When one practices mindfulness, the heart rate slows, blood pressure normalizes and breathing slows, bringing the body to a restful state where natural healing capabilities are activated.

The Practice of Mindfulness

Mindfulness is a powerful way to get in touch with ourselves and with what is most essential to our healing process. When you practice mindfulness, your heart rate slows, blood pressure normalizes, and breathing slows. When your body is in this restful state your own natural healing capabilities are activated. A rested body and mind cultivates creativity and renewal. Since the body and mind are connected, when the mind is deeply rested, the body is also deeply rested. This contrasts with the more common stressed out state we experience when are out of balance.

Mindfulness has been used for over 2,500 years and lies at the heart of Buddhist spiritual practices, yet its essence to quiet the mind is universal. Practicing mindfulness doesn’t require you to believe in anything special or to belong to any specific religious group. The only requirement is the intention to be more aware, to develop more compassion and wisdom.

Mindfulness enables you to connect with your higher self, where energy, creativity and inner awareness are your natural state of being. The purpose of mindfulness is to deepen your awareness until it becomes powerful and creative, enabling you to respond to all aspects of your life in a wiser and more compassionate way. Mindfulness meditation is typically practiced as homework between sessions and is the cornerstone of integral transformative therapy. Simply put, practicing mindfulness meditation can help you deal with your issues and schemas and has health benefits, as well as quality of life benefits, and it is easy to do.

"The true value of a human being can be found in degrees to which he has attained liberation from the self."

Albert Einstein

Health Benefits

Stress & Anxiety Management
Changes brain wave patterns
Changes how we respond to events in life
Activates control of the autonomic nervous system
Benefits the heart
Better sleep
Relaxes muscles in the body
Aids in the treatment of depression
Aids in the treatment of immune system diseases
Aids in pain management
Aids in the treatment of high cholesterol and high blood pressure
Aids in the treatment of anxiety disorders
Affects metabolism
Aids in the treatment of arthritis
Aids in the treatment of addictive behaviors, including alcohol, drug and nicotine
Releases negative energy

For empirical abstracts supporting the above list of health benefits, you can email Suzanne for further information at Suzanne@integraltherapist.com.

Benefits to Enhance Quality of Life

Increases alertness of mind
Increases awareness of self and of life
Stimulates creativity
Inner tranquility and silence
Positive and healthy self-esteem
Increases positive thinking patterns and positive energy
Self-insight
Strengthens ability to focus on the task at hand
Self-sufficiency in a practical relaxation technique
Energizes the spirit
Rejuvenates the body, the mind, inner drive and motivation
Encourages independence
Connects, aligns and re-balances the self

What is reality? Click here to find out how stress affects you from the American Psychological Association.

Meditation Classes/Workshops

"Teachers open the door, but you must enter by yourself."
Chinese Proverb

Classes Offered:

Introduction to Meditation: An 8-week meditation class to discover the tools for inner peace and renewed energy. The main focus of this class is to learn how to take care of ourselves in meditation by becoming mindful of and familiar with habitual thoughts and responses and our energy. The approach to meditation is based on the premise that we are made up of energy and matter and that there is a constant energy flow moving in the body. Classes draw upon Buddhist meditation and visualization techniques learning how to balance the flow of energy in our body and develop our natural intuition for health, healing and self-sufficient practice. A variety of meditation exercises using visualization, breath and energy work techniques to help manage stress, promote relaxation, and facilitate better physical, psychological, emotional, and energetic health, bringing conscious awareness to life. No previous meditation experience is necessary. Please wear comfortable clothes to class.

Exploring and Healing Our Body Memory: An 8-week class co-taught with Ruby Gibson, creator of this class. It is designed to be used as a personal recovery model or the skills taught may be incorporated into any therapeutic healing modality. Through breathwork, sensation, illumination, movement and symbolic imagery, students learn how to heal chronic pain, unwind trauma, release emotional turmoil and support spiritual recovery.

Exploring the Path of the Feminine: Balance the Feminine and Masculine in Your Life
A 2-day workshop to discover the way of the feminine. We will explore the methods of the feminine: surrender, receptivity, creativity, stillness, and flexibility. Through engaging and remembering our essential feminine self we come back into balance in a world that reinforces the masculine values of aggression, dominance, activity, and conquest. Accessing the feminine unveils the dynamic availability of your creative instincts and a new vitality in all of your relationships.

Please e-mail suzanne@integraltherapist.com for detailed class descriptions.

"When we come to see that everything we perceive and experience arises as a result of an indefinite series of interrelated causes and conditions, our whole perspective changes. We begin to see that the universe we inhabit can be understood in terms of a living organism where each cell works in balanced cooperation with every other cell to sustain the whole. If, then, just one of these cells is harmed, that balance is harmed and there is danger to the whole. This, in turn, suggests that our individual well-being is intimately connected both with that of all others and with the environment within which we live. It also becomes apparent that out every action, our every deed, word, and thought, no matter how slight or inconsequential it may seem, has an implication not only for ourselves but for all others, too."

His Holiness the Dalai Lama