inner peace

Breathe, go within and be present

It’s ever so simple, and yet so profound. Breathe! Yes, just do it! Take in a deeper breath or two and breathe out long. Take a moment to really notice it and feel it. Feel your body as it responds. Notice how you feel. Really savour the moment. And notice the effect it has. Now, what was going on for you? Where were you at when you read those words and took some deliberate, conscious breaths? Were you a bit somewhere else, a bit in your head, a bit on edge, or other ways that your mind uses to grab … Read more

Learning how to relieve stress

One could say that healing crises present us with a learning challenge, one that provides potential for personal growth. So it can be with stress too. In order to recognise not only that the symptoms are potentially dangerous and to seek ways to manage oneself differently, but also to take a good hard look at the underlying patterns, we have to to make significants shifts in our outlook on life and how we live it. It might even be that the approaching “stress crisis” invites us to make a choice between an old paradigm and a new one. Since huge … Read more

Finding our own peace in the midst of conflict

Yesterday on New Year’s Eve we went to the church in the “lost” village of Imber on Salisbury Plain for a peace vigil. Most people probably know nothing about this place, which was taken over by the military in preparations for the D-Day invasion of Europe of 1944 and held by them ever since. The inhabitants were ejected in the cause of the greater good, never to return, except on occasions when the MOD open up the access roads for a few days. The place in midwinter seems forlorn, showing little sign left of the once-active farming community’s houses but … Read more