Laura:

Hello. Hello. Welcome in. We’re glad to see some folks joining us for our wellness mini session. My name is Laura and I’m going to very briefly introduce our facilitator for today. So, again, welcome to our wellness mini session, The Mindfulness Map, A Journey of Connection. This session is hosted by the California Stronger Connections Technical Assistance Center. We provide support to local education agencies in California to foster safe, healthy and supportive learning environments and we’re really glad to be here today doing that in a sort of shortened version. So, I’m very, very excited to introduce our facilitator. This is Meade Williams.

She’s a licensed marriage and family therapist in California specializing in mindfulness based practices. And she’s currently the mindfulness coordinator with Tulare’s County Office of Education’s project Aware. Meade is passionate about supporting youth through their unique journeys while strengthening the communities that serve them. And in addition to her work with to Larry County Office of Education, she maintains a private consultation practice the Garden House Therapy. And we’re going to turn it right over to Meade to get into the practice portion of today’s session. Thank you so much.

Meade Williams:

All right, welcome everybody. Just a huge shout-out. Thank you Laura for the introduction. We are going to start really by jumping into practice, but just to take a moment just to offer up what I would like to have as an offering or agreement for our time together today, which is everyone who is joining to know that we have time, we have time right now to connect with ourselves, to connect with each other, and hopefully to leave with a new resource or a new model of how you may choose to integrate mindfulness practice in your day to day. I want to ask everyone first and foremost to take care of yourself. That means to engage and participate in our practice today at a level that feels comfortable to you. If that means completely leaning in and following along with each step all the better, or if that just means participating through observing and then maybe trying this practice or these practices out later, that’s all right.

Most importantly that you listen to yourself and only practice at a level that feels comfortable to you. And then just to know that while we have our minutes together today and some moments that we’re going to lean into that this support goes beyond these 20 minutes and that at the end of our time together you will be provided with my contact, a lot of information and links so that if you want to continue to explore, I’m engaging in mindfulness in this way or joining our map adventure, you will be more than welcome to do so. What I’d like to start with is just introducing how we’re going to practice, which not only will we do a mindfulness practice, and for many of you, you may already be familiar, mindfulness is a practice of paying attention to the present moment on purpose, with kindness, with curiosity and with non-judgment so that we can notice as much as possible about what’s going on in the world around us as well as our inner world experience, our unique experience of physical sensations, emotional ways, the qualities of our thoughts.

And so we’re going to put those together in a practice so we can really figure out what we want to do each moment, right? We want to take all of that information from the outside and the inside and use that in the present moment to make the best decision or the best choice we can make to move us towards our goals, to help us take care of ourselves, each other and our shared world. So, we will practice, we will process after each practice just a little moment to check in and kind of ask about what that experience was like, what’s the takeaway, the things that you noticed, the things that I noticed, the things that we can bring together to inform each other’s practices.

And then the third step is making a plan. All the skills and practices in the world and even knowing how they help us are not so meaningful if we don’t have a plan or some way that we’ve decided and committed to how we may integrate those skills throughout our day in just little ways. So, without further ado, mindfulness is not me talking about it. So, you’re going to hear me ring that bell for our first practice. Our first practice is called Let’s Catch Our Breath. And when you hear that bell ring, that’s just going to be that invitation to show up to notice wherever the busy brain or the wandering mind may be, and bring that awareness to this practice right now as you follow along.

As we hear that bell ringing, that’s just our invitation to show up. Remember that we can take time to find ourselves in a comfortable position. And so just taking a moment to maybe notice if there’s any way that we’d like to adjust before saying hello to our feet, we are catching our breath starting at our feet. Just maybe taking that moment to look down, see where your feet are, wiggle those toes inside of your shoes and then gently but firmly pressing those feet flat on the ground. Or if you’re sitting on the ground like me, just taking a moment to adjust to notice where your body is being supported from the ground under you. And then finding yourself in this comfortable position knowing that we’re just going to start by taking nice, slow, deep breaths in and nice slow deep breaths out.

Seeing where we might most easily notice the movement of breath in the body. If it’s helpful to do so, you might close your eyes or take that nice soft gaze down. And then breathing in and breathing out, knowing this is the practice, no judgment, just practice. Noticing the sensation of breathing, the movement of breath in your body. And if at any point you notice that the brain has wandered or you’ve been distracted by your own thoughts or things in the world around you, knowing that that’s all right, you’re not doing anything wrong, but just like a good friend, you can call that awareness back again, catching our breath, catching the movement of breath in our body as we breathe in and breathe out. Like the anchor on a ship our breath is an anchor to this present moment so that when the mind wanders like a ship wanders to sea, we can again use that breath one more time to bring our attention back to the present moment as we take those slow deep breaths in and slow deep breaths out. In a moment you’ll hear that bell ring again.

And when it does, I want to invite you to shift that awareness from your breathing and the sensations of breathing to just listening, listening to the sound of the bell until it’s no longer there or you can no longer hear it. And as that bell rings, if you have had your eyes closed, it’s a moment where we can open those eyes nice and slowly, really shake off that mindful practice. Our mindful bodies are strong and still quiet. And so shaking that off, if you’re like me and it’s hard to sit still for too long, or having a nice really big stretch and a hug marking the end of a formal practice, that practice catching our breath and knowing simple, one of the most foundational skills, knowing that we can find anchors in the present moment to help us bring our wandering mind back to the present where we have all of our power.

So, let’s go into a process, a few processing questions after that practice that I would want to ask you and encourage you that you would ask these questions to anybody that you’re practicing with, students and family alike. Asking ourselves, where did you most easily notice the breath in your body? And if you would like to share your responses in the chat, you are invited to do so to take that moment and think about how do you feel right now after that practice any changes from before or after. If you were going to choose maybe one or two words to capture your unique experience and what that practice felt like for you, you can add those to the chat. And then I’m actually going to ask Laura, Laura, as somebody I’m practicing with right now, thinking about that practice, where did you most easily notice your breath?

Laura:

I could feel it in my belly, sort of moving from my chest down into my belly as I breathed more.

Meade Williams:

Nice. And did your mind wander at any point during that practice?

Laura:

Yes, of course it did.

Meade Williams:

Absolutely. We can all raise our hands, you guys, I want you to know at the heart of the practice, and it’s so important for our students to know too. It’s not about not getting distracted sitting up on that mountaintop with nothing pulling our attention away. This mindful practice is to notice when our mind wanders because we’re building that capacity, we’re building that pathway in our brain that can notice when we’re distracted and bring it back. So, Laura, thank you for your honesty for showing up in mindful practice to share about, oh, my mind did wander. Did you happen to notice where it went?

Laura:

I was noticing sort of things going on outside of my space here, different noises and things that I hadn’t tuned into yet. So, it was a little distracting and a little bit like noticing. Yeah.

Meade Williams:

Wonderful. Because sometimes we’re distracted by outer world, right? The sounds, the birds. I noticed a fly came by, right? It’s all right. We are going to notice those outer world distractions and we want to stay aware of the world around us. And then also remember we can use that just like a bell to say, oh, I’m thinking about that noise out there now. And now I’m coming back to check in with myself and to catch my breath, this breath serving as an anchor again just to help us strengthen our ability to notice when we’re distracted and to come back. So, Laura, that’s an excellent example of processing. Oftentimes our younger students will be very eager to share about their experiences, and it’s an important part of the practice.

It allows us to practice mindful listening in community and what those we’re practicing with and really to learn from each other the obstacles that came up or the new strengths that we noticed as we continue to practice together. So, the last part of that first practice would be to plan. We know we have a mindfulness of breath practice. We can catch our breath, bring our awareness to notice the movement in our breath, to help us ground in the present moment. So, I would want to know from any of us out there who just practiced that knowing that one mindful breath brings us three benefits, lower cortisol levels, higher endorphins, everything feels a little bit like it’s going to be all right.

And that moment in the present, real time where we can check in on ourselves to make informed decisions on how to care for ourselves in real time and move through the day. So, I would love to know just one time where that might be a practice, not that you need 30 minutes or an hour or something else to put on your to-do list, but throughout your day is you’re already moving through the day, is there a time that you can think that using that skill would be useful and that you could weave that in to your daily routine already? Laura, I don’t want to put you on the spot again, but if you would like to share, otherwise I can offer up some other ideas that others have shared for planning.

Laura:

Well, I was just thinking this was a good reminder to try in the morning when the kids are running around and acting a little crazy just to center myself before I try and engage with that energy.

Meade Williams:

Absolutely. And I love that you chose a neutral time. A lot of times our first guess will often be like, well, when I’m upset I could use this to calm down and that can be effective. But it’s kind of like trying to pick up a hundred pound weight at the gym before we’ve done a lot of the little weight lifting. I highly encourage us all to remember that these little one pound repetitions throughout the day, whether that’s before the kids are there or when you’re walking into the office or maybe washing dishes, transitioning between classrooms or meetings every time, it’s like unplugging our system and plugging back in where we’re getting that physiological reset of knowing we do have time to check in and to catch our breath, to have those benefits, which then allows us to show up. And my message to all of the incredible educators out there is you are the curriculum, right?

Our embodied presence and ability to stay connected in the moment ends up being a vital piece of the puzzle of any mindfulness lesson that we may be doing. So, being mindful of time as it might be, I wanted just to take a quick one more practice so I leave you guys with at least two practices and then I’ll pass back over to Laura. So, in this practice, much like we found our anchor through our breath, this is also a practice about how we can connect to the present moment. This time fanning our connections through our senses. Not just the movement of breaths in our body, but we’re going to be trying to see about listening and touch, mindful touch. So, follow along when you hear that bell, knowing wherever our mind may be, it’s an invitation to come back and show up. We hear our invitation, that bell ringing.

If it’s helpful to move into a mindful posture or just find yourself in a comfortable position, taking a moment always to first catch our breath, noticing if we can feel the movement of breath in our body, and then fanning our connection to the present moment by shifting our awareness from the movement of breath to a touch point. So, when you hear that bell, moving from our breath to noticing, taking our hands, placing our hands together and just pressing, noticing heat or cool, smooth or rough, any of the sensations that may be present as we have a touch point, our hands touching. Again, moving our hands together, building that friction. You might have the mindfulness of sound, the soundtrack of this moment, hearing our hands, noticing again, changes in texture, temperature, all happening right now in the present moment. One more time ringing the bell, moving our awareness away from the anchor of touch to another anchor of touch in our surrounding environment.

If you are outside and have the sun on your skin or the breeze going by, the touch of your hair to your face or to where your body is being supported by the chair, just giving ourselves that moment to notice any physical sensations of touch connecting us to the world around us as we continue to breathe in then out. And then listening for that bell to bring us out of practice and connecting back with each other, shaking off that mindful practice, going for another nice squeeze. Knowing that is one of so many other practices that are there for us. Please take time to process. What are some ways that you may notice, touch or sound as another anchor to the present moment? And are there opportunities in your day where you could plan to weave that practice in as just another repetition, another way of building that capacity and sustaining mindfulness throughout the day to allow for real-time self-care. Thank you so much for practicing with me, Laura. I want to hand that to you with our last two minutes.

Laura:

Great. Thank you so much Meade for walking us through some of those practices and the idea of practice, process and then plan I think is just such a wonderful message. So, folks should see on their screens, there’s a very brief poll coming up in Zoom and I did want to share that Meade is happy to be connected with all of you. This is some different ways that you could be connected. She’s in Tulare County and part of these statewide webinars is to share really excellent practices happening among educators across the state. And thank you very much, Meade, for sharing with us. That QR code will take you to a slideshow that’s full of resources to stay connected, continue learning, continue exploring this mindfulness journey.

So, we encourage you to please go ahead and get in touch in any ways that feel right to you. And do stay in touch with our Stronger Connections Technical Assistance Center. This QR code will take you to that website where you can learn about some other learning opportunities that we’re offering for the school year ahead. And that’s a very simple email that you can get in touch with us. So, again, thank you everybody for spending some time with us. Thank you so much, Meade, for walking us through some practices and we hope that if you all are interested, you’ll continue exploring and you can stay in touch. Thanks so much everybody, and have a great afternoon.