"Lost" On The Path

A young woman and dear friend recently told me a story about her path in life. I'll call her Carly to keep her anonymity. Near the end of her freshman year Carly was taken out of school by her family and placed in a wilderness program for troubled youth located in the high deserts of Colorado. She knew she needed to be there away from the parties, the drugs, and pressures of academia. The days were filled with long hikes over rough terrain, group processing around camp fires, icy cold showers, and guided meditations in the dirt. Over time her connection with the land and her wilderness guides (the staff) helped her open up to her inner pain that had been masked by her self destructive activities. She began to forgive herself and her loved ones. She began to feel whole again. 

At the end of the program, the parents were asked to come an spend a few days in the wilderness with their teens so they too could experience the process that their children had undergone the past eight weeks. Carly's mother came. One afternoon, Carly and her mother sat on a few boulders with one of the wilderness guides, whom we'll call Tom. Tom moderated a discussion between the two woman.

Carly's mother, choking back her waves of emotion and tears, shared her relief and tried to empathize with Carly's past. "I think you were just lost and fell off your path. I knew that if you could just find your way again and get back on the right path, you would be okay."

The guide smiled and turned to the mother. "What if Carly has always been on her path and needed to go through this to be who she is now in this moment? What if being lost was part of her path? What if being lost is not "lost" at all?"

Tom's words seeped right to the mother's core. She knew he was right. She could see that she had been viewing her daughter's "path" in life as a straight line going from point A to B and any diversion from that line she labeled as "lost".

When we reflect on our past and where we are now, it's obvious in hindsight that it was the difficult times, the times of uncertainty, of doubt, or stuckness, that did mold our wisdom and understanding today. When we see our kids or teens struggling there can be this feeling of Oh no! They're making the wrong choices. They're going the wrong way! But when you think about it, how could it be any other way than how it actually is. We can wish that things had gone differently in the past and hope for a smooth and healthy future but the truth remains, it is how it is right now and we have no idea what will happen in the future. This truth alone, if not fully understood,  can bring a feeling of uneasiness. Not being able to control outcomes can be very scary. We can say to our selves in exasperation, Well then who's driving this train! On the other hand, if we can trust that things will be how they are meant to be, there can be an inner stillness and calm and then an understanding that we are not lost at all but right where we are meant to be in the universe.

I'll share a poem with you called Lost by David Wagoner. This was recently recited in a woman's tea circle I attended and was the inspiration for this posting.

Lost


Stand still. The trees ahead and bushes beside you
Are not lost. Wherever you are is called Here,
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger,
Must ask permission to know it and be known.
The forest breathes. Listen. It answers,
I have made this place around you,
If you leave it you may come back again, saying Here.
No two trees are the same to Raven.
No two branches are the same to Wren.
If what a tree or bush does is lost on you,
You are surly lost. Stand still. The forest knows
Where you are. You must let it find you.

~David Wagoner

Teachings of the Body

I woke up in the middle of the night on Saturday with a sore throat and stuffed up nose.

“Must be allergies” I told myself.

The following day  I was tired and irritable. My head felt slightly disconnected from my neck. My hearing became muffled as if underwater. I was clearly coming down with something. Out of either optimism or  ignorance, I turned to my partner, Sean, and announced, “I refuse to get sick! I don’t have the time.”

Of course, I was sick with a cold. I had a choice to either continue to ignore and deny this truth or turn my attention towards my physical discomfort.  I spent all day Monday paying close attention to my body, listening to its needs, giving it lots of water, vitamins, rest, and immune boosters. One moment I would think, “Ahhh…I’m feeling much better” and the next “I think I might die.” I had very little control over how my body was reacting. All I could do is be present with what was happening and respond with care.

Whenever I get sick I find it to be a perfect demonstration of how little control I have over my experience. It also directly points to the nature of change and impermanence.  One day I’m feeling fine, the next I’m in bed with a box of tissues. These are the teachings our body has to offer.

I’m currently co-teaching mindfulness meditation to a small group of middle school students. When asked to talk about when they feel most out of control, many of them referred to experiences involving the body.  This took me by surprise as I thought they would refer more to emotional experiences but it was their physical experiences that seemed to stand out most for them.  

Our body is a wonderful teacher. It gives us the opportunity to become comfortable and familiar with things that are not in our control. It teaches us how to let go, how to accept, and be compassionate towards ourselves. It shows us the changing nature of experience as well as its impermanence. It challenges our sense of “me” and “mine”.

Often we are wrapped up in our mental experience of things. Our thoughts are often in the driver’s seat and the body is forced to sit in the back. Mindfulness meditation calls our attention and awareness to the body. The body grounds us in present because it is always in the present moment. It is the seat of our instinctual knowing (gut instinct) and wisdom of how to live a balanced life (wellbeing). 

The following meditation is a Buddhist practice that is taught to help us become more aware of the body as well as challenge our perception of what the body is. In this simple practice, you are asked to observe the characteristics of the four elements in your body. Take your time to explore each element. This can easily be taught to students but be sure to try it out for yourself first to best understand how it works and how to adapt it to the age group you’re working with.  

4 Elements Meditation

Sit in a mindful posture; relaxed and alert. Take a few deep breaths to settle yourself into your body. Bring your attention to the breath. We’ll start with the breath to notice the air element. As you breathe in notice the movement it creates within your body; rising and falling, pushing and pulling. Take a few minutes (or as long as you’d like) to notice the breath in this way. You can then notice movement in other areas of the body which might include tingling, vibration, pulsing, and swaying. This is the air element.

Now pay attention to the sensations of your body on the chair or on the floor. Notice the heaviness of the body and the sensations of hardness. Take some time to notice similar sensations in other areas of the body. Notice any stiffness, solidity, roughness, and smoothness. These are manifestations of the earth element.

After spending some time with the earth element, move to sensations of temperature. These are manifestations of the fire element. Notice heat or the lack of heat. Scan the different areas of your body with your attention to notice how the temperature differs, where it’s felt strongly, and where it’s more subtle.  

The water element is experienced through wetness or fluidity. Inside the mouth can be a good place to start since we can easily feel the wetness of our saliva. See if you experience wetness or fluidity in other areas of the body as well. Take your time and use your curiosity to explore. 

RAIN Down Under

I've been in Australia for the past two weeks. I was fortunate enough to be hired as a consultant by Smriti: School of Mindful Science, an emerging organization bringing mindfulness programs to schools and social service centers in the Sydney area. Their main objective is to bring mindfulness based programs to schools serving the Aboriginal communities. They are off to a great start and I feel blessed to be part of it.

My visit here is focused around three workshops, two for parents and one for educators wanting to bring mindfulness to kids. To both groups I've been highlighting the importance of self care. I thought I would share a wonderful tool that has been part of my training agenda.

R.A.I.N

I believe this acronym comes from Michelle McDonald, a Buddhist meditation teacher in the US. I’ve heard it used by many other meditation teachers as well such as James Baraz and Andrea Fella. I’d like to pass it on as just another practical tool. When you are experiencing difficult emotions, overwhelm, stress, or anxiety, RAIN is a simple step by step process to bring awareness, acceptance, and balance to your experience. Educators and parents may find this particularly helpful as school gets started.

Recognize – Knowing in the moment what emotions are being experienced. Sometimes labeling the emotion can be helpful.

Allow – In mindfulness all emotions are okay. Notice if you want to push it away or change the emotion. Aversion or judgment to an emotion is perfectly normal. With mindfulness we can begin to notice how our relationship to our emotions further complicates or stimulates them. Sometimes I use a deep breath to help aid me in the allowing process.

Investigate –Take an interest in your emotional experience. Notice how it affects your body and mental state. Getting to know our emotional landscape allows us to become more equipped to understand how our emotions are linked with certain habitual thoughts and emotional patterns. Moving our attention out of the mental storyline and into the physical experience of the emotion can also help us regulate and come to balance faster.

Non-identify – To have emotions is to be human. Sometimes we can become judgmental of our self due to our emotional responses. We take it personal. With mindfulness we can begin to let go of those judgments and identification. 

Using RAIN with strong emotions - See if you can recognize it and name it. See if there is any added layer of aversion or judgment. Breathe and ask yourself to “Allow” the emotion to be present by opening up to it best you can. Investigate it in the body; take an interest in how the emotion plays itself out in your body. As the emotion becomes less powerful or as your awareness increases, notice if an appropriate response (vs. habitual reaction) becomes more available. 

Smriti Founder, Araliya De Silva, has been teaching mindfulness to a local preschool. I got the opportunity to visit and teach some fun mindful breathing exercises. I've never taught to kids this young. The one smiling at the camera is only 2! They were a very mindful bunch and did a great job. 

Hello World!

Hello World! I am very excited to be launching this blog today. This weekly journal will hopefully be a piece of the mosaic of offerings that I plan to release under the umbrella of the Heart-Mind Education Project.

For the past four years I’ve been hearing again and again “I’m the only one I know that is bringing mindfulness into the classroom” or “my friends aren’t into this stuff. I’m all alone in doing this.” The fact is thousands of people across the globe are bringing mindfulness practice to students. There are now several large organizations bringing trainings and services to anyone interested in integrating mindful awareness at home, in the classroom, into therapy sessions, etc. The problem seems to be that there isn’t a way for those who have been trained to then communicate with each other. There isn’t a community support system in place.

It is my intention to help bridge the gap between the multitudes of people bringing mindfulness programs to kids. I feel that there is an untapped wisdom and experience that lies within this community of parents, educators, social workers, and therapists, just waiting to be shared and supported.

I look forward to using this blog as a way to reach out the community with related research, articles, training opportunities, and mindfulness techniques. I’ll also highlight curriculum shared on The Heart-Mind Education Forum, which is scheduled to be launched in the next month. This forum will operate as a hub for the mindfulness community to share curriculum, resources, and wisdom.

I hope you will join me in this journey. Feel free to send me any articles or research you feel I should consider posting. Community input is what will make this a rich experience to share.