You've gotta see this!

I promise I won't make this blog a forum for the shamelss self-promoting of my own stories...... but......you've really gotta see the piece I did last night on meditation as a way of reducing stress. Not that we have any of that..right?

Here's the background to the story: I took an eight week class with 17 awesome women...most of them moms. They all had such interesting stories. We learned how to tune out all the crazy, distracting thoughts we have running through our heads all the time. And how to dial down after a day crammed with multi-tasking. It was heaven. And speaking of heaven, though the class was not based on a religious point of view, learning how to sit still and clear my mind has been a great way to become more open to comtemplative prayer!

And guess what? My parenting changed over the course of those eight weeks. I've been calmer. More focused on the kids when they've needed to talk to me. And more present during the precious moments we have together.

After checking out my In Depth Report called, "Motivated to Meditate," which is right here, http://www.myfoxtwincities.com/dpp/news/In-Depth-Motivated-to-Meditate-nov-19-2009 , you might want to try to find a book called Mindful Parenting. It's written by a guy named Jon Kabat-Zin, Ph.D. I haven't read it yet but have heard it's great. I'm going to pick it up...so I'll let you know.

If you're interested, I can post a couple of short meditations on my blog so you can try them out. Let me know. It's pretty cool.