Tag Archives: #legacyinthemaking

Mindfulness

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mindfulness

I began learning about mindfulness many years ago under incredibly tumultuous circumstances well before it became the catch phrase of the decade.  It’s been tossed around by everyone it seems but the people I trust most to toss it around are Louise Hay , Jon Kabat-Zinn and the staff at Green Mountain at Fox Run.

My definition, the one I’ve been honing for several decades, is “stay in today”.  I know it’s pretty broad and I’ve narrowed it down quite a bit myself but in essence if you stay in today so much angst can be alleviated.  You know how big a fan I am of angst, distant cousin to drama and worry.

I started with affirmations and learning the power of the mind body connection.  I suffered terribly from anxiety, and hopelessness, and bad luck and on and on.  My turning point was a gift from my best friend as I was lamenting the guardian angel energy that kept himself out of trouble she suggested it might not be guardian angel energy it might be my energy…   What? I had energy?  Turns out I have extraordinary energy.

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I’ve been working diligently on and with mindfulness for the last decade.  My health has improved, my life has improved, so many good things come my way that continue to surprise me and I live in gratitude.

Enter a wonderful weekend in Vermont to validate the things I’m doing right and hand me on a silver platter more ways to improve my life.  Ways to banish the cortisol!!!! Evil hormone that it is, maker of belly fat and thief of sleep, can be counteracted with mindfulness. Of course there’s more to it but if you start with mindfulness, if you stay in today, in the moment, and look up from the damn phone..l mean engage with your life, you will be amazed at what happens and what you’ll see.

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One of the biggest ah ha’s was mindfulness eating.  How the hell does a foodie not live in that space all the time?  When I’m eating something fabulous I’m definitely mindful but my problem has always been not being mindful to my hunger cues and getting to the sugar drop stage of no good can come from even opening the refrigerator.  I know you’ve seen it, you keep reminding me…

For the last month I’ve been practicing listening and following the cues and hopefully you can attest that there has been an improvement.  No bail money has been required, not once. What a relief, to us all.

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I began meditating in earnest many weeks ago and continued the practice while in Vermont.  It’s one of the methods they endorse for most everything.  There was a fabulous chair at the end of our hallway that called me each day.  Finally I listened and though it was on the way to one of the outside entrances, no one bothered me, it was sunny and warm and light and quiet.  If I had my way I would have hauled that chair home with me.  Just sayin.

walk mindfully

Mindfulness walks have always been my thing.  I don’t take my phone, I don’t listen to anything but the world around me.  I love hearing the birds each morning, I love the sounds and smells coming from open windows and I never want to miss someone calling my name to say hello.  The only time I’m not fully engaged is when I have my camera, then I’m focused on the world around me in a different way.  Its old school, you have to look through the lens and your vision is narrowed to within the frame.  I’ve been known to wander through fairs and markets and gardens and crowds with my camera and I am so grateful for what seems to download.  I see things through a completely different filter and it continues to surprise me.

Rooting yourself to the earth is yet another way to practice mindfulness.  I’m sure I have an unfair advantage being a gardener.  I love the smell of the earth after the rain, I love the digging, the planting, the weeding, hell I even love hauling the damn boulders out of the back shade garden.  I know…

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Being mindful allows for a different perspective, it’s non-judgmental, you can imagine the pain others have that make them act the way they do.  It  doesn’t condone bad behavior but it creates a better understanding at times.  It’s a weight lifted, not everything is yours, you don’t have to attend every argument you’re invited to and you can begin to be kind to yourself.  You can learn how fabulous you really are and you can begin to weed out those who don’t believe in you and your new way of thinking.

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I believe that mindfulness comes best to those who serve.  Themselves first, then serving others brings a continuance of good coming to them that you won’t want to give up.  I’m pretty sure the only thing that you’ll be giving up is the cortisol contamination, the excess worry about things that mostly never happen and the abuse you give yourself for what you believe you caused or created when really you simply weren’t paying attention…Now you are and you will begin to see the power that is you.  I remain ever grateful for the ability to stay in today.

Movement

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Once upon a time a long time ago when I lived in a third floor walkup with only on street parking, played racquetball at lunch and danced all night I was incredibly fit, shocking I know. The importance of movement at that time was irrelevant, I was having a blast.

Fast forward several decades, I leave it to you to figure out just how many decades, I am round.  No doubt you’ve noticed.  Through complacency, tumultuous times, yo-yo dieting and a lack of motivation I have become…round.  I go back and forth between how the hell did this happen and it is what it is.  No it’s not…and I know exactly how this happened.  Now what to do?

Enter the best kept secret in Vermont, I’m pretty sure they really don’t want to be the best kept secret so look here, and life as I know it is changed forever.  Not overnight, not in the gym, not in boot camp, but in real life, my life.  I am beginning where I am, what a concept.

LynnAnn Covel is the dynamo leading the fitness department.  She is trained in several areas of expertise and has been at Green Mountain at Fox Run for the last 26 years, well here you read it:

An energetic and inspirational leader, she heads up our fitness department, lending her own special touch and motivational skills to help women learn to love physical activity. Through her personal training and L.I.F.E. (Lifestyle Integration for Empowerment) program, LynnAnn provides personalized fitness programs and strategies needed to facilitate changes that make all the difference in “taking it home and making it work.”

Here’s the thing about LynnAnn, you would never know that she’s been at this for the last 26 years.  She brings a freshness to each day, she has an amazing sense of humor that goes right to the crux of what you think you want to use as an excuse and her pragmatism leaves you thinking, well shit of course I can do this…

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Add to that the now famous LynnAnnisms and you’re pretty much set:

Your pace is THE pace.

Something is better than nothing.

I’m doing this for me and no one can take it away.

I’ve been playing around with functional fitness as a way to incorporate movement into some of the many things I do all day.  Things like walking the dog, really walking the dog.  She’s not that happy about it especially on the weekends when we continue up the hill instead of making the right. Things like stretching when we get back using the porch steps, she sits on the step above where I’m stretching and gets a cookie at the end.  She’s beginning to like that part.

I found myself watching my Nutriblast whirring around for the minute it takes and thought I’ll do pushups against the sink while I’m waiting.  I do squats to get the clothes out of the washer and dryer (front loaders).

I took my first yoga class at GMFR and loved it.  Imagine looking out a huge cathedral window at Okemo as the sun sets and the candles scattered around the room come into their own as your first class. I mean really is that a tough act to follow or what?  Best I can do is sun salutation right out of bed. But hey, something is better than nothing, am I right LynnAnn?

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She stresses finding something that will work for you on a personal level, something you enjoy, some way to make it work.  We had a bit of a mindfulness walk one morning and I couldn’t help equating that to my photo walks.  When I’m behind my camera I’m so busy looking around that I lose track of time.  God knows how many steps later I feel like I got my fitness in without even noticing.

We practiced ti chi one morning which I thoroughly enjoyed.  I took a ti chi class several years ago and really enjoyed it then too but didn’t quite know where to take it after that.  I could never remember the sequences so it fell by the wayside.  Fast forward, lot of that going on, through the magic of Amazon Prime I’ve downloaded several ti chi classes through TIVO.  It’s all just magical this universe I’m living in.

Growing older is inevitable but aging is optional said someone recently, damned if I can remember who, but that resonated with me.  That along with something LynnAnn said about saving for your physical future needs to go hand in hand with saving for your financial future.  After struggling to recover my financial future I can certainly see the benefit of recovering my physical future as well.   My gratitude runs deep…

On our final day in Vermont we took a walk in the woods, it was the only time I felt it appropriate to bring out my camera so enjoy some of these wonderful last moments spent in Okemo State Forrest.

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Suffice to say…

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2015-04-05 12.08.46-5This was a day filled with tradition and family; the kind of family that is fashioned a bit from friendship and a bit from inheritance.  We gathered to share a meal that was part Easter and part Spring.  We ate the traditional foods in a different way, we picked.  We put it all on the table and just sat around and shared.  2015-04-04 13.14.56

2015-04-04 13.15.07-2We shared food and stories and laughs and concerns and wine and sweets.  We had the windows open for a time and the air smelled of fresh soil and renewal.  The music was jazzy and the exhale was immediate.  Just like Sping, love was in the air.

Rusty Cook

They say that Spring is a time for new beginnings but those new beginnings don’t come without old endings.  We lost our much-loved Rusty this week leaving Mocha to figure out life without him.  Our hearts are broken but if my dear Toti Nonna can begin to show the love again I am certain that little Mocha will too.

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“Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.” Maria Robinson

See Ya When I See Ya

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Never say goodbye, because saying goodbye means going away and going away means forgetting…Peter Pan

I don’t remember when I replaced goodbye with see ya when I see ya but it works for me on so many levels. Except of course when I use “you should live and be well” which is just karmic protection from the wrath of saying you’re dead to me which is a huge goodbye. I know, it’s a thing.

See ya when I see ya seems an insurance that we will be together again. It rolls off my tongue automatically usually combined with thanks so much. It’s a kind of a leaving now but already planning the next time we’ll be together prayer.

My Aunt Millie used to say, see you all of a sudden. That was a popular line in my family, I think all the Aunts said it but I remember Aunt Millie saying it the most. Then almost every Saturday she would show up at our house from Astoria with stuff and stuff and food and more stuff it was like Christmas every time she came. I remember her so vividly to this day and try very hard to model much of what I do after what she did. She was funny, opinionated, active into her nineties by dancing and singing, a fantastic cook and may have been the original slap you so hard you think you got a kiss woman. I like to think I take after her. My mother sighs at that sometimes, they had a questionable relationship as do we…

I was reminded of just how much I use this line this past weekend while visiting Buffalo to see my niece Kate in an amazing performance, see my dear Summer Sister Kyle’s new home and spend time with her family. It’s a long ride with a huge payoff, it speaks of ordinary elevated, it feels like home to me whenever I visit. I am grateful to have them in my life, grateful to sit side by side with my Summer Sister chopping vegetables, grating cheese, drinking wine, dancing around the kitchen or enjoying a performance. Her home is beautiful but to me she is what makes it so.

Gather a family together that folds you in after all the years of short visits as if you lived around the corner and you can’t help but want to see them when you see them again. It’s a comfort gift that never gets old even thirty eight years later. They’ve seen it all with charm and generosity, I adore them and love being around them. As you can see here.

2015-03-29 13.29.33-2It was the perfect transition into the last week of March when a decade ago the short visit was reversed to attend my father’s funeral. All manner of things changed after that goodbye, many of them for the better and perhaps that’s when I decided that saying goodbye wasn’t what I ever wanted to do again. Today was a perfect March day, I’m sure tomorrow will be too because the azure blue sky was magnificent then and has been each year for the past decade to remind me that there is beauty in the darkest days if only you look for it.  How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard…Winnie the Pooh.

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