As the hosting team prepares for the Art of Hosting – Vermont training that’s starting this Thursday, we’ve honed in on the theme of creating healthy and resilient communities. The group that’s gathering has begun to have email conversations around this topic which has prompted me to think deeply about the questions of what is More…
Tag: yoga
Beginner’s Mind
I don’t know if I’m getting older and feeling my age, if my chronic injuries need special attention, or if part of me is just getting “lazy”, but lately, after 20 years of practicing yoga (with a 5 year stint as a teacher), I increasingly find myself drawn to beginner yoga classes. In these “easy” More…
Returning to the familiar
Having just returned from a holiday visit with family, I’m well aware of how unsettling it can be to break out of the routines that are part of the normal patterns of our day-to-day life. To help manage these kinds of disruptions, my yoga teacher this morning reminded us of the benefits of returning to More…
What do fear of public speaking, trauma, and yoga have in common
I had a conversation with a colleague today about how much I incorporate yoga practices in the coaching I do with my public speaking clients and it reminded me of this article, which I wrote back in 2008. I thought readers of this blog might be interested and so here it is: In 2008 I More…
Lessons from a lint filter, water bottle and electric toothbrush
Somehow, as much as I’m trying to slow down and simplify my life, I always seem to be in a hurry. Every time I do my laundry I’m reminded that hurrying through my tasks isn’t the most efficient way to get things done. I always seem to want to quickly empty the lint filter in More…
The yoga of public speaking
I’ve been a yoga practitioner for more than 20 years. At one time I taught yoga. I now take every opportunity I can to study with different yoga teachers from different traditions. I do so to expand my experience of myself and to extend my ability to return to a state of inner quiet while More…
Speaking with both feet on the ground
Several weeks ago I gave a workshop on this topic with the intention of, for the first time, beginning to clarify what I mean by the phrase “embodied presence”. Here is some of the thinking that went into the workshop. Where we put our attention, that’s where energy goes. This is probably the core principle More…
Contemplative practices reduce anxiety
Several weeks ago, I gave a talk with Dr. Sara Lazar, neuroscientist and researcher at Mass General Hospital, a Harvard teaching hospital. Sara’s research is centered on changes in brain structures that result from meditation and yoga. Her results are very interesting! Basically they show that regular awareness (or contemplative) practices like yoga and meditation More…
Paying attention
I was in yoga class this morning doing a posture in which I was paying most attention to the position of my upper body. While in the posture, I suddenly became aware that I had no sense of what my left leg as doing… it was just hanging there without any awareness on my part More…
Find the haven of your back body…
The ability to step back, not get caught up in the fray, see the forest for the trees, is key for leaders in all capacities. When the chaos of an emergent crisis grabs everyone’s attention, it is so easy to jump in with both feet. All our attention gets pulled to the details of the More…