The Top 10 Guided Meditations of 2021

We’re taking a look back at some of our most popular guided meditations from the past year.

At Mindful we aim to deliver practical resources so you can build your practice. Our guided meditations are comprehensive and walk you through the practice step-by-step so that you can benefit from mindfulness, regardless of your level of experience. 

To help you deepen your practice (or get started), we’ve rounded up 10 guided meditations that have resonated most with you, our readers, over the past year. 

The Top 10 Guided Meditations of 2021

1) A 10-Minute Gratitude Practice to Notice, Shift, and Rewire Your Brain

When things don’t go according to plan, it’s easy to spot all the ways things have gone wrong. This gratitude practice from Nate Klemp is designed to change that. This exercise is adapted from Start Here: Master the Lifelong Habit of Wellbeing by Eric Langshur and Nate Klemp, and is led by mindfulness coach Priti Patel.

2) A 10-Minute Guided Meditation for R.E.S.T.

Rashid Hughes invites us to become more familiar with our inner spaciousness—where the pleasure of resting in awareness is sacred and healing.

3) A 12-Minute Meditation for Emotional Resilience

In this practice, Scott Rogers guides us to take the role of observer to difficult emotions, so that we can more easily create the space we need to let them go.

4) A 12-Minute Guided 4-7-8 Breathing Meditation

Pulmonologist and founder of The Mindful Healthcare Collective Dr. Ni-Cheng Liang leads us in a breathing practice to release stagnant air and find calm. This can be particularly helpful for those with chronic or obstructive lung disease.

5) A 10-Minute Guided Meditation to Open Up to Painful Emotions

Law professor and author Rhonda Magee offers a 10-minute guided meditation to remain grounded as reactivity arises.

6) A 12-Minute Breathing Practice to Activate Your Vagus Nerve

Andres Gonzales leads a simple breathing practice to help you extend the length of your exhale, telling the body it’s safe to let your guard down.

7) A 6-Minute Loving-Kindness Meditation to Expand Your Awareness

Tita Angangco, cofounder of The Centre for Mindfulness Studies, shares a loving-kindness meditation that serves as an ignition to spark change.

8) A 15-Minute Meditation for Self-Acceptance

On some level, many of us are healing from perfectionism, but with mindfulness we can learn to embrace our flaws. Cheryl Jones, founder of The Mindful Path, shares a guided practice to be with ourselves as we are.

9) A 10-Minute Meditation for Deep Relaxation

Jenée Johnson shares a mindfulness practice that is at the heart of one of our most basic needs: rest. As Johnson explains, there is no healing without rest.

10) A 12-Minute Meditation for Connecting to Your Body

The four elements have the ability to connect us, both internally and externally, with the world around us. Jeanne Corrigal brings her Métis heritage, and her training as an insight meditation teacher, to this guided practice to connect with the four elements within our own body.