I’ve often blamed my red hair on my quick-to-anger tendencies and passionate responses. In reality, I learned the behavior from my addict mother and stepfather. Emotional dysregulation was their default setting. It wasn’t really their fault — they were doing the best they could with their own inheritance of trauma. As the oldest of six children, I learned at a young age to override my own body’s messages, in order to function and survive the emotional storms around me. But as an adult, I knew that I didn’t want to continue living on an emotional rollercoaster, if at all possible. 

Over the past twenty five years, I’ve learned a lot of skills to help “regulate my nervous system” so that I can show up in my relationships, parenting, and work with more emotional resources. What I’ve learned is that the devil is in the details. It’s not about meditating for hours a day (though that’s great, if you have the time!), or “finding enlightenment” at a retreat (though also cool to do.) It’s really about my response to feeling overwhelmed by housework on the weekends and wanting to blame my husband, or my response to my daughter at bedtime when I’m tired and impatient with the drawn out dance that is bedtime toothbrushing and face-washing and “I have to pee one more time.” It’s about my response when I’m sitting in traffic, or waiting in a line when I perceive that I’m running late. It’s about my response when I’m feeling not good enough, overwhelmed by responsibilities that I’ve chosen. It’s about my internal response when I perceive failure on my part — like when I decide to eat a bunch of chocolate before bed after “eating healthy” all day. It’s about the response to the tiny and not-so-tiny daily stressors of life. 

I call this work Embodied Mindfulness. It’s a set of skills I’ve been studying intensively over the past year, and the difference it’s made in my life has been profound. Transforming a potential family blowup over a Friday night ballet class (“We committed! We paid for it! Exercise is good!”) into a family giggle-fest on our bed that my daughter still talks about weeks later. Transforming a moment of blame toward my husband about not “doing things right” when I feel irritable to a moment of vulnerability where we get to pause and connect emotionally, with greater intimacy. Transforming a system at work that was causing me stress into a more workable situation for all parties involved, leaving me to wonder, “why didn’t I make this shift sooner?!” Transforming a low-grade, subconscious internal narrative of “I suck. Not good enough. Not enough.” into “You’re doing the best job you can right now. Gentle, gentle. You’ve got this.” These transformations have profoundly, positively impacted my marriage, my relationship with my daughter, my practice as an acupuncturist and as a leader with my employee team. 

Because of its transformative effect on my own life, I want to share this skill set with others. This is not another meditation course — it is a method that teaches immediately applicable, life-in-motion mindfulness skills. All you need is the desire to live with more presence, a desire to have some choice about your emotional reactions, a desire to transform tiny (and big) daily upsets with mindfulness. 

Join me for a 4-week online course to learn the practical skills of Embodied Mindfulness. In this first of a four-part series, you will learn immediately useful skills for applying mindfulness as an embodied practice. This is mindfulness in motion: in parenting, in partnering, in working with others and in relationship to yourself. Not as a separate activity, but a skill that can be directly and immediately applied in the relationships and activities of your daily life. 

What is embodied mindfulness?

Simply put, is a skill of noticing and responding thoughtfully. This course helps to foster a deeper connection to the wisdom of our bodies so that mindfulness isn’t an abstract concept, but rather, a dynamic feedback system between our body’s wisdom, our thought processes and engagement with other human beings and situations. 

In this first of a four-part series, you will learn immediately useful skills for applying mindfulness as an embodied practice. This is mindfulness in motion: in parenting, in partnering, in working with others and in relationship to yourself. This is mindfulness as a skill that can be directly and immediately applied in the relationships and activities of your daily life.

1. Upset is Optional

Learn how to be more intentional in your responses with the stressors that come your way. The goal is not to eliminate every source of stress, but to develop more resources for responding to stressful situations and circumstances. 

2. Mood

Learn how to choose your mood. What if we weren’t at the mercy of the ups and downs of our moods, but we could choose how to respond, thoughtfully, with care and consideration for ourselves and the people in our lives? 

3. Breath as dynamic rest 

Learn how to immediately connect with mindfulness using breath. No separate activity required, only your lungs and intention. The perfect skill to cultivate during overwhelm, irritability, stress, depression and anxiety. 

Course Format

This is a virtual course. We will meet weekly over the course of four weeks this autumn via Zoom videoconferencing. The first portion of the class will be an overview of the lesson, and the remainder of the course will be discussion-based, focused on gaining a deeper understanding of how to apply the skills directly to your life as it is today. 

The Zoom calls will be recorded and you will be able to access the recordings afterward. Lessons on each of the skills will be through the Teachable platform, where there will also be a forum for asking questions and connecting with participants around the lessons. 

Scheduled live meetings will take place:

Tuesday, January 12, 2021 – 12:00 pm to 1:00 pm CST
Tuesday, January 19, 2021 – 12:00 pm to 1:00 pm CST
Tuesday, January 26, 2021 – 12:00 pm to 1:00 pm CST
Tuesday, February 2, 2021 – 12:00 pm to 1:30 pm CST*

*Note that the final class meeting will be 90 minutes in length and will be an integration of all the skills we have learned. 

Can’t make a particular time?

No worries! All the calls will be recorded. If you can’t make a scheduled live call time, you can still enroll in the course and watch the recording when convenient. 

Why now?

The timing of this course is to offer the foundations and how to apply them BEFORE the holiday season comes. Whether in person, or virtual, patterns of reactivity tend to flare during this time of year. Our four-week course concludes the week before Thanksgiving, just in time for navigating the holiday season with ease, intention and practical mindfulness skills! 

Course details

This course is limited to eighteen participants. 
The cost is $267. 
Registration closes January 5, 2021 at 11am CST.

Part Two of this four-part series will begin in January 2021. Participation in all four parts of this series is not required, but recommended. You will benefit tremendously from doing all four, and you will benefit greatly from doing Part One!

What are the Benefits of Embodied Mindfulness? 

• More patience: with circumstances, with family members, with yourself, with work. 

• Greater clarity and ease of decision making, ways in which to move forward, and exactly what the next steps should be, in any situation. 

• Being “more present” with yourself, your people, your life. 

• Better health, born of improved communication with your body.

• Improved relationships all around. 

• More nuanced and skilled communication.

• More energy — no more wasting effort where there is no flow. 

• Greater sense of purpose.

• A deeper sense of “more resources” to meet the demands of your life.

• More ease and flow in all areas of your life.

• No more being drained by others, no more “giving too much” and then feeling like you need a break to “recharge your batteries.” Moving through life with plenty of resources, at any given moment, because you aren’t a machine that runs out of juice. 

• A greater sense of self-acceptance, inner peace and self-compassion.