If you don't like this one, there are a bunch of other meditation apps to try, here are a few others to consider –

Meditate ($2.99 in the Apple Appstore) by Simple Touch, is an elegant but simple timer for your meditation, that includes preset meditations, the sound of Tibetan singing bowls, prep and cool down time, and a pause button. The most clever feature is how it handles interruptions - if you take an incomming call or answer a text message in the middle of your meditation session – and we've all been there before – the app will start right back where you left off. But if you want preparation time again, simply press and hold the pause button for 2 seconds until the app re-enters preparation mode. Nice. Simple. Touch.

ZaZen (99¢ at the Apple Appstore) by Innobytes offers a unique alternative interface for meditation timing, but ends up being a bit more confusing than innovative. But this is good if you like your user interfaces to feel like koans. The first screen is a picture of a rippling pond with a note to tap the screen for instructions. That screen tells you that you should go to the settings screen and adjust the size of two stones to change the length of the meditation from 10 minutes to 45 minutes, and the presence of a gong sound from every 5 or 10 minutes to off. You then click on the Zazen screen button, tap a candle in front of a statue to start, and hear a gong after a set one-minute preparation time. Beautiful graphics but limited functionality.

One final meditation app that looks really interesting is The Equanimity Project, which actually deserves its own complete review after using for a month or two. [Ed. Note: We'll provide a full review soon!] It's sort of the opposite of the other apps in that it skimps on the graphics - sort of like staring at a wall, and instead, delivers a serious and thoughtful meditation timer that times your sittings, provides a journal for sitting notes, and displays graphical tracking giving you clear feedback and reminders for your meditation practice. It's carefully designed to be the ideal companion for the serious meditator. The journal is comparable in quality to many standalone note-taking apps. It allows you to optionally take notes after your sittings, and lets you browse through your meditation history as either a visually annotated log or textual journal. All of your recorded data can be exported - as a nicely formatted email that you can print, or as a table that you can load into a spreadsheet if you want. You can also email individual journal entries - useful for posting them on a blog. Easy to read graphics let you know at a glance how regularly you are meditating, and how long your daily practice has been going. A chart illustrates your progress over the course of the year, and a bar graph shows the total number of hours you have meditated, and the application icon can optionally show daily reminders to sit or alert you if you've missed a sitting. This app could help any sentient being develop a regular meditation practice! This substantial iPhone app only costs $5 and it's published by the developer, Robin Barooah.

And finally, here are a few other apps that are worth mentioning:

iZen Garden ($3.99 at the Apple Appstore) gives you all the peace and tranquility of a beautiful Zen Garden right in your pocket, without the sand that just gets into everything. Choose from over 100 different types of stones, shells, fossils and plants to place in your garden and then use your finger to “rake” the sand into intricate abstract patterns. All while listening to the soothing sounds of one of our 9 built-in meditation soundtracks. You get nine different soothing ambient soundtracks to help still your mind while you tend your garden. You can relax to the gentle lapping of ocean waves at your feet, the quiet solitude of a forest, or the soft twinkling of bells and wind chimes. And you get a completely customizable rake with variable width and depth settings. Plus, and extra bonus - you receive a "Daily Zen" a daily Zen saying or Koan when you enter your garden. You'll want to clap for this app with one hand of course!

If you want something a bit more active, try Koi Pond (99¢ at the Apple Appstore) which is published by a company called The Blimp Pilots. I love this one! In this living simulation, you run your fingers across the surface of the pond, and water ripples away from your touch and the koi, disturbed, dart away. The app offers a high quality water simulation with refraction. You can feed your koi and even have them nibble your fingers. Slap on your earbuds and enjoy the 3D sound that's generated by the app, that offers a rich multi-layer ambient soundtrack. And you can even move around the lily pads!

There are tons of astrology and I Ching apps – but one of my faves is iChing ($1.99 on the Apple Appstore) published by Astrology.com. The app offers sweet graphics and smooth animation to deliver the wisdom of the iChing, which has been used for over 5000 years as an aid for decision making. Tap the yinyang spinners at the bottom of the screen and simulate the ancient tossing of coins to form a traditional hexagram which can be one of the 64 possible combinations of six broken lines or unbroken lines (trigrams) based on yin and yang principles. Then read a detailed interpretation of the original hexagram — and its changed form — for true insight into your issue or concern.It's published by Astrology.com. If you prefer tossing coins or yarrow stalks, get the Yi Jing app instead, which is a much more comprehensive application, published by Flat Earth Studio. It offers a slick iPad interface, but feels just a bit pricey at $4.99, if you're just looking for a quick I Ching reading. But on the other hand, iPhone apps sport remarkably affordable prices in general.

Hope you enjoy these apps! Send us an email if you run into something really fun!

More info at the Apple Appstore: http://www.apple.com/iphone/apps-for-iphone/