being mindful
Meditation instead of Medication
by barbara wilkinson on 02/22/11
The time is clearly ripe. The time is right. As information comes at us faster and faster and we get busier and busier, more people crave peace, stillness, serenity, and clarity in place of their overwhelming stress. We are longing to get out of reactive and automatic pilot modes; we want to respond appropriately and more wisely to our circumstances. We want something more than pharmaceutical companies and unhealthy conditioned coping techniques and bad habits offer.
Two prominent stories in the Canadian press recently report the healthy consequences of a regular meditation practice. The program for learning meditation that is referred to is the Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction program started by Jon Kabat Zinn at the Center for Mindfulness in the last 1970's. Thousands of research studies can be found by googling the topic. This is the same course I am offering in my therapeutic practice in Guelph.
Take a look at the article published in the Globe and Mail this week:
and then again take a look at a similar story as reported by Peter Mansbridge on the National News this month:
http://www.cbc.ca/video/#/News/TV_Shows/The_National/Health/1244506052/ID=1786859111
Contact me for more information. Perhaps this is also the time for you to hook up with someone to talk to ... or for you to begin learning to meditate. I assure you it is not likely what you think.
Take good care and let's get healthy and wise together.
I wish you well-being, health, peace and a life lived on purpose.
January Thoughts
by barbara wilkinson on 01/16/11
It is the new year, 2011. The mornings still feel too early, rather dark and chilly, albeit with promises of light in the shadows. Do you feel like me on the darkest coldest dawnings: wanting to turn over and go back to sleep til spring?
Working as a psychotherapist, I know for a fact, people are challenged by other awakenings this time of year: lots of flu and cold bugs lurking around testing immune systems compromised by the cold and the inevitable financial and emotional hangovers from the holiday season, which mainly seemed to tax our resources rather than replenish them. And then we have the resolutions. Resolutions galore to get it all "in order" and whip us into shape. Resolutions that often are already being broken and making us feel badly about ourselves.
I have decided this year that there will be no more resolutions for me. I have decided that perhaps, as Jon Kabat Zinn suggests, we need to pour our energy into what's right with us and, that perhaps in living one moment at a time, we can make good choices that will benefit our next moment, eventually adding up to a lifetime of fewer regrets and beautiful moments lived fully.
Apparently, according to David Rock, the average waistline in the developed world has increased 400% in 25 years, fostered by the immediate gratification of high-caloric food accompanied by the weak brain circuitry for inhibiting impulses. He claims our minds may be going in the same direction as the bellies as we fill them with the "empty neural calories" of online connections that are not really real. In other words they never really satisfy our craving for connection any more than sugary treats satisfy our hunger. He calls for "NeuralLeadership" and says it is time for us to wake up to what we are really doing and educate ourselves on the impact of new technologies. He suggests we take better care of our minds.
How is this possible when a recent study shows that most of the time we are mentally checked out and 46.9% of us are more than half the time engaged in "mind wandering"?
All this would be scary to me if I didn't also teach Mindfulness, and if my next class, starting next week, weren't full to overflowing, which tells me that many of us want to wake up, on purpose, to paying attention in the present moment nonjudgmentally. And it would be scary too if I had not attended a talk this afternoon in downtown Guelph, where Karen Armstrong, authour of 12 Steps to a Compassionate Life had not spoken to a throng of hundreds wanting to learn about Compassion. How exciting is all this.
I know mindfulness practice grows healthier choices, healthier neural circuits, better sleep patterns, compassion and self-compassion, improves the functioning of our immune systems, helps us with depression and anxiety and eating and generally being more responsible and more awake in a world that cries out for this - now.
Taking time to show up for yourself this cold January month, to really listen to your body, to really pay attention, to perhaps do nothing occasionally, which might really be the biggest "something" could be so useful. Thich Nhat Hanh says we diminish our quality of being and do ourselves a great disservice when we never practice on purpose "aimlessness". He of course is a master of mindfulness.
So many thoughts passing through my mind - so much hope, so much reason for rejoicing, as I see so many wanting to understand mindfulness and wanting to move towards a better healthier way. One way I find to thrive in the dark mornings is to put my bum on my cushion and sit in meditation before starting the day, being aware of all the thoughts circulating and knowing that in doing nothing, I am doing everything I need in that moment to start the day well. Send me your thoughts and questions and let's work together to change old patterns and be well and be whole - just now, just in this moment.
And I wish you a happy healthy new year with many new beginnings and full of satisfying moments.
Be well.
'Tis the Season
by barbara wilkinson on 12/21/10
Alongside the jingle bells, lights and festivities sit the heartaches and the headaches. December brings its challenges and is a difficult month for many.
Within the little mindfulness community of graduates of my Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction Classes, dwell those of us who are struggling with sick children, those who have recently lost partners and other loved ones, those who are struggling with chronic pain and /or illness, those who are lonely, and those who are dealing with mile-long shopping lists, work fatigue, demanding family members and bosses, credit overloads and fear; at the same time there are those who have recently received good news and those who are coming to a place of acceptance of old stories, a couple in new relationships, some who have welcomed new babies into their families, one who is waiting for a new baby, and so it goes.... no one is alone really ....we are all unique and all the same....
The mountain meditation reminds us to take on the qualities of the mountain: the mountain that sits solid and stable, breathing whether spring is bringing beautiful blossoms and mangy tourists or late summer is bringing forest fires and drought... the mountain sits and breathes... I know we are not mountains, huge big hills planted in the earth, unwavering, but rather human beings who know that the condition of life itself means that nothing will stay the same, that change is the only thing we can count on; sometimes we will perceive the change as good and other times as horrific... and in December it is all highlighted by media that tell us how it "should" be , by an economic system that depends on us shopping for happiness, preferably til we drop, by dysfunctional value systems that tell us that happiness lies in happy little families who don't have problems but who sit around the tree, beautifully decorated, accumulating more stuff... and there is not one of us who is not triggered by memories , good or sad of Christmases past..
...and so our challenge for December is to meet it all with equanimity, like the mountain... to hold the joy of the season and to hold the sadness of the season and to keep on keeping on... with equanimity... making space for the predictable and the unpredictable... and still breathing... and paying attention to the inhale and the exhale in some of our moments... knowing that the breath is the reminder of our life and our wholeness and our connection with ourself and with others and of our being. Equanimity means not reacting to our reactions. This comes out of mindfulness meditation practice and awareness and is just one small, but enormous, piece.
I would encourage you to 'just do it' , to hit the cushion everyday , to sit like a mountain, to feel like a mountain, to do body scans, to show up for yourself by doing 3 minute breathing spaces, to keep asking 'what does this moment require', instead of 'what's wrong with me'? to get out into the cold and move your body, to relax your tongue ( try it as it works), to pay attention to long exhales ( don't believe me- do it and see) ... I beseech you to care of yourself, for it is only in looking after ourselves, that we can better take care of others...
My very best to you in managing the gifts and challenges of December.
May you feel the peace that is in your heart.
