Thank You Simple Meditations

Simple Meditations

learn how to meditate using these easy instructions

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We offer meditations that are simple, natural and easy to do. The goal of these meditations is to help you to relax and flow more easily with life, so that you can live with greater authenticity, spontaneity and ease. We have a brief description of each meditation below and a link to click for full instructions.

Our Meditation Guidelines page contains suggestions which can help support your practice of these meditations. If you are already meditating and finding it difficult, visit our Difficulty Meditating page.









Breath Meditations

Many meditations involve focusing on the breath. We offer two variations of breath meditations.

Breath Awareness Meditation

This is perhaps the easiest way to begin meditating and you may never need to look further. In this meditation, you bring your awareness to the natural flow of the breath, noticing the details of the sensation of breathing. When the attention wanders, it is gently brought back to the breath.

Stillness in the Breath Meditation

This is a variation of the Breath Awareness Meditation which can be done when you find that you are able to follow the breath for periods of time. It develops awareness of inner stillness. Read instructions for our Breath Meditations.


Nature Meditation 

This meditation is done outside in natural surroundings. It helps to enliven the basic intelligence of nature in our awareness and physiology. Our being resonates with the sight of a flower, sound of birds, feeling of the breeze. These experiences wake something up inside of us, and help to set our lives into a more natural rhythm. Nature lovers have discovered this secret without ever studying meditation! (Read instructions.)

Walking Meditation

Walking meditation can be just as profound as sitting meditation, and has the advantage of bringing the meditative experience into our activity. In addition to being relaxing, it allows you to be more present in your body and in the present moment. The simple experience of alternating steps with the left and right foot naturally helps create a meditative state. (Read instructions.)

Meditation-in-Action — Taking it Easy!

Our Meditation-in-Action is a way of meditating while remaining active. It can be a very relaxing experience. It can also bring insights into how we resist the natural flow of life and help you to let go of that resistance to experience activity in a more natural and spontaneous way. This meditation can be for personal growth, or simply to relax. Usually this meditation will be most effective if you can take at least an hour to do it. (Read instructions.)

Grateful for Living in the Roaring Fork and Colorado River Valleys

Thank you Henrie House Vacation Rental

Follow the R’s for a Mindful Meditation Experience

by Frank Forencich on November 7, 2013

 From Google's "Labeled for Commercial Reuse" Art Soul

Note: the following is from the upcoming book Beautiful Practice: A whole-life approach to health, performance and the human predicament. (estimated publication: February 2014)

The faculty of voluntarily bringing back a wandering attention, over and over again, is the very root of judgment, character and will… An education which should improve this faculty would be the education par excellence.

William James

 For the purist, the ideal meditation experience is simple: shine the light of your attention on your breath and keep it there. When your attention wanders, bring it back onto the breath-target with compassion and without judgment. (To put it in the simplest possible terms, this form of meditation is sometimes called “aim and sustain.”) This is the foundation practice for developing attentional stability and is the basis for other, more advanced forms of meditation.

There are many meditation teachers of course and many variations on this theme. Here is one that you might find useful. It’s built on a series of prompts, each word beginning with the letter R. This makes it simple and easy to remember.

This meditation works best when led by a teacher. Students set up a relaxed position and settle in. Once everyone is comfortable, the teacher reads the following script in a calm voice, pausing and editing as desired:

Relax your entire body… every cell, every system, every joint, every limb, every organ, every vessel. Relax the core of your body, your abdomen and your torso. Relax into your breath.

Release your expectations and your narrative… Release your explanations and your commentary… Release your predictions, your calculations and your speculations… Release your ruminations about the past and your worries about the future.

Relinquish your attachment to thoughts, ideas, outcomes and points of view… Relinquish your defenses and your judgments…. Relinquish your opinions and your attitudes.

Receive your experience of the present moment, and all that comes with it… Feel what you’re feeling; experience what you’re experiencing… Allow your body and your spirit to be permeable to the world… Receive the insecurity, the uncertainty, the ambiguity and the emotion of the moment… Receive the blessings, the love, the kindness and compassion that has come your way…. Receive the totality of your life in whatever form it takes. (Note: see Rumi’s poem The Guest House.)

Return your attention to your breath.

Repeat this sequence as many times as desired. As you’ll discover, this guided practice is a form of relaxing work; it guides us through the process with an active, reversed effort. This sets us up to stabilize our attention and further develop our mindfulness.

Try it and let me know how it goes. AWESOME SOURCE:

The Ultimate Gluten-Free & Vegan Thanksgiving Recipe Guide

SOURCE

At MindBodyGreen, we see no reason the holidays should be a time for you to compromise your eating habits. You can have a happy AND healthy Thanksgiving, without excluding any friends or family members!

The surest way to silence critics of your dietary choices is by filling their mouths with delicious food! That's why we asked an all-star squad of chefs and cooks to send us their favorite gluten-free takes on classic Thanksgiving recipes — many of which are also vegan — so that you can enjoy the holiday without sacrificing taste or adding stress.

Click through the links below to put together the ultimate gluten-free Thanksgiving meal:

CLICK TO MINDBODYGREEN FOR THE RECIPES!

The Community of Rifle, Colorado

Awesome video of our neighbor down-valley Rifle, Colorado.In recent years the citizens and City staff have done an amazing job building community and revitalizing town.

MFHC – Eagle location, coming soon.

SOURCE: Mountain Family Health Centers

 

U.S. Health and Human Services (HHS) Announces New Healthcare Access Point Award for Eagle County, Colorado. 

On November 7, 2013, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced $150 million in awards to support new community health center access points across the country. Eagle County, Colorado, received one of the awards, under the auspices of Mountain Family Health Centers (MFHC). MFHC, working in partnership with Eagle County, Vail Valley Medical Center, the Eagle Care Clinic, and countless key community partners, will receive $650,000 annually to expand access to comprehensive primary health care in Eagle County.

“Our mission is to provide high quality, integrated primary, behavioral, and dental health care in the communities we serve, with special consideration for the medically underserved, regardless of ability to pay,” said MFHC CEO Ross Brooks. “This award will enable Eagle County residents to obtain the high quality, affordable health care we all desire.” 

MFHC has 120 days to implement the new health care access point, which will be located in the current Eagle Care Clinic location at 320 Beard Creek Road, Edwards, CO, 81632. MFHC’s Board of Directors is committed to bringing its organizational strength and comprehensive array of culturally and linguistically-competent services to Eagle County, with a service plan designed to address unique needs, improve health status and decrease target population health disparities. When fully operational, the MFHC Eagle Care team will serve more than 3,500 patients each year.

“The Vail Valley Medical Center team has worked diligently for two decades to create an important health resource in the Eagle Care Clinic and I am very pleased that the work we started will continue to grow under Mountain Family Health Centers,” said Doris Kirchner, President and CEO of Vail Valley Medical Center. “Patients will see added services including dental and mental health care and greater access to financial assistance.” 

“This outstanding award amount is due to the hard work of many partners over many years,” said Eagle County Commissioner Sara Fisher. “We’ve made access to health care a priority and we know our community – and most importantly our community’s health – will benefit from this resource.” 

For additional information, contact MFHC CEO Ross Brooks at 970-928-1609 or rbrooks@mountainfamily.org.

For full Press Release, CLICK HERE.

Love On!

Thank You True Nature Healing Arts

Russian Subway - Exercise for a Ticket to Ride

As a promotion for the upcoming 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics, Moscow subways have added machines that calculate your squats, apparently 30 earns you a ticket to ride.

Glenwood Moms for Moms Giving Back

‘tis the season & Glenwood Moms for Moms is giving back...

Join us this holiday season as we come together as the strong community of Moms that we are, to help out those in need. We have two organizations that we will helping this year:

Advocate Safehouse Project & Cakes Helping Kids

Both organizations will be speaking at our November Meet & Mingle to share their stories & at our December Meet & Mingle we will prepare all the packages.

Please email me or call 719.207.3653 if you have any questions or would like to meet up to donate items-- we will soon have drop off locations in town too. 

Join us at www.GlenwoodMomsforMoms.com today!

Advocate Safehouse Project

• A local non-profit  that strives to 'promote healthy relationships free from violence through education, advocacy, empowerment and safehousing.'
• Glenwood Moms for Moms will be putting together gift bags for the women & their children.  
• Many women who go into the safehouse used to pamper themselves and wish they could get back to that by painting their nails, wearing makeup, perfume and really just pampering themselves. 
• Children & Adolescents  are also part of this program so with our gift bags we can include toys or books (these items can be gently used)
• In addition to the women & children the Safehouse is continually in need of items that are necessary to maintain a household such as laundry soap, fabric softener, dish soap, paper towels, toilet paper, aluminum foil and saran wrap, tupperware, cleaning supplies.

Cakes Helping Kids

• Join Mom Member Janille Hudson & her family in their vision to help kids in need. They have chosen to help Primary Children's Hospital in Salt Lake City, this holiday season by sending them medical play dolls to give back to a program that has helped their family in the past.  
• Their goal is to be able to provide 100 or more dolls for Primary Children's and they will need our help to do this. The dolls are very simple to sew and can be made very inexpensively & kids LOVE stuffing them!! 
• You can find the pattern & read more about Cakes Helping Kids by CLICKING HERE . 
• These dolls can be dropped of at 3112 Hager Lane or at any our drop off points (to be announced)!
• If you have any questions for this project you can contact Janille at  801-702-7600.

How Solar Energy Works

How Solar Energy Works, cool primer from, honest view of problems and benefits and potentials Hank and SciShow

How True

Thank you Words of Wisdom

Carbondale Community Food Co-op

Carbondale Community Food Co-op

Source: Carbondale Community Food Co-op

"The Carbondale Community Food Co-op is dedicated to providing as many local, natural options as possible for our community's health as well as supplying other popular organic products and bulk foods right here in our town."

"We are a member-owned natural food co-op-- everyone is welcome to shop! Support local food and the local economy!"

RFWellness loves this Carbondale, Colorado resource be sure to visit the newsletter and read the "Consider Becoming a Member" information at the bottom of the page.

Check out the Facebook page here: Carbondale Community Food Co-op

Check out the Newsletter here: Newsletter

Thanks Grow Food, Not Lawns

Why Massages Really Do Keep You Healthy: A Cardiologist Explains

SOURCE: MINDBODYGREEN
 

We've all seen it on TV or in a movie.

The scene is tense and the patient is doing poorly. The doctor calls out urgently. Retractor! Scalpel! Suction! Massage Table!

Wait a minute .... Massage table?

Did Dr. House ever scream for body oil?

The good news is this: if you enjoy a massage, you just might be helping your heart and arteries stay healthy and youthful.

Scientific studies have shown benefits of massage therapy for insomnia, multiple sclerosis, anxiety, cancer pain, post-operative recovery and other conditions.
 
Several recent studies point to benefits of massage therapy that help heal the heart.
In 2008, researchers studied 263 volunteers who had a massage for 45 to 60 minutes. Average blood pressure fell by 10 mg Hg and heart rate by 10 beats per minute after one treatment. That's about as much as you might get from prescribing a new blood pressure medication for life!

Earlier this year, 50 people with mildly elevated blood pressure received a 15-minute massage, three times a week for 10 sessions, while a similar group just relaxed for the same amount of time. Blood pressure fell at the end of the sessions and remained lower for several days—but only in the massage group.

Another study this year examined 8 women with high blood pressure who'd had an hourlong massage each week for four weeks. At the end of that period, their blood pressure fell by 12 mm Hg systolic (top number) and measurements in the blood reflecting inflammation (specifically VCAM-1 if you like science) fell significantly. A control group just rested for the same amount of time and had smaller improvements in the same measurements. The drop in markers of inflammation is intriguing and suggests massage therapy may have a body-wide healing effect.
 
Why might massage therapy result in improvements in measurements of cardiovascular function?
Reductions in salivary and urinary levels of the stress hormone cortisol have been observed in several experiments in humans. In contrast, urinary levels of the stress hormones epinephrine and norepinephrine were not seen to fall during several studies.

Bottom line: not yet completely known and studies remain to clarify these pathways.

Is it time to chuck your blood pressure medication? Throw away your magnesium, CoQ10 and taurine blood pressure lowering supplements? Forgo your plant-based diets full of phytonutrient-rich leafy green vegetables and arginine rich pine nuts, arugula and watermelon?

No, it's clearly premature to consider massage therapy on par with those approaches. Furthermore, there are no studies showing a reduction in heart attack, strokes, and heart related deaths—and likely never will be due to the costs of such research projects.

However, given that tens of millions of people in the US alone grapple with high blood pressure, massage therapy can join acupuncture, yoga, meditation, and Tai Chi as complimentary approaches to maintaining optimal vascular health.

Buddha said that “to keep the body in good health is a duty, otherwise we shall not be able to keep our mind strong and clear.”

Maybe this is the week to schedule a massage treatment to move toward that goal?
 
Photo Credit: Shutterstock.com