Contemplative Glossary

There are a large number of fancy "meditation apps" in the marketplace these days.  They can be helpful for timing your sessions, tracking your activity, and sometimes helping you learn.  But buyer beware!  Unfortunately, the profit motive behind some of them undermines their purpose.  Funded by "private equity," they are incentivized to define meditation as "content," curated by experts, so that they can justify charging a monthly subscription to it.  Ironically, that disincentivizes them to teach the simple, natural, content-free meditation recommended by the ancient geniuses of nonduality.

Probably the most useful feature of any meditation app is the timer.  It can be very distracting to watch a clock during a timed meditation session.  With a countdown timer, you can let go and just be until it chimes for you.

For iPhone users, many of these meditation apps link with the Apple Health App, allowing you to track your "mindfulness minutes" alongside your exercise, sleep, etc.

Here are my suggestions for simple, free mobile meditation apps.  They both integrate with Apple's Health App.

• Simple Meditation Timer (Apple only) — a basic no-nonsense timer with three bells before and after. 
  
  
• Mindfulness Coach (Apple & Android) — This is a solid app, developed by the US Dept of Veterans Affairs' National Center for PTSD. It offers a series of lessons and exercises, including a basic meditation timer and progress-tracker as well.  

But, really any countdown timer will do — on your phone or an old fashioned kitchen timer.