The Mountain as a Teacher

Rental car loaded,  all of us ready to hit the road by 6:00 am, and we were off to Telluride.  A destination I had dreamed of visiting for quite some time. Once we arrived, the beauty around me far exceeded my expectations and I had only seen the surface of what was to come the following day.  I knew that this would be a very special trip to share quality time with the family but I also knew there was going to be even more about this trip that would make it memorable.

We boarded the chair lift the following morning that would carry us to the lofty peek high in the sky.  A brief overview of the map told us that there was one run that looked like it would be manageable, without landing any of us in one of those dreadful ski patrol baskets.  With a name as inviting as See Forever, I didn't see how we could pass it up.  As soon as we were released from the lift, I was overcome with an immediate visceral reaction to my surroundings.  In each direction that I looked, the endless beauty was more spectacular than the previous glance.  There were no words to describe what I was absorbing.  Off to the right, the tiny dots of men and women, far braver or perhaps somewhat crazier than I, were trekking by foot up to an even higher summit, where they were then clipping on their skies to perform terrain that I could not even imagine attempting.  They were floating through an untouched snow bowl that looked as if it might swallow a human attempting to cross through it. How were they managing that? Then I spotted a person in a cocoon type bag attached to wings literally soaring through the sky.  I was without words and quite honestly blown away.  I had never seen such pure beauty.  I felt so free, so calm, so at peace, and so grateful to be witnessing this creation of nature.   I could not really put to words why I needed to be up at this peak so often during our trip but I knew that I was being deeply touched and changed during my time alone in nature high in the sky. I knew that I would return home to write about my time with this mountain though not entirely sure what the words would be sharing.
It hit me while on one of my runs down See Forever.  My legs ached to the point that I questioned if they would carry me down this mountain safely. I knew that I was overdoing it and that the sensible thing to do was to call it a day and retreat to my cozy bed of the hotel room.  Sensible perhaps but I also knew that I felt called to stay out and just experience this  mountain to the fullest.  I knew there was a lesson that I was meant to learn and that the answers were somewhere up on this majestic peek. I have come to know my body very intimately over the years, living with a physical condition that can at times be very challenging.  I knew there would be a price to pay for indulging in this rigorous activity but I also was mindful that I had a choice in the matter. This is a sport that I have loved since childhood and as long as my legs would allow me to continue it, I was going to go for it each and every chance that I had.  I also knew that it would just entail listening to my body and allowing it the proper chance to recover once we returned home.  I felt grateful to have realized that I have arrived at the point in my life when I can listen to my body and make sensible choices but also let myself indulge from time to time returning back to the sensible business of taking care of myself. I felt happy in the realization that I have come to understand my relationship with MS and we have our own certain song and dance together that allows me to enjoy my life, while also taking care of myself.
The more my legs began to burn and shake, the more closely I felt connected to the mountain and what it was trying to tell me. Suddenly it began to become clear to me why I was so drawn to this spot on the mountain and this particular run where I could truly see forever.
From the views that this spot allowed me, I was struck at how this mountain just sits, constantly changing,  yet always being itself.  On this particular day the mountain was wrapped in a blanket of sunshine with nearly no winds assaulting it.  The forecast told us that before long this solid mass would be enshrouded in clouds buffeted by wind and snow.  In a few short months, spring will come and the snow will melt away allowing the streams below to fill with water, while flowers bloom in the meadows. In summer there will be no snow on the mountain except perhaps for the peaks.  Birds will sing again. In the fall the mountain will take on a new face of beauty as the leaves turn a myriad of brilliant colors and an autumn crispness will fill the air.  Through all of the changes this mountain sits through it remains centered, rooted, and unwavering.  Whether in the light of day or the darkness of the moon, the mountain just sits experiencing each moment exactly as it is.  It is always itself no matter what the changes around it are.  As the weather changes moment by moment, day by day, it remains there in its stillness unchanged.  No matter the season, the presence of visitors or not, it just sits unmoved.  It dawned on me, as I pushed myself down for yet one more run, that if we can learn to experience the mountain, we too can become rooted, still and grounded in our lives.  No matter what the challenges of our lives, whether we are in our own personal lightness or darkness, experiencing moments of pain or joy, we can become like the mountain and use these experiences to strengthen us. Like the mountain, we might come to know a deeper silence, stillness and wisdom in our lives.  This is what this mountain had to teach me.

When We Follow Our Hearts, We Will Always Find Our Way

Living a life of Mindfulness has allowed me to discover more of who I am at my core, to come to  better understand my purpose in life, and to recognize opportunities when they present themselves in my life.  Living Mindfully with intention and awareness and practicing meditation daily have been great teachers to me over the years.
As I have shared in previous blogs, my interest in mindfulness began years ago, when a diagnosis of MS left me searching for ways to reduce the stress in my life.  I did not realize it then but it was the beginning of what would prove to be a life altering journey that would not only help me with my own personal healing but would eventually lead me to sharing the lessons learned along the way with others.
When that first MS episode robbed me of the vision in my right eye, I remember knowing deep in my heart that I was loosing my vision so that I could SEE something that I was meant to see.  Though I was uncertain what it was at the time, I knew that there was a purpose greater than myself at play.  In fact, the word MySelf kept coming back to me as is if were a comforting blanket. MySelf. I began to see this condition that doctors labeled Multiple Sclerosis, as representing MySelf. The MS began to symbolize what it was that I was meant to learn and see through living with this condition.
Little did I know that it would take years before I would begin to gain the clarity I was looking for.
Over the years, I sought out to learn as much as I could from as many different teachers as I could find.
I attended Jon Kabat Zinn's eight week Mindfulness Stress Reduction Program and later worked as an assistant teaching the program to others, began a daily meditation practice, worked with a couple of gifted counselors, attended morning prayer groups and weekly church services, was a part of a hands on healing group, practiced yoga and researched various exercise programs that were helpful to those living with MS.  I studied the benefits of essential oils, nutrition, and positive thinking.   I experimented with acupuncture, massage therapy, and got my level I Reiki certification.  I continued being an avid journal keeper and read books on a vast array of topics, mostly having to do with healing.  I attended weekend retreats on Mindfulness and various healing modalities across the country.  I prayed often and trusted that God had a plan in all of this for me.  I was a living sponge absorbing all that I could from anyone I felt drawn to.
 Throughout this time, my own meditation practice continued and my belief in the power of Mindfulness continued to grow. I was living the benefits and was feeling an ever growing desire to share with others what I was benefiting from.  An article in the New York Times led me to the Institute of Life Coach Training, where I graduated from a program as a certified Life Coach specializing in women's wellness.  I knew that I was moving in the right direction but still had a nagging sense that there were things I was not yet seeing clearly.
A move across country with my family landed me in Arizona.  At the time, I remember questioning why life was leading me to the desert but comforted with an all knowing sense that I was meant to be making this move for reasons that I could not see at the time.
During this time in my life, I was still practicing my daily meditation and studying different things of interest while I was adjusting to living across the country from a town where I had lived for over forty years.  I began running and surprised myself when I completed my first and only half marathon.  I spent time studying the bible with a group of women learning a great deal about my own personal faith.  I became an avid follower of Dr. Terry Wahls.  Many in the MS community know her well.  She is a neurologist with progressive MS, which had left her confined to a wheel chair unable to do most everything she had once enjoyed.  When all medications were proving ineffective for her, she began her own research studying the connection between nutrition and MS.   Implementing the research she was conducting, she was soon out of her wheelchair hiking mountains.  The more that I followed her work, the more committed I became to incorporating her protocol into my life.  While not easy to adapt to this rather restrictive diet, I believe the results have been indisputable.  That will be a separate blog entry all of its own.
Late this summer, my husband came across A Mindfulness Life Center while out one day.  I was back east at the time and still remember his call to tell me about this center.  " I found the perfect spot for you", I heard him excitedly telling me over the phone.  My dear husband could not have been more right. From the moment I set foot in the center, I knew that I was meant to be there.  I quickly enrolled in the unlimited membership taking full advantage of the many classes, series, and workshops that were offered.  I loved everything about it and still the sponge I had become all of those years past, I just kept soaking up all that it had to offer.  It was not long before I began thinking seriously about wishing that I worked there.  I kept thinking about how much I would love to be a part of this center in an even greater capacity.
A few months after I began spending much of my free time at the Mindfulness Center, I had another MS episode of optic neuritis.  While I was grateful that this episode was not nearly as severe as the first one years back, it did leave me in a rather blurry state for a period of time.  I can't say that I am surprised that it was during this time of blurriness that I began to see with a greater clarity the wonderful opportunity that might possibly happen for me, if I believed in myself and worked to make it happen.  So I tackled my own self doubt issues that were getting in my way, and went about asking the center for a job.  As fate would have it, they were looking for someone and I was blessed to be the person who they hired for the job.  The pivotal moment for me, in the whole process, was when the executive director said to me, " I believe in you.  Now we just have to get you to believe in yourself."
How right she was! After the very first meditation class that I led, I had what I like to call a major "AH HA" moment.  So many years practicing, studying under great teachers, seeking and learning as the student and there I was on the other side of the cushion guiding others through a meditation.  It was almost surreal for me.  In that moment of guiding this group of men and women through this 45 minute class, it was as if I could at last SEE what it was that I was meant to see all of those years back.  In those 45 minutes, I was exactly where I was meant to be.  After the meditation ended, I asked if anyone had questions or comments they wished to share.  In listening to these people open their hearts up to me,  I was caught by surprise at how deeply touched I was as I listened to them share of their experiences.  After so many years of wanting to share what was in my heart with others, it was in their sharing with me that the real magic was found.  The walk back to my office was one I will not forget because each step that I took, in the quiet stillness that surrounded me, I felt overcome with a tremendous sense of accomplishment and gratitude.  To some it might not have looked like much but to me it was huge.  It was symbolic of something far greater than guiding a meditation class.  For me, this opportunity to connect with these people on this deep and personal level, through sharing something that I have been practicing for such long time on my own, was such a gift.  In that moment, a lump filled my throat as I could feel that I was at long last truly seeing what it was I could feel tugging at me all of those years ago. I was seeing who I had become over these years and I smiled at my own reflection.  I knew in that moment, as I got back to my desk, that this is just the beginning of this next chapter in my life and I am indeed exactly where I am meant to be.

MINDFULNESS - A VITAL PIECE OF THE PUZZLE

The more involved I get with my own mindfulness practice and the work that I am fortunate to be doing at A Mindfulness Life Center, the more I am experiencing some trepidation and judgement from people in my life.  Where does this resistance and judgement come from?
I have had people ask me, "Is Mindfulness a cult?" or "What is it that I am seeking in a Buddha based practice"?  I have listened as people have shared with me some of the overwhelming stress in their lives, while telling me that they desperately need something like a mindfulness class but just don't have time.  I have not really understood where the resistance or the judgement have been coming from but I have felt a longing to somehow help people better understand exactly what mindfulness is.  Mindfulness is really quite simply, paying attention. You can be laying on a mat in a quiet yoga studio, you can be folding laundry, driving in rush hour traffic, reading the bible, cooking dinner and be doing all of those things mindfully, if you are fully present in each moment.

While my daily practice involves time where I intentionally draw away from noise and activity so that I can reach a deeper state of relaxation, while still remaining fully conscious, the real challenge and benefits come when I take that mindset out into my daily life.  I like to think of it as a muscle that I am training.  Each time I practice Mindfulness, I am training my mind to be at peace. The more that I practice, the quicker my mind remembers this natural state and the easier it becomes to go back to that place.

Mindfulness is practiced by men, women and children from all walks of life, all ages, all different faiths, and all different life experiences.  Today I had the pleasure of talking with a young firefighter, a professional athlete trainer, several working men and women, several stay at home moms, several retired men and women who had one thing in common.  They were all attending a mindfulness class with a desire to create more peace in their lives.  I have no idea what their religious beliefs are and it makes no difference.  Mindfulness is not a religion based practice.  It is not a "cult" or anything trying to convert anyone from or to anything.  It is true that yoga and some forms of meditation come from the Buddhist culture just as all things originate from someplace.  While mindfulness can be practiced during yoga and meditation, mindfulness is not the practice of Buddhism.  Mindfulness is not meant to replace anything but I believe it is a vital piece of the puzzle in our lives as we strive to create more harmony, peace, and balance.

Sometimes It Is In The Darkness That We Find The Light

My first MS episode began Christmas night close to twelve years ago. It started as just a terrible headache that I attributed to the hectic Christmas season entertaining family, staying up late to prepare Christmas for our small children. and just plain and simple running myself a bit ragged.  However,  the following morning, I woke to an unusual sensation in my eyes. To move my eyes was excruciating.  My husband assured me it was an optical migraine, which he had suffered from before.   As the day passed by my vision began to fade and I knew that something was not at all right with this situation.  A trip to urgent care resulted in being told to take sinus medicine, which didn’t make sense to me at all.  I was not a doctor but I knew that I wasn’t congested,  I was loosing my vision!  By the end of that day, I had lost all vision in one eye and the other was fading fast.  The rest of the story is a long and tedious one but in the end I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, a potentially debilitating disease of the central nervous system. My immune system was attacking the myelin sheath protecting my optic nerves. Over the next six months my vision slowly returned.  I was left with color blindness and the loss of peripheral vision in one eye but despite some remaining blurriness, I was fortunate to regain my vision. There is much that I will be sharing in the future about what I have learned living with this chronic health condition and the ways that it has been an enormous blessing in my life, despite some of the challenges along the way.  For today, I wish to share with you the gift that temporarily loosing my eyesight gave to me. I hope to share with you about how I believe the darkness can teach us what we need to know.

Whether it is a literal darkness we are in or we are going through a dark time in our lives, we can ask the darkness to teach us what we need to know.  It can guide us if we allow it to and it can be a great teacher. 

As frightened as I was, I knew that I needed to allow the darkness to teach me whatever it was I was meant to learn from this experience.  I knew that this was not happening to harm me but rather to guide me. During the dark times in our lives, we can choose to hide in fear and to keep ourselves so busy that we don’t have to feel anything. We also have another option and that is to walk straight into the pain, challenge, or fear.  We can go inward and if we can just sit still with things, profound changes can occur. 

For me, during this time in my life, when my vision left me for those six months, I chose to give up being in control.  I was frightened and I had a lot of bumps along the way but I allowed the darkness and the fear to be my teachers.  I learned to say “no” out of necessity and to give myself permission to no longer live my life trying to be some version, that I had created in my own mind, of what it was to be the perfect mom, wife, daughter, and friend. I could quite simply do the best that I could do and honor that. I could love myself despite my flaws and in fact, at times, because of them.

I have learned things in the dark that I never would have learned in the light, things that have changed my life in the most profound and remarkable ways.  The extent to which I learn to live in the darkness, I also learn to experience the light with all of its magical brilliance. So I can determine that I need darkness as much as I need light.

SO Simple Though Not Easy

I had the pleasure of beginning my day this morning by taking a Yoga Nidra class at The Mindfulness Life Center with a uniquely gifted teacher and beautiful group of men and women.  For those of you who may not know what Yoga Nidra is, it is a set of deep relaxation techniques that can lead you to a meditative state allowing the body to reach the deepest possible states of relaxation while still maintaining full consciousness.
After a few poses to loosen up the body in preparation for the practice, you are instructed to get as comfortable as possible as quickly as possible using whatever props you prefer.  I am quite serious about my comfort so I waste no time getting all cozy in my blankets, with bolster pillow to support my legs, pillow to cradle my head, eye pillow to soothe my eyelids, a few adjustments and I am ready to go! From that point on, the only instructions are to stay as still as possible and to remain awake.  No two sessions are exactly alike but the principles are the same in that we are guided to deeper and deeper states of relaxation using a variety of methods.  The hour passes by much too quickly and before I know it I am being led back to the present slowly and gently by the calming words of my instructor.
As I slowly come back into the room, I find my way to a seated position basking in the deep peace I have just experienced marveling at how something so simple can bring about such profound changes.  Often this is a time for sharing with one another about how the meditation went for each of us.  I look forward to this portion of the experience as much as the heavenly time laying motionless on my back because I am constantly learning ways to carry this experience out of the studio and into my daily life.  Today I heard my most favorite quote when the man to my right, still foggy from his hour of bliss, gently whispered,  "It just feels SO good. Thats all. Plain and simple".  He was so right! Plain and simple.....Mindfulness is so simple though not always easy.
When we allow ourselves to release and let go, we return to who we are at the core and we are then able to get a taste of the inner peacefulness that is always there.  The more that I practice mindfulness and tap into this inner beauty, experiencing just how good it feels, the more I want to be in that state throughout my days.  The challenge is to take what I practice in the safety of the center out into the world and still be able to harness that feeling no matter what is happening around me.
Who out there doesn't want to experience more peace in their daily lives?  "It just feels SO good.  That's all.  Plain and Simple".

Welcome to A Journey Through Mindfulness

Welcome to my new blog A Journey Through Mindfulness.  My name is Jennifer and I am excited to share bits and pieces of my own personal journey with living life mindfully with intention and awareness.  I will also be sharing posts about living with a chronic health condition and the many things that I have learned over the years which have allowed me to manage a condition, that can at times be challenging, in ways that have left me empowered and grateful for the lessons I find it teaching me along the way.
My own personal journey with Mindfulness came years ago while reading Jon Kabot Zinn's book Full Catastrophe Living after being diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis.  It has been a remarkable life altering journey of growth, exploration, and healing.  Now as a member and employee at a Mindfulness Life Center and someone who has always loved to write, I have decided to share some of my journey with those of you who will be interested in reading.
I welcome feedback from any of you interested in sharing as I hope to learn from you through this process of my own personal sharing.
Namaste!