Mindfulness for Stress Reduction | MBSR in San Francisco with Augusta Hopkins

Mindlessness

This story has been circulating around the “inter-webs” for a while now, mostly as a joke pointing at old age, but I think that at any age, we can relate to this and see it as mindlessness. I decided to wash my car. As I start toward the garage, I notice that there is mail […]

The Five Awarenesses ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

The Five Awarenesses Be aware that all life is one and that happiness is not an individual matter. By living and practicing awareness, we bring peace and joy to our lives and the lives of those related to us. The First Awareness We are aware that all generations of our ancestors and all future generations […]

Mindfulness and the Brain by Philippe Goldin

This presentation at the 2010 Wisdom 2.0 Conference by Philippe Goldin Pd. D, clinical neuroscientist at Stanford University, is a great introduction to the scientifically documented benefits of Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction. via Mindfulness and the Brain by Philippe Goldin: Wisdom 2.0 Conference on Vimeo.

Wild Geese, by Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves. Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine. Meanwhile the world goes on. […]

Mindfulness Meditation Timer

There are more and more smart phone apps designed to encourage mindfulness practice.  Insight Timer is one of the most popular.  In addition to I-Qi it is a wonderful timer to support formal sitting practice. I learned of i-qi clock (pronounced Eye-Chi ~ qi as in qigong) from one of my MBSR students in 2011 […]

Bells of Mindfulness

There are so many bells of mindfulness…car alarms, honking horns, the  Tuesday noon “emergency siren,” church bells, stop lights anything can be a reminder for us to come back to ourselves, come back to our breath and to check in.  We might even STOP (Stop, Take a breath or three, Observe how we are doing […]

Being Peace ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

This is one of the first books by Thich Nhat Hanh I ever read. I was in Vietnam, it was 2006, I had just spent ten days at a silent meditation retreat in Thailand at Wat Suan Mohk. The simple practices in this book, Being Peace, changed the course of my life.  An audio file […]

Peace Is Every Step ~ Thich Nhat Hanh

This is the first book of Thich Nhat Hanh’s I ever read.  It was instrumental!  Thich Nhat Hanh offers simple guidance to help us gain peace through cultivating awareness of everyday life. From here I read Being Peace, and three days later, I was living with 200 young nuns in the Central Highlands of Vietnam […]

Bhavana Society | Bhante Gunaratana

Bhante Henepola Gunaratana is the founding abbot of the Bhavana Society. Born in rural Sri Lanka, he has been a monk since age 12 and took full ordination at age 20 in 1947. He came to the United States in 1968. “Bhante G” as he is fondly called by his students has written a number […]