The other night I had the pleasure, no the honor, to hear Thich Nhat Hanh at the Warner Theatre in Washington DC.

As I’ve mentioned previously, “Thay”, as his students call him, is a Vietnamese Zen Buddhist monk. He was born in 1926 and was exiled from Vietnam in 1966 and founded Plum Village, a Buddhist community (sangha), in France. He is a poet, an author of over 100 books, a peace and human rights activist. He was nominated by Martin Luther King in 1967 for the Nobel Peace Prize.

His life’s mission has been to “ease suffering” through mindfulness, loving speech and deep listening.

For two hours this 85 year old man, spoke to a packed house that was so quiet, so engaged, that you could hear a pin drop.

Thay spent a great deal of time talking about the importance of “going home”, of learning to listen to our suffering inside. That touchy feely feelings stuff that most of us run away from.

He said, “We have to understand our own suffering in order to understand the suffering in the world.” And that” by understanding our own suffering it will enable us to cultivate compassion and understanding and that understanding and compassion – the healing energies – will heal and transform us and the world.”

Mindful breathing is the way “to come home”. The monks and the nuns at Plum Village have a bell on their computers that dings every 15 minutes to remind them to stop, to breathe mindfully and to remember they have a “body”.

                              Breathing In I am aware of my whole body.                                      

Breathing Out I know my body is truly alive.    

Pretty powerful stuff.

So what does all this have to do with Intentional Health?

“Keeping your body healthy is an expression of gratitude to the whole cosmos – the trees, the clouds, everything.” Thich Nhat Hanh, Touching Peace: Practicing the Art of Mindful Living.

Drought: 1) a period of dryness 2) an extended shortage

It has been four weeks since I’ve posted anything. I can’t blame clutter this time for the drought or anything else for that matter.

I’m busy. I’m a multi-tasker. I’m a doer and I love to write. So why the drought?

Something happened about five weeks ago but rather than blame something or someone, I want to thank Amanda Owen and her book, The Power of Receiving. This little gem of a book is worth its weight in gold if you’re stressed out or not getting what you want or deserve.

Like I said, I’m a multi-tasker and always on the go. What this means is I spend most of my time in what Amanda calls Active States. Persuading, Doing, Analyzing, Talking, Thinking, Evaluating, Controlling and the list goes on. Sound familiar anyone?

“When you rely almost exclusively on activity, your will is overtaxed. There is no replenishment time. It’s easy to see this in the person who is constantly on the go. Eventually the body, emotions or the mind tend to rebel. The body may become sick, the emotions frazzled or the mind scattered. It’s like trying to keep a bunch of balls in the air all the time. It’s exhausting” (p31)

For the past month, I’ve been spending as much time as I can in Receptive States. Meditating, Allowing, Observing, Listening, Welcoming, Feeling Grateful. And of course, feeling Feelings, those touchy feely, sometimes painful things that most of us try to ignore.

While this past month may be a drought of posts, it certainly has not been a drought of writing, exploring and gratitude and growth.

www.ThePowerofReceiving.com

I had the honor of knowing Marlin Smith Perkins and yes, I can say, she was my friend. In fact, she was everyone’s friend.

At the service earlier this week honoring her life, the poem below was in the program noted as one of her favorite readings. You may have seen it as it’s been circling the internet since 1999 as a plea (and hoax) from a (fictitious) dying girl. In fact, the poem is real, written more than 20 years ago by David L. Weatherford, a child psychologist from Tennessee.

Whatever the origin, for Marlin the message rang so true that her friends and family knew how important it was to her. In fact, it was how she lived her life.

Life is not a race. Do take it slower. Hear the music before the song is over.

I can not change all those lost moments with my family or my friends but I can change how I move forward. What better reason do you need to Stop, Look, Listen and Just Breathe?

Slow Dance

Have you ever watched kids on a merry-go-round?

Or listened to the rain slapping on the ground

Ever followed a butterfly’s erratic flight?

Or gazed at the sun into the fading night?

You better slow down. Don’t dance so fast. Time is short. The music won’t last.

Do you run through each day on the fly?

When you ask, “How are you?” Do you hear the reply?

When the day is done do you lie in your bed with the next hundred chores running though your head?

You’d better slow down. Don’t dance so fast. Time is short. The music won’t last.

Ever told your child, “We’ll do it tomorrow”? And in your haste, not seen the sorrow?

Ever lost touch, let a good friendship die ‘cause you never had time to call and say, “Hi”?

You’d better slow down. Don’t dance so fast. Time is short. The music won’t last.

When you run so fast to get somewhere, you miss half the fun of getting there.

When you worry and hurry through your day, it is like an unopened gift…thrown away.

Life is not a race. Do take it slower. Hear the music before the song is over.

I had the pleasure and honor to participate in a silent retreat last weekend. Yes, silent. Yes, last weekend i.e. 48+ hours! One of my yoga teachers organized a retreat and boy was it a retreat in every sense of the word.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary definition of retreat includes: the forced or strategic withdrawl of an army, the act of withdrawing (as into safety or privacy, retirement or seclusion), a place of refuge, seclusion or privacy, a period of retirement for prayer, meditation or study.

The weekend was everything and more than the definition. Even “withdrawl of an army” applied to me. An army of chores, of projects, of “shoulds”.

When was the last time you had no caffeine, no cell phone, no computer, no TV, no food, no talking, no music, no books, no clocks for 48 hours? Believe me, it was a first for me on most every count.

So what do you do when you have no distractions to keep you running around all day? Yoga, breath work, meditation, writing, walking and a de-toxing juice fast with the most amazing array of fruits and vegetables.

The weekend was an opportunity to become aware of thoughts and feelings, to observe them and to even accept them. It was an opportunity to be still, to stop, to look, to listen, to give thanks.

The Am Kolel Retreat Center and Sanctuary in Bealesville MD is an old farm house with a labyrinth, acres of gardens, hiking trails and benches and chairs scattered inside and out to take pause. It was a perfect setting for a withdrawl of the senses (pratyahara).

What’s the takeaway from what must seem to some as total torture? Silence (and stillness) really is golden – a precious time that doesn’t need to be filled with idle chit chat and busyness.

The weekend was exhausting and exhilarating but more than anything the weekend reinforced my belief that carving out even 10 minutes of your day for quiet time for breath work or meditation may be the best thing you can do for your health and your mood.

I’ve never written a book review and I haven’t read any reviews of this book.

I am simply writing from the heart. If you are a multi tasker, if you have too many “shoulds” in your life, if you ever doubt yourself then give yourself the gift of this book.

Seeking Peace: Chronicles of the Worst Buddhist in the World by Mary Pipher (2009).

I knew Mary Pipher as the Midwestern psychotherapist and well known and in demand author of 1990’s best sellers, Reviving Ophelia and The Shelter of Each Other. I still remember her writing about the importance of sitting down to family dinner without the distractions of TV (this was long before cell phones and texting) no matter how busy and over scheduled you are. What I didn’t know is that she dropped off the radar for years after running in to a brick wall.

I would be surprised if you don’t find something of yourself on almost every page of this memoir.

We are all so hard on ourselves. We are all so over scheduled and spread too thin. We are all regretting something we did and worrying about what we need to do next. If you still don’t get it about the importance of being “fully present”, if you still haven’t made the time to have a regular meditation practice, this gem might help.

We are what we pay attention to. Sadly, most of the time we are not attending to the world or ourselves. Psychologists estimate we have  60,000-70,000 thoughts a day, 99% of which are more or less what we thought yesterday. Our habits run our lives. Most of the time we are phoning it in. (p217)

Not all minutes are created equal and only a few become moments. We tend to greet every minute with demands such as: I want this. I don’t want this. I want more of this. I want less of that. We have ideas about what our minutes should or should not be. We want sunshine or rain, quiet or company, work or rest.  We are such yearning organisms. Yet, there is a sense in which many of us are fighting for our lives. We are struggling to be present for our own experiences. (p212)

Do you want to rush past Joshua Bell? (p212)  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hnOPu0_YWhw