivy is natural.

Hope: (10:31)
Right.

Arden: (10:32)
. And one thing that I’ve learned over time is a lot of the minerals that became popular in makeup brands like bare minerals, that kind of a product, when we’re using minerals and makeup, we have to be careful because heavy metals actually tag along with those mineral colorants that are found in the earth. So one of the issues that we see in all natural, so to speak, mineral makeup, is it can have a higher heavy metal content. And that’s really toxic for us when we’re exposed to it repeatedly over time. So defining the word natural is a really big hurdle that we’re in the middle of tackling right now with the Natural Cosmetics Act. So things are starting to happen slowly but surely in Congress and hopefully over the next, you know, decade or two, realistically we won’t have advocate for ourselves and the products on store shelves will be safe.

Arden: (11:27)
But for now we have to keep sort of, we have to sort of keep voting with our wallet and letting our legislators know that this is an important issue.

Hope: (11:36)
Right, right. Yeah. So what ingredients should we be looking for? And I guess on both sides of that, so what ingredients should we be staying away from? And then what ingredient should we be looking for? ’cause I know a lot of cosmetics they don’t, I mean, they don’t put all the ingredients on there. So how do we know if what we’re putting on, like how do we know?

Arden: (11:56)
Great question. So the first thing I would say, you made a good point that ingredients aren’t always clearly listed on products. And just as a general rule of thumb, if a company or a brand that I’m shopping with doesn’t clearly mark the ingredients, I just avoid it straight away.

Hope: (12:12)
Mm-Hmm. . Mm-Hmm. .

Arden: (12:13)
So I think sticking with brands that are being transparent and making the ingredients easy to find is the first step. If you’re listening to this, you probably are aware of parabens being a problematic ingredient. Parabens are hormone disruptors, which means that they can mess with the body’s hormones and interfere with developmental and reproductive health.

Hope: (12:35)
Mm-Hmm. .

Arden: (12:36)
So I think most of us at this point who are already health minded are avoiding parabens. But one thing to know is if you’re actually looking for it on a label, it can look a lot of different ways. So it can be listed as methyl paraben, butyl paraben, propyl paraben. You will see a lot of those in kind of conventional skincare and haircare. So Cetaphil is one brand that a lot of people are surprised about.

Hope: (13:04)
Yeah. ’cause the dermatologist tells you to use it .

Arden: (13:07)
Exactly. It’s a clinical brand. Yes. Yes. And it’s marketed as a very gentle, non-irritating brand for sensitive skin. And although that may be true, you know, on a performance results based level, someone who has sensitive skin may use Cetaphil and think, great, my skin’s not reacting to this. But if you look at it from a different perspective, like how it’s affecting the health of your hormones, it may be a different story. So, um, looking for parabens is, is a big one because they’re easy to find on a product label. You just look for the word paraben. Another thing that comes to mind is you’ll see paraben free a lot on product labels because the market is catching on to the fact that people are demanding safer. This is a great thing, but at the same time, you know, everyone wants to sell their product understandably so.

Arden: (13:58)
And they’re going to appeal to what people are demanding. So if you see paraben free on a label, that’s a good start. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that the product is completely clean and safe. Just because something’s free of parabens doesn’t mean that it may not have other ingredients that are harmful. It’s kind of like when you see soda at the store and it says gluten free on it. Mm-Hmm. like, obviously there’s not gonna be great right soda, but just because it’s gluten-free doesn’t mean that it’s sugar free. Exactly. So I like to call that whole phenomenon greenwashing. Yeah. A lot of things are trying to, um, appeal to people who are looking for healthier products and saying, highlighting one thing and then maybe distracting from something else. So just keep that in mind. Another ingredient that I think is best to avoid is synthetic fragrance.

Arden: (14:51)
Mm-Hmm. . So on a product label, you’re either gonna see the word fragrance or you’re gonna see the word parfum. Mm-Hmm. perfume. Not sure how to pronounce it, but P-A-R-F-U-M. Basically the reason to avoid synthetic fragrance is it often contains phthalates, which are plasticizing chemicals that also disrupt the endocrine system or have been shown to do. So. It’s pretty crazy that, going back to the fact that the legislation hasn’t changed in 82 years, way back when, when the perfume industry was booming, companies were keeping their scents, their perfume scent, a trade secret so that it was proprietary. And it’s totally understandable that a perfume label would wanna do that, right. Because that’s their entire livelihood. But the way that that has trickled down is now if any product dissented, a company can just say, oh, it’s proprietary. We’re not sharing what’s in our fragrance and we’re just gonna slap the word fragrance on the product label when in reality there could be up to thousands of different chemicals, many of which can be harmful wrapped up in that word fragrance.

Arden: (15:59)
So I think it’s just a best practice to avoid it completely. And it doesn’t mean that if you’re avoiding the fragrance ingredient, you have to use products that are unscented. Right. You can absolutely find products that smell really nice from essential oils and things like that. So there are alternatives out there now.

Hope: (16:17)
Yeah. I find that’s a hard one because I know even like you were saying at, you’ll find a lot of products that have like, or whatever, but then you read through the ingredients and I feel like that fragrance is in like everything. I feel like that is the most challenging one. Like it’s in everything deodorant. I mean it’s, it’s just crazy that, that’s a tough one to avoid.

Arden: (16:37)
It is a tough one to avoid. I, I don’t think that the vast majority of people have caught onto it yet. So companies are continuing to use it.

Arden: (16:45)
Mm-Hmm. . And I’d like to think that a few years into the future that’ll start to die down. But now there are great, there are even perfume brands out there now that are being totally transparent and they are using synthetic fragrance, but it is rigorously tested for safety. So it’s not that we want, I think it’s a best practice when you’re shopping for a random personal care product to avoid synthetic fragrance. But if you still really wanna use perfume, you can shop with safer brands. Mm-Hmm. . So one of the brands that I recommend for perfume is called Henry Rose. Okay. It was started by Michelle Pfeiffer and that is all like very mindfully, rigorously tested synthetic fragrance. Mm-Hmm. . And there’s also another brand called Phlur, spelled P-H-L-U-R, which is another safer brand for perfume. Okay. So we don’t have to swear off scent. Right.

Arden: (17:39)
. And then one other ingredient that I can share for avoiding, which is lesser known is one called PEGs, it stands for polyethylene glycols. And those are widely used as like thickeners and softeners and they carry moisture. So they’re just used to give products a certain consistency. You’re gonna find them in creams and shampoos and sunscreens. And the issue with pegs and the issue with a lot of product ingredients is the ingredient itself may be safe, but during the manufacturing process it’s really common for ingredients to get contaminated with toxic chemicals. And so the contamination doesn’t show up on the product label. Right. So when you see PEGs in your moisturizer, it’s not gonna say this may be contaminated with ethylene oxide, which is a carcinogen. Right. Right. So just because of the nature of the manufacturing process, it’s best to avoid anything where you see PEG in it as well.

Hope: (18:41)
That’s good to know. So then can you speak, not to like throw anybody under the bus, but can you speak to any brands just in your experience that are maybe kind of near the bottom of the list in terms of the ingredients that are in their products? Like, like if you were telling consulting with somebody, you should avoid these brands.

Arden: (19:00)
Yeah, I can share a few that along the way on my journey as a consultant, when I started to research more just like brands that surprised me. Mm-Hmm. because the thing that most people don’t know is safer ingredients really doesn’t connect in any way to like how high end a product is. If that makes sense. Yeah. So you could find safer products at low and high price points. You could find problematic products in the drugstore and at the department store. Yeah. So it really runs the gamut.

Arden: (19:31)
I would say that if you are shopping in a conventional drugstore like a CVS and you are looking at the, the least expensive products in the store, I would just stay away from that because what I’ve come to find is when products are really, really cheap Mm-Hmm , there’s a reason for it. Right. Right. And you really do get what you pay for in this industry where companies have to work really extra hard and put extra resources in to formulate something that’s clean. You really are gonna get what you pay for. And what I’ve found, and I appreciate that everyone’s on a different budget, but what I found is those really inexpensive products, they tend to run out quicker because they have a lot of fillers in them. They’re very diluted. So you’re gonna run out of them quickly and have to replace them sooner anyways.

Arden: (20:20)
So my preference is just to spend a little bit more on something that’s been formulated mindfully that performs really well and you’re just gonna use a little bit anyways. So in general, I would, I would avoid kind of the cheapest products you’re gonna find at the drug store. And then on the other end of that, there are a lot of higher end brands that unfortunately haven’t switched over their formulations. Now that we’ve found out that a lot of these ingredients are problematic. Bobby Brown is one that I was pretty pretty disappointed by. Laura Mercier. I used to use makeup from both of those brands and when I started looking into it, I saw a lot of problematic ingredients. So those are just a handful. Yeah. Would you like me to share some alternatives too?

Hope: (20:59)
Yeah, that’s what I was just about to ask. I guess started, I guess both sides again, like so if, if your, your budget is going to your local CVS, what should you be getting?

Arden: (21:08)
So as far as makeup at the local CVS, most of it honestly isn’t great. Yeah. I personally find that unless you are a true makeup junkie and you’re wearing a full face of makeup every day, we can get by on just a few products. And if you buy a blush, it’s gonna last you at least a year. Yeah. You know, so I like to think about it in terms of how long is this gonna last me? What’s my cost per use? Right. And I personally feel that spending 20 something dollars on a blush and just purchasing less frequently is worth it. Yeah. Because it’s gonna be safer for your health. So I personally would avoid most makeup in the drugstore. If you’re shopping at Target though, there tend to be a few safer alternatives there as compared to like a CVS or something. Honest Beauty is a brand that has decent ingredients.

Arden: (21:57)
Yeah. It’s pretty affordable. And I haven’t tried a ton of their stuff, but I have used their mascara and I really like that. So, honest Beauty is good. Josie Moran also makes a line that can be found at Target that’s on the safer side, going a little bit higher end, I really like the brand RMS mm-Hmm. For makeup ia, ILIA. They have really beautifully made safer makeup as well. And my personal favorite is Beauty Counter. I’m obviously biased, but they go to a, a lot of extra lengths to make sure that the product isn’t just rigorously tested for safety. But it also works really well.

Hope: (22:34)
Yeah, for sure. And I’ll say with my personal experience, it’s funny that you were saying that the cheaper products run out quicker because I was just having this conversation with someone who sells Beautycounter. I was like, I’ve had this, like, I think it’s like a, a toner or something. I mean, I feel like I’ve had it forever. Like I feel like there’s stuff last forever and like I just, I had this like face wash I was using in the shower and I’ve had it for months. Like, so I feel like that is true. You buy the higher end and it does, it lasts longer ’cause you don’t have to use as much and it’s absolutely quality ingredients. Like you really can’t tell a difference.

Arden: (23:07)
Yes. And the other thing that that reminds me from what you just said is the reason why Beauty Counter is able to make products that last a really long time is because we do formulate with safer preservatives. So this is a common misconception about safer products. Oftentimes we hear like clean beauty, safer products, that must mean that it’s a hundred percent natural. Right. But really as we talked about, natural doesn’t always mean safe.

Arden: (23:32)
So although it’s best to mostly go with natural ingredients, we also purposely use at Beauty Counter some synthetic manmade preservatives to make sure that mold and bacteria don’t grow in the product. Right. So it’s kind of the best of both worlds in that way. And if you’re someone who wants to be switching over to Safer Products and you’re into the whole DIY thing and you wanna make your own, just keep in mind that if you’re using water to make anything, it is going to start to grow mold and bacteria within a few weeks. So it’s just something to think about.

Hope: (24:06)
Yeah. So in terms of the education that Beauty Counter is providing, what are y’all doing in that field of educating consumers on clean beauty?

Arden: (24:17)
Great question. One thing that we just came out with today is really exciting. I’m gonna try to find the name of it here because it’s brand new.

Arden: (24:26)
We just came out with something called The Clean Guide, which is basically this comprehensive list of all kinds of brands and products that meet our standards for safety. So yeah, we, we like to think that, you know, people wanna shop with us, but we also acknowledge that we’re not accessible to everyone. Yeah. Some people like to mix it up, they want a variety. We don’t make household cleaning products. We don’t make perfume, we don’t make deodorant yet hint hint. . But we, we teamed up with a lot of other brands that we’ve kind of given our clean stamp of approval. So we wanna give people resources and provide this list of, hey, if you shop with this brand and this brand and this brand for X, y, Z needs in your house, you can count on that being safe. Yeah. So we try to provide resources like that.

Arden: (25:14)
We do a lot on social media, both, you know, me personally, consultants all over the place. And also Beauty Counters, corporate Instagram. We do a lot of education about ingredients to avoid, you know, things to look for on a product label. So social media is a really great resource for learning about stuff like this.

Hope: (25:33)
Yeah, that’s awesome that those are great opportunities. And I don’t wanna leave out the other side of your mindfulness practice, which is your meditation company, I guess is the right word for it in New York. Right. So can you speak to that part of your mindfulness practice?

Arden: (25:50)
Absolutely. It’s funny, I probably wouldn’t have started to care so much about what I’m putting on my skin had I not started a meditation practice and grown my mindfulness in general. Yeah. So it absolutely is connected.

Hope: (26:04)
Yeah, totally.

Arden: (26:05)
I came to meditation before I came to the whole clean beauty world.

Arden: (26:09)
I started out my career as an elementary school teacher and I had a really, really chaotic time teaching at a school in Harlem where there was just a lot of dysfunction and I was struggling. Yeah. To be the least.

Hope: (26:22)
Yeah.

Arden: (26:22)
And so I turned to meditation kind of out of desperation as a way to combat stress and anxiety and just be able to function. So I started to meditate. Um, every single day I learned a technique called Vedic meditation. It’s spelled V-E-D-I-C. And what’s unique about Vedic meditation is it’s not based on focus or concentration or trying to quiet the mind. It’s actually a really relaxing and easy technique that anyone can do. It’s as easy literally as thinking of thought. And that had such a profound effect on me that I started to feel really inspired to teach it myself. So I went through the process to train to become a Vedic meditation teacher.

Arden: (27:05)
And a couple years ago I opened a studio in Manhattan called The Spring. So I teach people how to meditate there. Awesome. And yeah, I’m really lucky. It’s right around the corner from the Beauty Counter store. So all of my work is in this little.

Hope: (27:18)
That’s perfect. Manhattan. Yeah. Yeah. So cool. So are you teaching, are you doing like teaching people how to teach people? Are you, do you have like a teacher training? Are you teaching just classes?

Arden: (27:29)
I’m teaching classes. So the way that my course is structured and the way that all Vedic meditation teachers courses are structured is we want people to be self-sufficient. We want people to learn how to meditate without needing a guide or an app, or to have to show up in a studio every time that they wanna do it. We train people in a really comprehensive way so that by the time they’ve taken their course, which is four sessions, 60 to 90 minutes per session, they have a technique, they’re confident in how to do it.

Arden: (27:57)
They’re set up to have a daily sustainable meditation practice. So.

Hope: (28:00)
That’s awesome. So tell me a little bit more about this Vedic meditation though. How, how exactly is it different than other types?

Arden: (28:09)
Sure. So when most of us think of meditation or mindfulness, we think of something where the mind is focusing. Whether you’re focusing on your breath or you’re focusing on, you know, listening to the sound of an app someone guiding you through. Or if you’re contemplating, you know, there’s a type of meditation that’s very popular called Loving Kindness, where you’re contemplating certain ideas that are really beautiful. And every meditation practice out there, including the ones I just described, are effective. You know, anything that you do with consistency and you do it correctly, it’s going to be effective in helping to kind of quiet your mind and give you an experience of something that’s a little bit greater than yourself.

Arden: (28:51)
And having said that, a lot of people, including me, tend to struggle with practices that involve focus because the mind is, uh, is a little tricky. , it thinks involuntarily. Yes. Just the heartbeats involuntarily. Right, right. So as householders as people who are not monks sitting in a cave all day concentrating, it can be really challenging to meditate in a way that requires focus. We spend so much of our days being active both physically and mentally. So when it’s time to sit down and meditate, focusing some more can just be a really tough thing for, for many people to sustain. So the way that Vedic meditation works is there’s no focusing and no concentrating involved. We actually use a sound, which we call a mantra, and it’s a silent practice. So we think this very specific sound that the teacher gives you silently in the mind.

Arden: (29:44)
And what the sound does when you think it very gently and effortlessly is it starts to fade and get quieter and softer and subtler. And along with that, all of your thoughts start to fade and get quieter and softer and subtler. And so what this very specific sound or this mantra does is it takes your mind from its active thinking state to its least excited state. And so a few minutes into meditation with this style, you find your mind is settled down, your body settled down, and it’s actually a really restful practice. And most people don’t associate meditation with that deep physical body rest. Mm-Hmm. . Um, so that’s one of the things I love about it. It’s really restorative.

Hope: (30:22)
Yeah. That’s super interesting. So for people I know, my husband and I have started getting into meditation last year and we’ve, we’ve gone to a couple like workshops and like seminars and stuff. So, and I know when starting out, ’cause I was the one who was trying to like push him like, ’cause he’s like so high strung and I’m like, you need something to, you know, settle you down. And for him, which he’s, he loves it now, but getting into it was so hard. He was like, there’s no way I can sit here for even 10 minutes. Like 10 minutes was like a stretch. So do you have any, I guess tips would be the right word for people who wanna get into this mindfulness. ’cause you know, obviously I think everyone knows that it’s beneficial, but it’s hard to get started when you don’t know how to just shut everything off. Mm-Hmm. . So you have tips on how people can get started?

Arden: (31:06)
Yeah. I think that if you’re able to find an instructor in your area, it makes a big difference to be able to learn how to do something, you know, in a very specific way rather than just kind of guessing.

Hope: (31:18)
Right.

Arden: (31:18)
But obviously we’re currently living in times where that’s not possible and people may just be eager to get started on their own, which is great. So if that’s you, I would say just a really simple mindset shift of letting go of the idea that you have to quiet your mind because that’s literally impossible.

Hope: (31:37)
Yeah.

Arden: (31:38)
With the technique that I teach, we use this very specific sound that has a vibrational quality, that that encourages that, and it really helps make the process easier. But if you’re not using a specific technique, just know that you can sit in stillness, close the eyes, sit comfortably. Not in a way where you’re like sitting up having to cross your legs and you know, sit up perfectly straight. Right. Just be comfortable. Let your body and mind be easy. Allow yourself to think thoughts and just let the thoughts flow.

Arden: (32:08)
Just sit in stillness, letting the thoughts flow. And as soon as you give up trying to quiet your mind, as soon as you stop resisting the thought, you’ll find that it’s a whole lot easier to sit in stillness. And even two minutes of that is incredibly beneficial to start.

Hope: (32:23)
Yeah, totally. Yeah. No, I think that’s really good advice. So I think that’s where, I know that’s where my husband was struggling. It was just like you, you’re putting so much pressure on yourself to just stop thinking, stop thinking. Like you can’t stop thinking . Like it’s.

Arden: (32:34)
telling yourself to stop thinking is a thought .

Hope: (32:36)
Right. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. So how has it helped your life? Like how has it changed your life, just deepening your meditation practice?

Arden: (32:45)
Oh, it’s been absolutely game changing. I can’t even really remember how I used to sort of experience the world and show up in the world and interact before I grew up.

Arden: (32:56)
A really anxious person, someone who just kind of tended to worry. Yeah. As a kid, I was really scared. I was scared of Santa Claus, I was scared of everything, scared of balloons, you know, I just, I was that kid who was perfectly supported and I didn’t have a reason to be stressed, but I just was, it was all mental. And that of course affected the way that I showed up in the world. It affected my confidence. It affected, yeah. Just my ability to open up and loosen up and have fun in life.

Hope: (33:23)
Right. Right.

Arden: (33:24)
Really hard for me for most of my life. And I just knew that I wasn’t really thriving, that I couldn’t really put my finger. It’s, it’s like hindsight is 2020, right? Mm-Hmm. . I couldn’t really put my finger on what was missing, but I knew that I wasn’t thriving.

Arden: (33:37)
And I would look at other people and think, oh, they’re having so much fun, or they’re so carefree and I wanted to be like that. But when your nervous system is stressed, you can’t just will it into a different state. It really takes a physiological shift to be able to interact with the demands of life differently. Right. So that’s why the technique was so revolutionary for me because it was giving my body and my mind really deep rest and allowing me to kind of release all that accumulated stress that we build up just from being human beings and getting overwhelmed. Yeah. It’s really been incredible. It’s just really helped to stabilize my nervous system, give me more confidence and mental clarity. Yeah. And I couldn’t recommend meditation more highly.

Hope: (34:23)
So, great. I totally agree. That’s so great. I love that. Well, thank you so much Arden for all of this. I have one last question. Well, actually two. So first, where can people find you and find out about all the things that you’re doing?

Arden: (34:36)
Oh, good question. So I’m pretty active on Instagram. My handle is just my name, Arden Martin. You can follow my studio, the spring meditation on Instagram as well. And those are the main places to find me.

Hope: (34:49)
Awesome.

Arden: (34:50)
You can also find me at thespringmeditation.com. That’s my studio’s website.

Hope: (34:55)
Perfect. And then I have one question I like to ask everyone to tie it all together, sort of a deep question. What do you think is the most important thing people can do or the most important change they can make to live with purpose?

Arden: (35:09)
I think that attending to your mental health and focusing on your needs, whatever you need to feel balanced and grounded on a daily basis. That has to be the foundation. Because without that, you won’t have the clarity to know what it is that lights you up, what it is that your purpose is. So just getting your mental health balanced and clear is ground zero for me.

Hope: (35:34)
Yeah. Yeah. That’s perfect. I couldn’t agree more. Thank you so much, Arden. This was super enlightening and educational all at the same time. , this has been great.

Arden: (35:43)
I’m so glad. Thank you for the opportunity to share this information with people. It’s been a pleasure.

Hope: (35:48)
Yeah, thank you.

Hope: (35:50)
Thanks for listening to Hopeful and Wholesome y’all. If you found value in this week’s episode, please subscribe on iTunes, wherever you get your podcast, and leave review to let me know what you thought. I love to know what you find useful in these episodes so I know how I can provide the most value I can to my listeners. And if you have topics that you wanna know more about, I’d love to hear those as well. So shoot me a message on Instagram, Facebook, or LinkedIn. It’s at theHopePedraza. Or visit my website hopefulandwholesome.com. Thanks y’all.