Archives for posts with tag: mindfulness

Talk Radio

December 21, 2015 //

Parents often tell me that their children are “very verbal”. Typically, this means that their child talks a lot. Sometimes, it also means that their child has a creative way with language or that he or she is particularly bright. The children who fit the latter description, also tend to talk more than average.

My first and last negative report card comment was in kindergarten, “talks during rest time.” I am verbal. I talk a lot. I like to think that I have a lot to say. Whether I have a lot to say is debatable, but what I believe is a quite objective truth is that my mind has a lot to think and that a lot of those thoughts are verbal. There’s a lot of talking that goes on in my head. No worries, people! It is my voice that is doing the talking.

There are a lot of advantages to having a busy verbal mind. I have a quick sense of humor. I am good at observing and solving problems. My thoughts are useful in my writing, in my interactions, and in my daily contemplation.

Sometimes, however, I can’t get it to stop. My thoughts are worried and frenetic. They keep me up at night. At other times, they are relentlessly busy conveying boring but mindsucking information. I generally dislike Talk Radio. Talk talk talk. Going nowhere. Taking up space where meaningful existence could occur.

At many times, the most meaningful existence is rest. It’s slowing down. I love the holidays. But the hustle and bustle amid the dark drizzly days of the northern latitudes can be difficult. Tonight will be the longest night of the year. There will be about 8 hours of daylight tomorrow. We have 16 hours of daylight on our longest day. If you tell me it makes no difference, I would guess that you live at the Equator. I get tired when it gets dark. During the holidays, there is a lot to do during the lowest energy time of the year.

You’d think during this time of year since my body slows down that my thoughts would, too. You would be wrong, I’m afraid. Although the Talk Radio in my head does not seem to require much energy to produce, it certainly takes energy from me.

The holidays are not the best time to take on a campaign for changing my habits. But I did just that when I decided to complete a self-directed course on Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction. The current formal mindfulness meditation is the body scan. The body scan is just that. It’s a guided meditation during which I shift my attention and awareness to different parts of my body. The particular scan I am doing takes 32 minutes.

An advantage of the body scan, compared to other formal meditations, is that it can be done in bed. My Fitbit has recently confirmed that I am a very restless sleeper. Consequently, I often awake not feeling altogether rested and happy to stay in bed to do the body scan. I’ve been doing the daily body scan practice for over a week now.

At first, my thoughts constantly interrupted the words of the recorded voice on the body scan. This has been such an issue in the past that I decided against doing guided meditation for nearly three years after first giving it a try. It was like an exercise in voices interrupting one another, mine and the voice of the recording. This time, I decided to give this another try.

My young cats, Leeloo and Basie, have added an extra element of challenge. They are energetic and social. They like to use me as a blanket and running path while I am meditating. I also experienced one meditation, using my tablet since my phone was not working. Unfortunately, my tablet was set up to turn itself off every 5 minutes. So, I had to turn it back on every 5 minutes.

I have enough experience with mindfulness meditation to just keep going with my meditation, redirecting myself back to the exercise, even if it is very interrupted. I will obviously try to plan better for the next meditation, if there are factors I can control. If not, I go with it. In the past, I would have stopped meditating because I was frustrated that I was not “doing it right”.

One of the things I love most about mindfulness meditation is that all of my experience is part of the meditation as long as I stick with the process of trying. Sometimes I have a “good” meditation. Sometimes, I have a “bad” meditation. But every meditation is a meditation. Every meditation counts.

I have found over the course of my body scans that my thoughts are slowing down, bit by bit. I still have fits and starts. Sometimes I fall asleep or zone out. But it is a helpful process, a useful one.

Arguing with the Talk Radio in my mind has not been useful in my life. However, listening followed by redirection, has changed the channel.

Tags body scan, mindfulness, Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction

Categories Mindfulness

Now what?

December 12, 2015 //

As I mentioned in my last post, I am leading a mindfulness group on social media. I posted a short mindfulness activity this week. Inspired by an article about adult coloring books posted by my friend and fellow blogger, Yvonne, I developed a simple 5-10 minute long mindfulness exercise on coloring. I provided a link to free coloring pages for those that did not have their own book. Adult coloring books are popular right and there was some enthusiasm among group members for doing this exercise.

The instructions for the exercise were to engage in coloring for 5-10 minutes, with the goal of staying engaged, non-judgmental, and in the present during the activity, noticing sights, sounds, and tactile sensations as well as thoughts and emotions during the exercise. Although I wrote the instructions for the exercise, I did not complete it myself until a couple of days later.

I love art. I have yet to learn how to draw or paint. I even took a self-directed course designed for people to whom drawing does not come easily. I did well until the exercises advanced to the point when I had to learn how to draw three dimensional scenes rather than line drawings. This was one of the early lessons. I still have all of the art supplies necessary to complete the course. In general, I have amassed a lot of art supplies. I have used most of them for various craft projects.

A few months ago, I bought a couple of adult coloring books. The patterns were mesmerizing. I love colored pencils. However, I’d worn my beloved colored pencil collection down to nubs. I decided to buy new pencils. I looked online and drooled over the possibilities. I ended up buying a lot of colored pencils. Like A LOT a lot. It was actually five sets of 24 that I bought. Yes, that’s 120 pencils. Well obviously with that kind of pencil population, I also needed a case in which to store them. My dream was that I would have a case that would allow me to see what I had while I was using them and keep them organized.

My dreams were realized with the purchase of a zippered multi-section pencil case that holds 120 pencils. I spent a couple of hours unwrapping and sorting those pencils by color. This, in and of itself, was a mindfulness exercise. Here they are in their color-organized glory:

Yes, I realize that the photo is a bit out of focus. It is hard to focus when I am drooling and misty-eyed over the beautiful spectrum of my colored pencils.

Oh wait, did I mention that I can not yet draw a lick? Though it is true that I have used pencils for craft projects and that I used to use them often, I had not done any colored pencil related crafts in some time, maybe at least a year or two. Maybe even three years. I bought a couple of adult coloring books and waited for inspiration. I waited for awhile.

I was eager to do this mindfulness exercise. I had my case of 120 colored pencils and a barely used coloring book full of glorious flower patterns. I got out my materials and set a timer. I looked at the page. I looked at my colored pencils.

I don’t remember mindfulness meditation having so many choices!!!!!! What now? I was a little overwhelmed but I connected with my breath and chose a flower. What now? Then I chose a pencil and I started coloring. What now? In the middle of the 15 minutes I had allotted for this exercise, my family walked through the front door. They started asking me questions and giving me greetings. Can you believe it? Did they not know that I was trying to be one with my coloring?

My mindfulness exercise was full of decisions and interruptions but I kept taking my mind back to the exercise, listening to the sound of the pencil rubbing against the paper, feeling the pressure of the pencil against my fingers, and looking at the combination of colors that emerged on the page. As I worked, despite the interruptions, my work became more organized and less overwhelming. I felt more grounded just seeing that something had happened to which I had connected.

I picked up my camera and took a photo of my work. It popped visually off of the page just like the flowers that I encounter and photograph on my walks do. I am not always mindful, but when I am, things come to my full attention. Sometimes this means seeing something clearly sticking out from the background.

As Jon Kabat-Zinn, the founder of Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, says, “mindfulness is not doing, it is being.”

Now what?

Now can be sloppy. Now can be imperfect. Now can be an interruption. Now can be painful. Now can be joyful. Now can be peaceful. Now can be sweet.

Now what? Now is what.

What else can there be?

Tags mindfulness, Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction

Categories Mindfulness

The Gift

November 24, 2015 //

People say that every day is a gift. This is true to the extent that every day is not totally under our control. Gifts are not earned or brought into being. They are given to us.

Some gifts are not welcome and are returned.

Some gifts are not welcome but cannot be returned.

Some gifts are exactly what we wanted only to be met with disappointment.

Some gifts fill an empty spot that we never knew we had.

Gifts can accumulate over time, like links in a chain, on which we can hang memories and meaning.

Some gifts are small gems with their own light and singular beauty.

Today is my 50th birthday. I woke up and thought to myself, “I am 50”, which was accompanied by a broad smile on my face. Today is a beautiful gift, the gift of life, the gift of family, the gift of friends, and the gift of love. I have pain, sadness, anxiety, and heartache in my life. But I also have an embarrassment of riches in cherished gifts. I offer you the gift of my wishes today.

I wish you the gentle hopefulness that comes from witnessing the quiet beauty of nature.

I wish you the spark that comes with taking on a new endeavor.

I wish you the joy that comes from exuberant connection.

I wish you the contentment that comes with the habits of our daily life.

I wish you the peace that comes with the ease of suffering.

I wish you the music your heart’s desire.

Tags gifts, mindfulness

Categories Mindfulness

Opening Up

November 15, 2015 //

As described in my last post, the first step in pottery throwing is centering the clay on the wheel. My pottery teacher says that it takes students typically four weeks just to learn how to get the clay to stick to the wheel head, to mix the clay by coning it up and down for structural integrity, and to keep it centered.

The next major step is opening up the form. First, a thumb or sponge is used to make a small opening straight down into the clay. This is much harder than it sounds or looks. For most of my pieces, this has resulted in losing center and turning my clay into a wobbly mess. I typically end up taking a wire tool and removing the clay off of the wheel. Unfortunately, the clay has to dry out for awhile and be rewedged to remove air bubbles, before being re-used.

One of the reasons that I have focused more on plate-making is that they do not have to be opened. Yesterday, I arrived at class still not having independently made a decent cylinder, a basic form. I had, however, watched a number of pottery teachers on the Internet over last weekend. What they were doing didn`t look any different than watching my instructor. A lot of pottery is learned through feel and I was just not getting it.

I came into the studio and tried throwing a plate, which ended up going off center in the last step. It was not worth trying to save so I took it off of the wheel, balled it up, and put it back into my clay bag to be used in a couple of weeks. Then I tried to throw a cylinder, which turned into a saucer sized plate. I liked the looks of it so I was not too bothered by the fact that the clay had a mind of its own. Then it collapsed and I wired it off, discovering that the bottom was so thin that it was not viable, anyway. Counting the two plates I tried to throw last week, I had now made four wet clay blobs in a row. I was feeling a little frustrated.

Mikki, our instructor, had other things in mind. She wanted us to learn to make mugs. A mug is a cylinder. We were also adding curves to the form to make it easier to make a handle that would accommodate fingers. I centered my clay, mixed it up and down three times, took a deep breath and poked my thumb into the top of the clay to make my opening. To my surprise, it worked. Then I took my thumb and pulled it across the bottom of the form to widen the cylinder. I had a couple of close calls but there was nothing that I was not able to repair. I had successfully opened up the form without collapsing it.

Then it was time to “pull” the form. Basically, that is when most of the vertical growth occurs in the form. I carefully followed the steps but my form went awry. I asked my instructor for help. She put her fingers in my piece and said, “Oh, you didn’t make your hole deep enough.”

When I opened up, I had not gone deeply enough. I have also ruined forms by going too deep. I have also ruined forms by not having the wheel spin fast enough. I have ruined them by going too slow. As for this form, I was able to fix it and had a break through about what “pulling” a form actually meant and I moved my hands, slowly at the speed of the wheel, just as I had been instructed to.

By the end of the night, I had made two nice looking mugs. No, they didn’t match. I was actually kind of happy for that. I like variety. Next week, we’ll learn how to make and apply the handles.

By going deeply enough at the right speed and by trying over and over, I will have made a vessel from which I can derive sustenance. Opening up leads to many outcomes. Fortunately, life gives us many many do-overs.

Tags life balance, mindfulness, opening up, Pottery, relationships

Categories Mindfulness

Centering

November 2, 2015 //

When I was in college, I lived in the dorms for the first two years. Our dorm had a pottery room, which was open for student use. One of my acquaintances, a ceramics major named Kal, was hired to provide instruction. I wanted to learn how to throw a pot on the wheel. However, I purposely avoided going to the pottery room when I knew that Kal would be there. Kal acted as if he had a strong romantic interest in me. He was never anything except a polite and respectful young man to me but he was really intense. When he looked at me it was as if he were picturing what our children might look like when we got married. As a 19 year-old, this was too much. It made me feel uncomfortable and off balance.

One day, I went into the pottery room by myself, whacked off a hunk of clay, plopped it on the wheel, got the wheel turning, and tried to shape it into a pot with my hands. It was quickly obvious to me that pot throwing skills might be enhanced by instruction. I managed to take an off center blob of clay and transform it into an even more off center blob of clay with ridges. I’m not even sure how I got that clay scraped off of the wheel but I did. Then I did a little hand building followed by having some fun with the slip molds. Slip molds are easy. You pour in the clay slip, wait a bit, and then pour it out leaving a lining on the mold. Put it in the kiln and presto, a perfectly molded piece came out, ready to glaze. I can’t say that it actually stoked my creativity, using those slip molds getting the same shape, over and over.

It is now thirty years later and I am learning to throw pottery on a wheel. I signed my husband and I up for a pottery class at the local community college. This is the first class we’ve taken together since the travesty that was ballroom dancing at the Bloomington, Indiana YMCA, 17 years ago. I have signed us up for other classes in the past few years and have had to cancer them due to urgent parenting needs that have made it necessary for us to stay closer to home. We spend every Thursday night working with clay. The first thing we learned was to wedge the clay, in order remove the air bubbles and prevent cracks. Then we learned to center the clay on the wheel. Working with un-centered clay is kind of like trying to get a washing machine back in balance by hugging it.

To center clay, you have to make it stick to the wheel and you have to stick it to the right spot. Then you have to use your hands and tools to move some of the clay while keeping the whole pile of clay stable. It is a dance of flux against stability and like any dance, it requires coordination. The first thing I learned to do after wedging was centering. Then I was kind of stuck because I could not get the clay to move the way I wanted it to. It either moved too much and unevenly so or nowhere at all. Micki, our instructor came over to each of us at these times and helped us out either with verbal instruction or by demonstrating the technique on our work.

With each lesson, I learned a different part and by the 4th lesson, I had learned enough parts that I was able to get the clay to do some things that I wanted. I had a few epiphanies that led to my hands working together but performing different jobs. I am learning to use my right hand to create change and to use my left hand to hold everything steady while also accommodating the growth of the object. I am learning to move my hands at the right speed. I am learning to use the strength of my forearm and body weight to create width instead of willing the heel of my hand to be flatter and stronger. I can make a reasonably acceptable looking plate now. I am still working on pulling up the clay higher for cylinders, a process that has been somewhat hindered by the fact that the flat surface of a plate is much more interesting to decorate.

I am very much enjoying this class, as is my husband. We are both learning. Perhaps if I wanted to and dedicated the time to it, I could get really good at throwing plates. I suspect I will keep learning to make new things, each a combination of struggle and discovery.

I do know that with each new learning I start the same way, by taking the time to get my work securely centered to the wheel before getting creative or fancy. It requires patience, persistence, and plenty of do-overs.

Tags art, ceramics, flux, learning, mindfulness, stability

Categories Uncategorized

Wait a minute

October 26, 2015 //

I attended a professional workshop last month on mindfulness. There were a number of exercises, one of which was a 30 minute long body scan. Afterward, we discussed our physical sensations as well as the overall experience in a small group. In a body scan, one focuses on and notices one body part at a time, moving to different locations in the body. I shared the observation that when we were instructed to focus on our torso that I found it difficult to shift my attention from the parts of my body that are numb from my mastectomy and reconstruction. One of the women in our group said to me, “I’ve been through that. I had a mastectomy 20 years ago. I thought my life would never be the same. But I don’t even think about it any more.”

I know that she was trying to be encouraging but my first thoughts were, “Wait a minute! You can’t take my cancer away from me!”

I hate that I’ve had breast cancer but I love how I changed my life in reaction to it. I don’t want my life to be the same as it was before. I want to stay mindful and appreciative of the preciousness of life. There’s only one person who could really take that away from me and that person is me.

I’ll keep doing my best to keep myself in line.

Tags body scan, Breast Cancer, mindfulness, survivorship

Categories Breast cancer, Mindfulness

The Interrogatives

September 23, 2015 //

Who, what, where, how, and why are interrogatives, nouns that signal a question.

Very soon after babies start speaking words we understand, they start asking questions, “what” and “who” questions, most commonly phrased in one baby word, “Da’at?” (That, as in “what’s that?” or “who’s that?”) They are learning nouns, the names for people, places and things.

As parents, one of the challenging stages of our children’s development happens a few years later, when we are CONSTANTLY asked, “Why?” We provide the explanation, which is followed up with another, “Why?” It can be exhausting as parents often convey to me.

However, finding out “why” is not always the function of these questions. Some children are just learning that “why” is part of having conversation. Asking “why” is a way of guiding the direction of the conversation, a powerful skill, indeed. Sometimes “why” serves the function of stalling for bed, for clean-up, or for any other distasteful parental instruction that has just been given.

When I was a psychology researcher, there were a lot of questions phrased as “why”. But were they really “why” questions? It seems to me that most scientific questions are actually answering “how” questions; they address questions related to process and sequence. In treatment research, the question is even more rudimentary, “Does it work?” Treatments manipulate many many variables and as a result, it can be difficult to explicate how they work even if they appear to do so. I mean, we have ideas and models for how we think treatments may work but it is difficult to know for sure.

“How” and “why” questions can also preface statements of distress. “How did this happen?” “Why me?” Having a plausible explanation for situations, even if they are not objectively true, can be rather comforting and reduce distress.

“Why” questions are also a concentration of philosophy and religion. “Why are we here?” “Why am I here?”

As a person drawn to complexity, you might think that I would love pondering these big questions. Sometimes I do. Sometimes, I even enjoy it. But some questions are so large and complex that trying to answer the question seems to be a great oversimplification. We have enough people boiling down big problems to utter simplicity, much to the detriment of our world. Most of the current presidential candidates come to mind.

Why are we here?
Why did I get cancer?
Why is my kid having such a challenging time with life?
Why am I here?

More and more, these questions are replaced by:
“I am here.”

Most days that is more than enough.

Tags acceptance, cancer, mindfulness, Parenting, research, why

Categories Breast cancer, Mindfulness, Parenting

Through the window

September 21, 2015 //

Yesterday was a lovely late summer day in Seattle. I was thrilled because it meant that I’d be able to have lunch for my mom’s 81st birthday out on my deck, which has become my little oasis. As if on cue, a hummingbird came right to the fountain on the deck to take a drink. My mom got a nice close-up view though she was disappointed to not have her camera at the ready.

By 4:00 or so, very light drizzle was falling. John and I were working together to put together a small storage box together for the deck so we were out there. The weather changed frequently. It was a breezy day and the clouds were moving in and out of the sky quickly.

Having had a lovely weekend, John and I got into our cozy bed. Our mattress is getting older but I put a memory foam topper on it a few years back and it really is the most comfortable bed in which I have ever slept. John quickly fell asleep. I listened to the night noises coming from the back yard as well as the gurgling of our fountain. Suddenly, a gust blew a fine mist of rain through the open windows.

My first impulse was to close the window and keep the rain out. Keep the outside, outside and the inside, inside. That’s a natural human inclination to keep a boundary between shelter and “out there”. It is a boundary that has kept us safe for a very very long time.

Noting that I felt a fine mist of water on my skin rather than a deluge, I stopped myself. The unexpected mist was actually delightful. It was unexpected, refreshing, and surprisingly comforting. After a minute or so, I closed the windows because I was sleepy and perhaps the rain would get heavier and wake me up. I am finally sleeping well again and I wanted to continue to do so.

I have been thinking some about how being more mindful of sensation, touch, taste, smell, sight, sound, and balance, so often provides me with a greater sense of comfort and calm. I also notice how my cats are the same when they are alone, interacting with one another, or when interacting with me. As I write this, Basie is purring loudly while kneading a blanket with his claws. Now he is licking his sister, Leeloo, who has her eyes closed contentedly. I also see the way they use their whiskers to gauge their physical position in space.

Humans are thinking and feeling beings but we are also sensing beings, just like my kitties. My kitties are however, not big thinkers with their small albeit adorable brains. Their capacity for feelings is based on pleasure, pain, calm, protection, and fear, just the basics needed for survival.

Sensation is important. It protects us. It creates and maintains bonds with others. It enriches our lives. It is also orienting. It is so easy for my mind and feelings to take me away from the moment to take me to places away from where I really am. Thinking and feeling can give us glimpses of reality but without being mindful of my senses, it can be like looking at reality through a window rather than experiencing it firsthand, on the inside.

My senses tell me where I am. This helps me be who I am in the reality I have, right now.

Tags Living in the present, mindfulness, senses

Categories Mindfulness

The Cartwheel

September 7, 2015 //

During the summer between the 7th and 8th grade, I remember spending a substantial amount of time in the front yard trying to teach myself how to do a cartwheel. My palms hit the grass time and time again but I was having trouble making myself turnover. I was an athletic teen but gymnastics was not my thing. Gymnastics was like making your body into an amusement park ride, going topsy turvy. That was just not my thing. It made me afraid. I avoided amusement park rides.

I was bound and determined that summer to learn how to do a 360 degree revolution with my body ON PURPOSE during MY free time. Why would I do this?

I did it out of fear of failure. My older brother, John had told me that I would be tested on my ability to do a cartwheel in 8th grade P.E. I was a major achiever. I had straight A’s. I took all of the advanced courses. There was no way that I was going to fail something as simple as a cartwheel!

I don’t know how long it took me but eventually, I was able to get my legs above my head and back down on the ground. It was not a proper cartwheel because I landed on both feet instead of one at a time. And no, it did not look like a round-off, a variation of the cartwheel that ends in a two footed landing. It looked like a slightly defective cartwheel. I was never able to achieve the one-at-a-time footed landing but I figured that I’d perfected a C- cartwheel and had not completely failed.

I went on to 8th grade. Ms. Boone was our teacher. It was unusual for a teacher to go by “Ms.” back then in the 70’s. She was also the only African American teacher I would ever have in my suburban school district. Ms. Boone had played professional basketball in Italy. Ms. Boone was cool.

She had us do a disco dancing unit instead of tried and true square dancing. I learned the Hustle.

We did a softball unit. I demonstrated my slide into home. I loved doing that. I was one of the only girls who slid and the catcher, almost always a boy, looked so surprised as I plowed right into his shins, forcing him to drop the ball.

Then it happened. She had us do a gymnastics unit with a balance beam, uneven bars, a vault, and everything. Boy, I was terrible. But I tried and I even practiced what I could at home.

I have no memory of how I was graded on that unit. But what I do remember is that I was never asked to do a cartwheel. A headstand, yes. A handstand, yes. Forward and backward rolls, yes. Cartwheels, not a one.

As I said, I was a high achiever. By the end of the 8th grade, I had received awards for science, music, writing, and yes, even P.E. I had achieved my end goals, excellent grades, evidence of my competence, and the approval of adults.

Yesterday, I was stopped at a traffic light by a city park. I saw a girl who looked 5 or 6 years old do a cartwheel in the grass with a two footed landing. It took a few seconds. But even in those few seconds, I could see the pleasant look on her face, the buoyancy of her movement, and the way she moved on from her cartwheel to another activity without a plan in place.

She was turning her body 360 degrees ON PURPOSE and for fun.

Just because she could.

Tags academic achievement. goal-driven behavior, joy, mindfulness, perfectionism

Categories Mindfulness

Not just coffee

August 31, 2015 //

During one of my recent walks, I was thinking about a conversation I’d had with a friend a few months ago. The friend had broken off a relationship with someone he’d previously known through the community for almost 20 years. He was surprised by how complicated her life was beneath the surface and a number of very unhealthy choices that she’d made, those that people make who have an extraordinary amount of pain and suffering, with which they are not dealing well. I told him, “I see lots of families in my practice who I imagine appear very different to people who have known them for years. You just don’t know what is going on in people’s lives.”

I was thinking about this, about the lives we lead on the inside that don’t match our outsides. We just don’t know what people are going through. Sure, some people wear their pain on the outside because they cannot contain it; some wear it like a badge of honor. But many of us go along with our daily lives carrying heavy burdens. I thought about the interactions I have with people everyday and my own natural tendency to assume that people are similar to me. Given that I am an empathetic person and a trained mental healthcare provider, I can quickly shift this set point but there are many interactions we have in our own lives that are so short that it is difficult to do this. And even still, sometimes we just don’t know.

In my musings, I reminded myself of how important it is to be kind and to give people the benefit of the doubt. I am also mindful that to do so is also better for my health. Maybe the driver who cut me off really is an asshole? Is it really good for me to hold onto that thought and the anger that accompanies it?

By then I had arrived at my neighborhood coffee shop, Bird on a Wire. Elton John’s, Rocket Man, was playing. Angel, who was making my latte, looked up at me and said quietly, “This song reminds me of my dad.” Angel is a young man, still in his twenties. Nonetheless, I asked, “Is your dad still living?” “No”, he responded, still quietly. I asked a couple of questions and learned that Angel’s father died 6 months ago within a week of being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.

Angel is a kind and gentle person with a spritely sense of humor. He is one of those people who exudes kindness. He loves community and will go out of his way to not only learn the names of the customers, but to introduce them to one another. Angel has made many lattes for me in the past six months. I had no idea.

He said, “I’m sorry.” “Angel, there’s no need to be sorry. That is something I would want to know.”

“I’m sorry,” he said again.

I grabbed his hand and squeezed it.

“Angel, people care for one another. That’s a very good thing.”

Tags compassion, kindness, mindfulness, suffering

Categories Mindfulness