I’m delighted to share with you an amazing resource I’ve recently discovered. Palouse Mindfulness is an authentic, validated, and FREE online program that offers you the well-known 8-week Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) course—no strings attached. No sign up. No commitment. On your own schedule.

David Potter, a dedicated psychotherapist from the “Palouse” region of the Pacific NW,  developed the Palouse Mindfulness site in order to share more broadly the tremendous benefits of classic MBSR program developed by Jon Kabat-Zinn at University of Massachusetts. Potter was motivated by great benefits that he and others received from Kabat-Zinn’s program and based the Palouse program on the original MBSR program, including many videos and practices offered by Kabat-Zinn and other well known teachers. The traditional in-person private 8-week  MBSR courses are fabulous, but are not always affordable or available.

Whether or not you have heard of MBSR, please take a scroll though this site. All of us living in 2024 probably have some stress. For example, Week 4 is “Stress: Responding vs. Reacting. STOP: The One-minute Breathing Space.” This page offers information, videos, and practices that will help you understand what stress is, how it affects your health, and, most importantly, steps you can take to reduce your stress. Week 6 is “Mindfulness and Communication,” and it covers topics like listening and conflict management.

Week 8 of Palouse Mindfulness is titled “Conclusion, Developing a Practice of Your Own.” This is the time to take everything you have learned and experienced during the 8-week course, sift through it, and select what type or types of practice you wish to incorporate into your lifestyle.

Though I have not taken a formal MBSR program, I’m familiar with much of the material. I love breathing practices—the classic antidote to the stress reaction. I have a prayer phrase I say many times a day in a practice that I call “God-centered mindfulness.” More than ten years ago I adopted Centering Prayer as the  meditation practice that fits me, my needs, and my beliefs. Palouse Mindfulness will give you some great ideas about what new habit or practice  might work for you.

SUGGESTIONS:

1. If you are  stressed, hurting, anxious or suffer any ailment, like insomnia or pain, take a look at this  site. Click on a few of the links and just see where it takes you.

2. I love quotes and this link has dozens of wonderful quotes on every page. Here’s an example:

“There is something in every one of you that waits and listens

for the sound of the genuine in yourself.

It is the only true guide you will ever have.

And if you cannot hear it, you will all of your life

spend your days on the ends of strings that somebody else pulls…”

- Howard Thurman -

Happy August, love and prayers,

Donna

EXTRAS

-EPISODES 1-8 NOW AVAILABLE -

Engaging With a Messy World
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Susan and I would love to hear from you about our series.

In case you missed my earlier announcement, my good friend Integral Coach Susan Riggs and I have officially launched our free video series, “Engaging with a Messy World”! We are convinced the information in each 20-minute episode can help you survive, thrive, and even bring healing to what many are calling our “world on fire.”

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Dr. Donna Chacko promotes health of body, mind, and spirit through her website (serenityandhealth.com), her blog, her podcast/vlog series, “Engaging with a Messy World” and " “Pop-Up Conversations on Health of Mind, Body, and Spirit,” and programs at her church. She is the author of Pilgrimage: A Doctor’s Healing Journey (Luminare Press, 2021), a recent best-seller on Amazon, 2022 Illumination Awards Gold Medal Winner, 2022 Reader Views Literary Award Gold Medal Winner, and 2022 Catholic Media Association First Place Awards.