Expand is free to download, and it uses Monroe’s signature combination of guided meditations and Monroe Sound Science. When you open the app, you will discover that there are over 80 deeply meaningful meditations that cover a multitude of important topics areas:

Relaxation and Healing, Creativity and Manifestation, Sleep and Dreaming, Nurturing Healthy Relationships, Insight and Intuition, Joy and Meaning and Beyond the Physical.

There is a lovely feature that allows you to customize an unguided meditation. I tailored a 20-minute “Focused Attention” session each morning before I began my day, and I would change up the background sounds to fit how I was feeling that day.

After my first residential program at the Monroe Institute, I was set down a path of meditational experiences that changed my life. I couldn’t wait to continue my journey after I got home in my own, familiar environment. At Monroe, I was able to experience expanded states of awareness that I had never felt before, and it was something I wanted to continue doing. However, it can be hard to set a daily schedule for meditation in our busy lives, and it can be even harder to find the time to quickly make it back to another residential or virtual retreat. So, when I heard about Expand, the Monroe Institute’s new app, I was thrilled to find that I could experience expanded states of awareness any time I wanted. I’ve now been using Expand for a couple of weeks. I think it’s an incredible tool to customize your own journey in between Monroe retreats.

Now, what’s so exciting about this, in my opinion, is that the Monroe Institute just provided all of us with a tool to personalize our meditation journey anytime, anywhere. While many of us are always eagerly awaiting our next program, this allows us to tailor meditation to our daily needs in the meantime. I was thrilled to try this out, as I have a busy schedule that I am very particular. 

Here are some of my favorite features—

CREATIVITY AND MANIFESTATION

I began with various “Creativity and Manifestation” sessions in the morning. Starting the day with gratitude is always important for me to maintain a positive and productive workday, and a creative meditation session allowed me to express that gratitude. As I grew with my journey, I began expanding my morning meditations. There is a lovely feature that allows you to customize an unguided meditation. I tailored a 20-minute “Focused Attention” session each morning before I began my day, and I would change up the background sounds to fit how I was feeling that day. These custom unguided explorations are really a unique and exciting idea, as they give you the freedom to choose the amount of time for your meditation, the type of meditation you would like to focus on and the background sounds in your meditation. 

When I finished my workday and was feeling up to it, I would do a manifestation meditation session with the help of Expand. I’m a very driven person with a lot of goals, and I find that meditating with the purpose of manifesting the future I desire helps me to clearly and efficiently follow through with my dreams. I just don’t feel like I’m accomplishing anything if I’m not focusing on what’s next, and Expand allowed me to focus this energy. 

SLEEP AND DREAMING

Lastly, I will occasionally have trouble sleeping. So, if I had a rough day and had trouble winding down, I’d do a “Sleep & Dreaming” meditation. I found the “Restorative Sleep” and the “Dream Sanctuary” meditations helpful in allowing me to have a beneficial night’s sleep. 

On the weekends, I would set aside a bit of time to experience some of the deeper, profound meditation exercises in the “Beyond the Physical” topic area. 

Now, life is never constant (though we may like it to be); life is very fluid. So, what may work for you one day may not work for you another day, and Expand gives you the tools to craft and change your meditation experience each day. It allows you to pick the meditations you’d prefer whenever works for your schedule and goals. You can use it to think about the big picture and free yourself from unwanted patterns as you see them arise in your life by setting weekly goals in your meditation practice. For instance, I saw myself showing a pattern I didn’t like, so I could focus my daily afternoon sessions on removing that limiting pattern. 

If you need to feel inspired, I found Expand to be a great tool to provide inspiration throughout the day. Simply set aside 15 minutes to meditate if you’re feeling the need to be creatively inspired. 

JOURNALING

The other tool in the app that I was very thrilled to find is the journaling tool! There is a space where you can journal after your meditation sessions and record text or audio notes of your spiritual journey in a place where you can refer to them later. As I completed my meditation sessions in Expand, I was prompted to journal each time a session ended. I feel incomplete without writing down the experiences from each meditation, so this was really something that made me excited. This helped me to keep track of my weekly meditation goals and see how my journey had grown. Aside from journaling, I was able to tag my entries in a way that groups like-entries. This was helpful when I went back to reference my experiences, as I could  refer to similar experiences to see how my journey had progressed. 

Finally, I created a profile on Expand and hope to connect with more like-minded participants soon.

I’m looking forward to experiencing all that Expand has to offer and sharing more of my personal experiences with you! 

While I’ve only been using Expand for a couple of weeks, I already feel that it drastically changed the way I meditate for the better and provided me with greater accountability for my practice. I’m looking forward to experiencing all that Expand has to offer and sharing more of my personal experiences with you! 

Try Monroe's EXPAND app for FREE!