gentleness

A BLIZZARD of thoughts and emotions swirls around each of us, obscuring the true nature of mind, but if we learn to sit tall and let the blizzard happen around us, and if we do this over and over, we come to know the blizzard for the emptiness it is, and we begin to see through the snow clouds in which we've become ensnarled.

space & the ice cream van

"When the space element is balanced in us, there is room for life;

whatever arises can be accommodated."

~Tenzin Wangyal

As if the constant HAMMERING and SAWING every day for the past two months weren't enough, an old busted-up ice cream van would come and park in the middle of it all and BLAST the most horrible noises. The tune wasn't anything I recognized, a cross between JOHN JACOB JINGLEHEIMER SCHMIDT and SHE'LL BE COMING ROUND THE MOUNTAIN, with a lot of CAR HORNS, WHISTLES and HAND CLAPS thrown in, repeating in an infinite loop. And between each repeat, the recorded voice of a woman saying HELLO. Then the song would start up again. Of all the noises — the HAMMERS, the NAIL GUNS, the POWER SAWS, the BEEPING SOUNDS the big trucks made when they went in reverse, the WHISTLES, the CAR HORNS, the HAND CLAPS — it was that single spoken HELLO that sent me over the edge.

tea and crumping

Went to Dripping Springs, Texas yesterday (just west of Austin) to lead two Peaceful Habits groups at a brain injury rehab center there.

the opposite of umbrella

photo: jetheriot

WHEN YOU FEEL a painful emotion, your instinct is to recoil. It's painful, so you pull away.

     But it's exactly at the moment when an emotion is most repugnant that you have the greatest opportunity to know it. The suffering is in the resistance — like when it drizzles, and we armor ourselves with unnecessary umbrellas. We recoil from the rain before it has even touched us. To learn to close the umbrella, to relax, to let the water find your face — it wasn't as bad as you thought it was going to be, was it? — that's the way forward. You feel it. You let it happen. You walk through the rain of it.

the first wednesday

photo: jetheriot

It takes only a few minutes for a meditation instructor to teach a person the mechanics of meditation: how to sit, how to bring the mind to the breath, etc. That's not what our first Wednesday together is about. Today the lesson is rhythm.

baby mockingbird

eye of the salamander, neck of the giraffe

PEOPLE CAN FOCUS so intently on a small area of space that they become blind to their larger surroundings.

big red robe

I BREWED Big Red Robe oolong today for my Peaceful Habits group, a tea often reserved for honored guests in China. “We’re honored guests,” one of my patients said. I said, “Of course you’re honored guests!” The tea was rust brown and smelled like toasted coconut, and when we drank it, it seemed to land squarely in the center of our hearts with a warm and mellow glow, like we were being wrapped in a big red robe.

peacefulness app

My app for iPhone and iPad -- it's called Peacefulness -- is now available on the App store. It's free at the moment, mostly because I haven't taken the time to change the price yet. But I'm going to change it soon, so get it before it's $0.99!! And drop me a line if you do download it and use it. I'm eager to hear how it's working out in the world.

daily peacefulness practice

photo: jetheriot

earth day

images courtesy audubon society

To celebrate Earth Day I gave a bird quiz to the residents at Touchstone. These are all birds that can be found on the campus. The residents tried to match the name to the picture of the bird.

peaceful habits e-book

Kindle edition available here on Amazon

ebook description

Meditation isn’t for everyone. It’s true. As a neurologist who specializes in brain injury and stroke rehabilitation, I can assure you. Half of my patients are too confused or too disoriented to meditate. They’d forget the instructions as soon as I finished giving them. And the other half are too distractible. Their attention spans are so short they can’t sit still, much less sit still and meditate, for more than a few minutes at a time. I’m not exaggerating when I say that a formal meditation practice is beyond the reach of virtually every person I treat. It’s too complex. My patients need something simpler. That’s what this small book is about.

invisible mockingbird

"Today we're going to learn how to notice," I said. "Today we’re going to practice noticing.” Then I stopped talking and we started practicing noticing right away. Since you can't practice noticing with nothing, I made a pot of coconut tea, and we used it as our something-to-practice-noticing-with. 

peacefulness takes practice

photo: jetheriot

what's a prescription?

Today when we hear the word PRESCRIPTION we automatically think of a prescription for medication, but doctors can prescribe other things as well.

app description

I have a friend who would rather do just about anything besides meditate. She says she tried it once and it made her want to pull all her hair out and run screaming down the hallway. Maybe you can relate. Or maybe you have a short attention span, and the thought of sitting still for more than a few minutes intimidates you. As a brain injury doctor I treat a lot of patients with short attention spans and profound memory impairments. The truth is, meditation isn’t for everyone. Maybe it isn’t for you. That’s why I made this app.