Note From Louisa
 
What a sense of relief as we finally feel the onset of spring, the warmer breeze, the last of the snow (one hopes!). I feel the release of a long held breath I didn't know I was even holding.
 
I laugh with friends as we anticipate the coming months, knowing that we will soon be complaining that it's too hot and yearning for cooler and less humid air.  It's so amusing to be a human being!
 
It is our nature to always be seeking, to never be satisfied with what is. And it can make for a very frustrating existence... always striving for things to be other than they are.
 
Eleven years ago, as my good friend Paula was nearing the end of her life, I remember her telling me "we waste so much time and  energy on the things that don't really matter. Trying to control the things we can't". Such wisdom in those words...
 
This is where our practice best serves us: to find the joy and appreciation in what is, just as it is. To approach our lives with gratitude and love, to embrace the winter, the humidity, the failures and the triumphs with equal measure.
 
To relish all it means to be a human being.
Happy spring!
 
With compassion,
Louisa

Ongoing Contemplative Practices
Workshop: Sitting Meditation Groups
Workshop: Mindfulness Study Group (see below)

Workshops & Events
Hosted at The Center for
 Mindful Living


Feldenkrais Practitioner and Mindbody Coach Susann Suprenant is back in town to share her knowledge on somatics and managing chronic pain.



The Chronic Pain Puzzle: Finding the Missing Pieces 
Evening Talk ~ Friday, April 26, 2019 ✦ 7-9pm No Charge
 
Susann Suprenant, a Mindbody Coach for Chronic Pain Recovery, will share findings from current pain science research and the latest chronic pain recovery programs that help patients/clients "unlearn" their pain. Susann will help us explore how pain education plus somatic, reflective, and mindfulness practices work together to help our clients (and ourselves) recover from persistent pain and related mindbody symptoms. The evening will include lecture and time for questions and answer. No need to register for this workshop.  


The Art of Mindful Movement: Increasing your Awareness Through Movement with The Feldenkrais Method®
Workshop ~ Saturday, April 27, 2019 ✦ 1-4pm
 
Making "the impossible possible, the possible easy, and the easy elegant."   - MOSHE FELDENKRAIS

In this half-day session, Feldenkrais Practitioner Susann Suprenant will share how The Feldenkrais Method works to enhance our mindbody connection. We will explore how to bring more awareness to our habitual ways of moving and to expand our self-image for greater ease and efficiency, creativity and resilience. The session will include a combination of demonstration/lecture, guided movement, and discussion. Awareness Through Movement lessons are gentle enough for all ability levels and challenging enough for all who seek greater sensorimotor integration and a heightened sense of well-being.
 
Tuition for this workshop is $45. Click here to register.


Communication Teacher and Author Oren Jay Sofer
to Share Teachings and Community in Omaha
 
***PLEASE NOTE DATE CHANGE***
 
The Art of Mindful Communication:  Living Your Values 
Evening Talk ~ Friday, June 14, 2019 ✦ 7-9pm at Brownell Talbot School (James Library)

Oren Jay Sofer will help us explore how our contemplative practice can provide a foundation for bringing more compassion, clarity, and connection into our speech and relationships. Oren will be offering teachings from his new book, Say What You Mean:  A Mindful Approach to Nonviolent Communication. The evening will include a guided meditation, lecture, and time for questions and answer. For those who wish to explore the topic further, see below for a daylong training on this topic.


Say What You Mean: Creating Meaningful  Conversations  
Daylong Retreat ~ Saturday, June 15, 2019 ✦ 9-5pm   at Brownell Talbot School (James Library)

In this daylong session, Oren will share the foundations of an integrated approach to skillful communication. We will explore how to bring more mindfulness and care to our communication - our listening, speaking, and thinking. The day will include a combination of guided meditation, discussion, and interactive practice. This workshop is appropriate for all levels of experience; NVC will be taught at an introductory level.

Register for one or both sessions here or email [email protected] 


Ongoing Offerings
 
Mindfulness Study Group
Facilitated by Laura Crosby
First and Third Sunday of the month from 4pm to 6 pm
 
Join us as we begin A Path with Heart, A Guide through the Perils and Promises of Spiritual Life by Jack Kornfield. Considered an essential classic that many return to again and again as part of their mindfulness practice, A Path With Heart offers inspiration and teachings for living mindfully, intentionally, authentically and compassionately - or as one reviewer put it, with "full-tilt compassion."
   
The Group will read together, so there is no pre-reading or homework involved.  We will read, discuss and practice mindfulness meditation based on the teachings of the book.  Copies of the book are available for use in the study session or to check-out.    
 
This Mindfulness Study Group is freely offered. There is no charge to participate. Drop-ins welcome at any time. While this selection is based on Buddhist mindfulness teachings, the Study Group as a whole is not religiously affiliated.

Featured Article

Lucky Mud

by Laura Crosby
 
"And I was some of the mud that got to sit up and look around.
Lucky me, lucky mud."
-  Kurt Vonnegut


The Mindfulness Study Group recently started Jack Kornfield's, "A Path With Heart, a Guide Through the Perils and Promises of a Spiritual Life."  

As we explore the "path" Kornfield shares, I experience the chapters as gardens of teachings and stories about mindfulness and life. There are blooms of peace, inspiration, and wisdom. Each time I visit, I see something new and I am changed. Yet it's not romantic or idyllic. It is honest and real, with a heartfulness that experiences and allows all that life brings. Here, all is present and abiding.

I was struck at our last session by the insights on "the preciousness and brevity of life." Since then, this has been a recurring theme each day. Here is how:

We Croak - In the spirit of the adage, "to be a truly happy person, one must contemplate death five times daily," the We Croak app shares quotes that inspire daily contemplations of death. These inspirations against the backdrop of a Path With Heart have infused my meditation and mindfulness with simple reflections on the dear and fleeting nature of life. 

Far from the Shallow - This reflection has helped me wade into a deeper, more embodied understanding and honoring of my own mortality and the beauty of life - an understanding well beyond a shallow intellectual understanding.  To go pop culture and quote the Lady Gaga-Bradley Cooper song Shallow, there are times when I feel "far from the shallow now."

Room for a View - Rather than dark or gloomy, these reflections pave the way for a clear seeing and savoring of life. It affects one's view of the world, life and self. It crystallizes one's deepest values and intentions. In the ordinary is now seen something extraordinary, in difficulty is known some equanimity, in pain compassion, in confusion clarity.

Letting Go - From this place of reflection, understanding and intention, it gets easier and easier to naturally let go of the unnecessary and unwise in life - as they say "abiding without clinging."
 
Please join us for the Mindfulness Study Group the first and third Sunday each month 4-6pm. Freely offered, drop-ins welcome, and no registration necessary. We read together and discuss each chapter. Books are available for use in session.
STAY CONNECTED
The Center for Mindful Living is a space for healing that hosts independent practitioners and educators coming together to create an Urban Sanctuary in the middle of the city.