I stood and watched the 10-year old girl release the trapeze bar and float freely, high in the circus tent for a few moments, before her expert trainer gripped her arms and swung her back to the platform. She’d been practicing for a week, and this was her performance for her parents and other guests, me among them.

Even with the safety net below, letting go was an act of courage for that young girl, and it took a week of training to get the skills needed to go with the courage.

Do I need courage to let go of things in my life? You bet I do. How about you?

What would it take, say, for me to let go of distracting thoughts so that I could contemplate my own death.? (I don’t know when it will come, and I am not sick, but I do know it will come some day.)

Letting go of any challenging idea takes skill and courage. It means learning to drop the defenses long enough for the mind to clear out thoughts that are quite tenacious. It means developing courage to face the emotions that the busy mind is trying to keep out of awareness.

This probably is not how you understand the purpose of….

Motherhood, Mothering, Mother … this (upcoming) Mother’s Day, how do you relate?

Is this the journey toward Motherhood? The 28-day cycle of possibility-anticipation-disappointment, on repeat. Some days filled with positivity in the process and others consumed by its negative feedback.

Is this the shift of Mothering? The emotional juggle of unconditional love, tough lessons, sleepless nights, or guilt over being “enough”. Finding yourself balancing thoughts of gratitude for these precious beings while also looking for time and space to prioritize your own needs.

Finding peace and comfort in the Journey

8-Week Mindfulness Workshop

Tuesday Evenings: May 11, 2021 – June 29, 2021, 7p-9p (ET)
Cost: $750 *Financial assistance available to those in need*

Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) is an empirically based treatment that combines mindfulness and meditation with cognitive behavior therapy to help work with negative thought patterns and our bodies' automatic responses to them.

While out on an errand, I was caught in a mindful moment. I was initially struck by the bright blue detailed staircase, then the mural depicting several swimmers gracefully navigating the waves, and finally at the end of the block, illuminated by the sun overhead, the sign “Rebirth” hung, so poignantly affirming the moment.

I found a shift in perspective. The somewhat meaningless errand along an often travelled path, became something more…enhancing the moment and lightening my mood.

Resilience is the ability to respond to adversity, something we all need in these challenging times.

Check out this workshop offered by the Mindfulness Center of the Cambridge Health Alliance, a teaching hospital of the Harvard Medical School.

Starts Wednesday, April 21, 5:30 PM EDT - 8-Week Workshop

Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy (MBCT) is an evidence-based educational program shown to prevent depressive relapse and reduce symptoms of anxiety and depression. MBCT combines the practice of mindfulness with practical tools from cognitive therapy.

In MBCT-R, you will learn skills for responding to the anxiety and emotional challenges arising from our current situation. Through the practice of mindfulness you will learn to engage

By Angela Babin

This is a true story that I used to recount to my young patients undergoing medical treatment for very serious illness. I first told this to a set of identical twin brothers – one of whom was very sick with a blood cancer – while the other one was very healthy and athletic. This was during my years working at a major children’s hospital in New York City as part of the ancillary health care team. (My young patient was challenged with cancer – but he resonated with this recounting of serious injury.)

The True Story

There was a set of twin brothers named Rodrigo and Rogério. They grew up on a farm in Brazil and were extremely active. When the boys were just 11 years old, Rodrigo was involved in a terrible accident in which he was pinned underneath a tractor for hours.

By Michelle Morrison

In This Meditation, Recorded The Day After The Start Of A New U.S. Administration, we take time to envision a future of safety, peace, and happiness for our fellow Americans.

By imagining a bright future for our neighbors, we may come to see that our happiness is not separate from their happiness.

Finally, we reflect on what steps we might take towards making that future a reality.

This was offered as part of the weekly "Free Friday Mindfulness at Noon" sessions. To join, visit: https://learnmindfulnessnow.com/free-...

-Michelle Morrison Michelle’s Website

SEE THE VIDEO: CLICK “READ MORE”

“The quality of our day is directly related to the quality of our thoughts”

By Annie Shackelford

A powerful statement that had me thinking for awhile; how does this relate to my own experience? Am I spending too much time on any one thought, unaware of my current experience? Now, a year (of unimaginable events) later, I am once again reflecting on this message. Our ability to connect with awareness to a thought is one of the best ways to ground ourselves to the present. Once grounded, we then have a choice in following a thought or letting it go.

By Angela Babin

I have described to clients “My Grandmother’s Good Pearls.”

When she was in her 80s, and struggling with aphasia – she and I would walk together at an outdoor flea market in New York. She would hold up items to me and point out the good things – like a correctly rolled hand-stitched hem on a vintage scarf or – the way that the silk thread was knotted in between each pearl on a necklace.

…. these knots prevent grave loss and accidents. Imagine your strand of pearls suffers a break. In the case where there are no knots, all of the beads cascade away following the first bead that got wrenched off. Some of the beads may even get lost as they roll away, on the floor, on the street.... However, with a knotted strand - in time of accident, break, injury – exactly a single pearl is lost.

Let is apply this image to our experience with mindfulness…..