Breathe Down the Defenses.

Tags

abuse, armor, breath, breathing, children, energy, feelings, Forgiveness, grief, healing, Heart, life, Marriage, Max Strom, My Life, pain, parenting, recovery, relationships, release, shame, story, therapy, yoga

I haven’t been in the mood to write much.  I don’t know why. Maybe I feel vulnerable.

I surprised myself and attended all of the workshops with Max Strom I signed up for last weekend.

After “The Healing Power of Forgiveness” lecture Max presented, I stayed awake late into the morning hours because I couldn’t sleep.  I wasn’t really thinking anything, so it’s not like my thoughts were keeping me up.  I was just filled with energy.

So much energy.

I still actually feel that way, even though I have been extremely tired/wiped out at the same time.

I actually told some of my friends about Max coming to town because I had already shared about his “Learn to Breathe” DVD on Facebook before I ever knew he was coming to town.  So one of my best friends and her husband decided to come with me for the Forgiveness lecture.

It was nice to not be there alone.  It’s been so long since I haven’t felt alone in this healing process (if this process is a healing process and not something else I don’t even know yet.)  There are still times I feel really alone, but the structure of my life –and me– is changing.  I’m a lot more open these days, more uninhibited, more real (I’d say,) and less ashamed.

(As an aside, I did get to use my special Forgiveness Tissues I mentioned in my last post. I even got to share them. )

The shame waves still take me down every once in a while, but they don’t seem to be as high as they used to be.  Not as powerful.  Either I’ve gotten stronger or the shame has become weaker…or maybe both…which is extremely cool.

I’m able to step back when it feels like I’m about to go down and say, “Wait a minute, that’s shame and it’s not really mine.”  Or…which isn’t quite as fun (but no less useful)  I am able to step back and look at what I’m experiencing and see where I need to step up and grow beyond myself a little bit…or a lot, but with realistic expectations.

Oh, this growing thing.

I have therapy tonight.

I sometimes wish I could just punch things into a computer and put all the pieces together to make them whole again without all the elements having to actually go through getting where they need to be.  But then it wouldn’t be real life, and real life is what I’m after.  I don’t want just a virtual life.

The part that is so hard is looking up,  making eye contact and not just watching images interact on a screen.

In his workshops, Max actually spoke on how with the technologic developments that are going on robots are becoming more human and humans are becoming less so.   It’s easy to see and say that, harder to take responsibility for our humanity and counteract it.

Especially when so many people are hurting.

It’s sometimes seems easier (and better) to stop breathing and let the robots do it for us.I know it’s a lie.  Most things that steal true, authentic life away is a lie.

But lies can be enticing, even when you know what it is.

The lie says you can do that (in this case, not breathe) and still get away with it.

LIE.

Anyway, Max didn’t talk about lies.  He talked about breathing.  And he didn’t just talk about it.  He demonstrated and taught how to do it too.

I like lectures, but I’m always getting myself caught up in these damn experiential things! lol

A word about Max Strom that I haven’t really read anywhere else.  He’s known as a respected yoga teacher and somebody who teaches deep breathing (the kind that actually gives and sustains real life,) but nowhere have I ever seen that Max…is for the children.

Yes, Max is a teacher who gets it.

Hang in with me here as I try to explain…

He understands about the hurt and pain and struggles of our lives, but he’s not blind to the origin.  Our pasts…and most commonly, our childhood.  Without saying a word about creepy inner child stuff (Inner child stuff is not really creepy, but it has always just creeped me out.) he speaks to the inner child (through teaching breath, it’s the inner child part of us who I think has stopped breathing, and we just follow along…my words, NOT Max’s…so this part is my spin on what I learned from him this weekend)…and then once he sees that he had taught our inner child (or teenager) how to breathe…he reaches out to the children who are really in our homes.

I can’t even name the times Max directly spoke about the children in our lives and in our world who need us to breathe down the defenses of our armored lives, our armored chests.

‘Breathe down the defenses’ are my words too, but that’s how I interpreted what I learned.  And…it’s what happened in the space of the hours I was in workshops this weekend and what I’m committed to working on from here on ever-after.

I’m sure there’s a lot more that will come out as a result of what I learned.  It’s hard to put it into a summary of words because breathing (in my mind) is such a right-brained thing, even if breathing deeply takes some focused effort.  Maybe the effort lessens some after you’ve done it longer.  It’s too bad we take one deep breath when we’re born and then it seems they get shorter and more shallow as life progresses.

I say, let’s reverse that trend.

I’m going to do my part!

(It’s simple to join me.)

ps.  I don’t make any money off of this! 😉

Ready: Ready or Not

Tags

breath, breathing, feelings, Forgiveness, God, healing, health, life, Max Strom, My Life, path, relationships, story, yoga

The day has come.

I knew it would come.  I’ve prepared for it for years.

I don’t know when it hit me that I knew this would be part of the story, but the feeling/knowledge has been around seemingly forever.  Maybe it’s something as simple as breath…and it originates with the breath and wherever breath comes from.

Simple, huh…that breathing thing.

Yeah.    Right.

A couple of months ago I posted here about breathing and a guy, Max Strom, who teaches people how to breathe.

A few weeks after I discovered Max Strom and his dedication to breathing I went to a yoga class at my local studio and learned that he was coming to see me!  Ok, maybe his intention was not to come see me, but he was coming to lead some classes at the very studio I attend!

And it all begins tonight.

What begins?

FORGIVENESS.  Oh yeah, forgiveness.

Forgiveness?  I thought this was about breathing!?

It has sometimes seemed almost like a dirty word.

In the world of healing it’s one of the very biggest words I can think of…just to even think of.

Loaded.  Like guns are sometimes loaded.  Big.

Max Strom, the guy who is a respected yoga teacher who also understands the importance of breathing in life is starting off with a bang by presenting a lecture aptly titled, “The Healing Power of Forgiveness”

I have an inkling that these tissues I picked up recently are soon going to have the perfect occasion for their début.

Forgiveness Tissues?

Some years ago, after the abuse from my former therapist and after the extended stay on a (emotional) trauma unit in a hospital, I picked up a book titled, “Daily Affirmations For Forgiving & Moving On-Powerful Inspiration for Personal Change” by Tian Dayton, Ph.D.

Like I said, I knew a long time ago this day would come.  I at least hoped for it to.  It was at least on my mind.

My heart wanted to want it.

I am heart-scared.  I am the cowardly lion.

I’m walking into that realm.  I’ve had this book and scary thoughts and deep gut feelings for years that one day dealing with the topic of Forgiveness would enter onto my path.  I tried to look at the “Forgiveness Book” when I purchased it, but never really made it past the title, itself.

I didn’t know what exactly was in there, but I wasn’t ready for it.

It was foreign.  It even seemed insulting.  Yet, I still knew I needed it.  I wanted it.  I spent my hard-earned cash on it.  At the time I was single and not even close to making ends meet and I still bought this book.

Now, I know there’s no magic in this book.  There probably won’t necessarily be “magic” in Max’s lecture tonight, as much as I’m extremely excited about being in person to hear it.  But the magic-or the real scary blessing-is that the presence of this in my life has arrived.

And the timing, of all things!

And here’s another interesting tidbit.  I had even forgotten that I had the Forgiveness Affirmations book until yesterday when my 10-month old baby daughter was checking out the bookcase and started pulling books off the shelf to show me.

Guess what she handed me….

You got it!

So, tonight I’m attending Max Strom’s lecture on The Healing Power of Forgiveness.  And if you’re wondering, I did actually purchase his breathing DVD titled “Learn to Breath to Heal Yourself and Your Relationships” like I said I would in my February post. It’s still sitting, safe and sound, in the hidden darkness of it’s DVD case.  I took it out once to preview it while I cleaned the house.  I thought it looked exceptionally good and like something I really needed.  And that’s where my breathing practice ended.

But now here it is.  The real deal, living and breathing right in front of me.

And I’m ready, ready or not.

It’s going to be a busy few days.

I am signed up for tonight’s lecture on Forgiveness as well as Movement and Breathing workshops for Saturday and Sunday, consecutively titled, “Avoiding a Near Life Experience” “Transformational Breath” and “Your Next Fifty Years: Breath and Balance Workshop”

And on a completely different, but potentially related subject…On Sunday, after my workshops with Max are complete, I’m heading immediately across the street for a sewing class I signed up for (without knowing I already had all of this other stuff going on)…another skill that I haven’t mastered that I think could quite possibly be essential for life!

Breathing Is Not Selfish

Tags

breathing, feelings, kindness, learning, life, Marriage, Max Strom, parenting, relationships, subconscious, yoga

“People subconsciously often feel that healing is selfish when in fact the inverse is true.  To heal ourselves emotionally is our duty, our obligation, to those that we love and those that love us.  There’s no greater gift that we can give them.  We affect people. We can AFfect people or INfect people.  Let’s affect people by breathing deeply.”   ~Max Strom/ Learn to Breath DVD Intro

I really hope you’ll take the time to watch this 8 minute video even if there’s no time (or desire) to read this post.  I believe the content of the video is important and relevant to everyone so  just skip over the rest of my mumbo jumbo here and click ‘play’.

Max Strom is a well-known yoga teacher in the United States.  I’ve heard his name before during my dabbling into yoga over the years.  I’ve never taken the time or effort to actually really research any of the leading national teachers, but now that I am actually starting and being effected by a yoga practice and want to know more about what it’s doing and the whys and hows I’m investigating a little more in an effort to be more conscious about what I do and become in my life.

I’ve looked up a few “names.”   It seems like they all have a sort of similar flavor and a definite ego that is blatantly or subtly denied.  I find  that denial annoying at best and dangerous at worst.  So, tell me if you agree, but this guy I “found”, Max Strom, seems to be on to a good honest thing here.  I am discerning, I think.  I don’t automatically just buy into crap just because someone has somehow managed to win a popularity contest.  I’m impressed with his simplicity.  And there’s something to be said for a sort of guru of a guy who can just be practical and make good sense.

The stuff he says here about breathing is what I know for a fact to be true.  I know it’s true.  It’s readily proven.  But it doesn’t really make the practice and application of breathing easier for me.

This video is actually the introduction to a DVD he has out titled Learn To Breathe (To Heal Yourself and your Relationships).  It’s about how our breathing and mind and emotions are connected.  He talks about the storage of grief in our body.  He talks about changing the breath to change feelings.   But he says what he says a lot better than I do, trying to say what he says, so just watch him instead.   You have time.  If you’re reading this far you and me both know you have time.

I purchased this DVD on Amazon tonight. I’ll give my personal review in the next week or so after it arrives.