Mindfulness Flowers

A lovely Mindful experience for the third year now is the flower fields in Carlsbad. What a delightful experience to walk with Steve and Cricket in the flowers on a sunny day. The yummiest strawberries were at the end of the walk to enjoy and share with Natalie .

My final summary of the conference. A few notes of day three from my perspective as a attendee who is blind with a guide dog. There are 800 attendees and on this day I begin to get comments on the good behavior of my dog, Cricket. Day three she has established her reputation as being a quiet listener (sleeper) and guide at the conference.    I'm not looking at the camera in this picture but Cricket is so cute and ready for the camera. 

During this conference, I reflected for a few moments on returning for that PhD.  At this point, the reflection came and went ... I really am doing what I love and even with additional schooling would continue to do the same thing so its not necessary but the idea pops in and intrigues me.  Hearing about the latest research has me thinking - what would I do my dissertation on.   If you are reading this Steve, I love you and know that you would support me in this endeavor - that fills me with gratitude, however, the intensive studying is not really appealing at this time.   

What again is mindfulness?  Dr. John Briere states mindfulness is a learnable set of skills, involving ongoing moment-by-moment focused awareness and openness to the here-and-now, without judgment and with acceptance. 

Love this quote from Dr. Sylvia Boorstein about yoga:

I realized from yoga I could feel better without anything else in my

circumstances & world changing.

We spent a morning on Loving/Kindness for ourselves and others.  She stated our mind feels good in kind mode.  Peace.  We can't make the world be peaceful, but we can inhabit the world peacefully and feel peace.  It was a beautiful morning.  

Some of the benefits research suggests of even 30 minutes of daily mindfulness meditation are:

ability to prioritize and manage tasks 

voluntarily focus on specific information

alertness to environment

limits the influence of distracting thoughts

immune enhancement 

In professional context, practicing mindfulness allows

one to be fully present for another.

A victory for the day:  Shannon, Kim and I ran almost 10 miles this am getting ready for the SLC 1/2 next Saturday.  This just makes my heart sing and

my legs a little sore.