Category Archives: Habits

What are You Feeding Your Mind?

For many years I have had a habit of listening to health, personal development, and spiritual audiobooks. It is a big part of my mindfulness practice. Back before you could download books to your phone with Audible, I used to purchase cd sets from Sounds True. I also love to listen to podcasts or interviews… Read More »

How Stress Can Undermine Your Goals

I came across this study in the journal Neuron about how stress undermines self-control and predisposes people to choose foods with “immediately rewarding taste attributes” (code for Ben and Jerry’s). Here is what the authors said in the abstract: “Our results indicate that stress may compromise self-control decisions by both enhancing the impact of immediately rewarding… Read More »

Led From Within

A main part of my job is to facilitate the development of a personal contemplative practice for our members, and to support them as they grow in this process. Ultimately, as people become more mindful, they are led from within themselves to make their own necessary choices toward improved health. As people become more mindful,… Read More »

Just Do This One Thing…

Engage (verb): to participate or become involved in. To assume an obligation. We often hear this in our groups “I had a bad week, yet I still lost a pound. I don’t know how that happened.” And then they go on to describe several instances where they made sligthly better choices, or choices that were… Read More »

The Importance of Daily Practice

Practice, noun: the repeated exercise in, or performance of, an activity or skill so as to acquire or maintain proficiency in it. A foundational tenet of our program is that in order to change habits, a person must have “a practice.” We borrowed the idea of a practice from the Eastern traditions of yoga, meditation, and… Read More »

How to Make Your Health Goals a Priority

One of the most common problems we see in our groups is not having enough time. People’s lives are filled to the max, and sometimes overflowing. Times are tough. We frequently hear people say they are “stretched thin,” “putting out fires all day,” “don’t have time to breathe,” and “pulled in all directions” — and… Read More »