by Nathalie Edmond PsyD, RYT-500

It’s the new year, new season.  The world invites you into refocusing your energy and creating resolutions or goals or intentions.  Aren’t they all really the same thing; it's just how you approach them?  I love the freshness of January or any new season really.  It is a time to make a commitment or promise to yourself.  You can go down the path of intensity and self criticism if you are less than perfect in achieving your goals or you can see it as information. Perhaps the goal was too big, maybe not right for this time, maybe it doesn’t align with how your nervous system is talking to you. What if you picked an intention instead of a goal? What if you focused on a value you want to deepen or be more congruent with. It could be your guide for a season or the year.  If we focus on values and intentions there is nothing to fail.  An example could be if you choose to focus on health this year or season.  Maybe you meditate on health throughout the year.  See opportunities for healthier choices? See where it is difficult to have health and be curious about why that is.  A resolution or goal might focus on losing weight or going to the gym. You can see how you can not accomplish the goal of losing weight or going to the gym which might lead to disappointment and giving up on your goal a few weeks into the new year. What if we make small incremental changes in our life or move more towards radical acceptance or a sense of ease or contentment, reconnect to our natural rhythm rather than what we think we should do and be.
 
I am inviting you into deepening your relationship with meditation.  A meditation challenge has a tone of goals and you are either successful or not. An invitation is just opening to curiosity about how this may fit into your life and as you practice meditation noticing what arises.  Explore the different ways meditation can show up in your life.  There are so many different practices out there to help support you.  Perhaps you need a few minutes a day of silence or being in the flow of some activity you love.  Maybe you want to step onto your yoga mat and do some stretching, intentional breathing, a restorative pose, or sun salutations.  Maybe you love the sound of music or chanting.  I was leading a seminar a couple of months ago and I asked the therapists in the room what they mindfulness meditation as and this is some of what they said.
What is mindfulness?  What is meditation?

• Awareness and attention to the present moment without judgment
• Purposeful attention to the present moment
• Being aware of ourselves within our body and all those body feelings
• Inner wisdom
• Attunement to current present moment and self in the present moment
• How and what core mindfulness skills (DBT version of mindfulness)
• Doing things one mindfully in the moment
• Nonjudgment; doing things effectively
• Observing, describing, using all five senses
• participating fully in the moment
• Meditation is a way to get to mindfulness
• Deeper level of consciousness
• Focus on internal processes as things come up
• Take a deep breath
• Noticing patterns
• Focusing and refocusing
• Settling
• Turning towards resistance and discomfort; leaning into whatever arises
• Allowing yourself to be vulnerable
• Letting go of control/noticing strategies for control
• Openness
• Tapping in
• Play
• Exploring
• Practicing gratitude
• Being in the flow
• Noticing parts of self
• Cultivating compassion
• Emptying the mind
• Gently redirecting
• Just noticing
• Refocusing
• Building awareness
• Noticing the way the mind wanders or explores
• Celebrating the fluctuations of the mind
• Saying yes to life
• An invitation

I love how Lorin Roche, a meditation teacher who focuses on the rhythms of meditation in everyday life, invites us to find a practice that we look forward to.  He normalizes that having a to do list while meditating is an act of love. When we slow down what most needs tending to rises to the surface.  Perhaps we can heal by addressing what rises to the surface.

If we approach meditation as a practice we can't fail.  We begin again every time we show up.  Every cycle of breath. Perhaps turn your attention to the process, the patterns rather than the outcome.  We learn from the past and we move forward more mindfully, maybe with more wisdom and clarity.

Learn more about meditation here..  Check out one of the guided recordings or the 7 day meditation invitation on the youtube channel. Every day we explore a different type of mediation practice. Want to move as part of your practice; join our free gentle yoga class the 2nd Friday of the month at 7 pm EST.  Register here.  Want to do yoga on your own time? Purchase our library of yoga sessions by contacting us.  Sign up for our newsletter to keep up with our offerings.  Learn more about the team at Mindful and Multicultural Counseling in Ewing, NJ.
 
May you be well. May you feel nourished.  May you have not only enough to survive but enough to thrive.

by Michelle Gerdes, RYT-200

​​I can’t remember exactly when I first heard the word “yoga” but it was probably sometime in college in the mid ‘90s. I wasn’t sure what it was all about but I recall being intrigued by something that seemed to be both a spiritual and physical practice. After buying “Yoga for Dummies” (yes, that’s an actual book) and flipping through it, the demands of school and life took over and my interest waned. It wasn’t until I was in my mid-30s that yoga called to me again, and this time I made room for it and its beautiful and bountiful gifts.
I was an editor in a busy and stressful New York City newsroom. I had just come out of my second postpartum depression, with the help of talk therapy and my incredibly supportive husband, and despite “having it all” on paper—prestigious job, nice house in the suburbs, two cars in the driveway, two healthy children, a loving partner—I felt as if something wasn’t right. I wasn’t happy. I wasn’t living my best life. I was living someone else’s idea of what a good life should be.
Sound familiar? It’s reported that about one-third of Americans are experiencing some type of emotional disturbance right now—especially amid Covid-19: depression, anxiety, extreme stress, and with that related conditions like insomnia, feelings of isolation, digestion issues, lack of patience or joy.
At this point I knew I needed to make a change but I had absolutely no idea what that change would look like. And stepping out of my comfort zone felt too scary. It was around this time that I noticed a yoga studio just a few miles from my house. The funny thing is I had passed it hundreds of times and didn’t realize it was there.

I signed up and as I settled in for my first class the teacher did her best to make me feel welcomed, but I’m an anxious person and, to be honest, that first class was an interesting combination of uncomfortable and magical. As I moved my body and felt my breath, the teacher encouraged us to be present in the moment and listen to and respect signals from our bodies. Through this breath, movement and listening I began to catch a glimpse of the peace and joy I had been missing and a true connection with myself. Over time, the discomfort began to melt away as I learned ways to calm my anxiety, trust myself, and recognize and celebrate my innate worth. The changes I needed to make began to become clear. The fear of stepping into my idea of a fulfilling life began to melt away. I discovered myself. I was there all along, but the gifts of yoga allowed me to uncover her and celebrate her! This is yoga.

Simply put, yoga means to “yoke,” as in to join together. We join movement with breath, we join the head with heart, and we join the body with spirit. If you can breathe you can practice yoga. Yoga isn’t about being able to touch your toes or stand on your head. It’s about exploring and practicing its many tools—including breath, movement, and meditation—to help you befriend yourself, your emotions and your nervous system. It provides practices and guideposts to help you lead your best life.
 
If you are looking for ways to spend more time in a state of wellbeing, if you are seeking tools to help you cope with stress, if you want to map out a route to leading a more fulfilling life, I invite you to join me for the four-week series Yoga for Emotional Wellbeing sponsored by Mindful and Multicultural Counseling in Ewing, NJ. This class will provide a safe space to explore various yoga tools and use them to befriend and join together your unique body, mind and spirit.  Find out more about yoga and mindfulness resources here.  Check out the intro video below with Dr. Nathalie Edmond and Michelle Gerdes or sample a beginner class.
 
Namaste!