Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction - MBSR South

I attended a talk by Frank Ostaseski at the end of last year entitled: The Five Invitations: Discovering What Death Can Teach Us About Living Fully.

The invitations include:
Don't wait.
Bring your whole self to the experience.
Rest in the midst of it all.

We will be offering our next MBSR course beginning April 2019. For course details visit www.mbsr-south.co.za.

Don't wait.
If life feels to full we invite you to create time to 'rest in the midst of it all'.

Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Cape Town | MBSR South Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction in Cape Town. Mindfulness Meditation Training at MBSR South.

Next MBSR South 8 week course starting 2 August 2018.

See details and contact us at www.mbsr-south.co.za

Comments from a participant in our last course:

"I am still benefiting from your course and noticing more and more each day how my general day to day life has improved in so many ways...I am definitely a lot kinder to myself, I give myself more time to just "be" and not push myself to always keep doing things to fill time and get things done....I have noticed that instead of the anxiety lingering in me, it dissipates a lot quicker than it used to."

Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Cape Town | MBSR South Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction in Cape Town. Mindfulness Meditation Training at MBSR South.

"Not the meaning of life but the aliveness of it is what we find here." - Anthony Osler in Mzansi Zen.

Our next eight week teaching cycle (the final one for 2017) begins Thursday 10 August 2017. For enquiries contact Mandy Johnson [email protected]

A favourite Mary Oliver poem, a bit long to read in an MBSR session but you could make it a mindfulness practice now. Read it slowly, savour it.

Bone

1.

Understand, I am always trying to figure out
what the soul is,
and where hidden,
and what shape
and so, last week,
when I found on the beach
the ear bone
of a pilot whale that may have died
hundreds of years ago, I thought
maybe I was close
to discovering something
for the ear bone

2.

is the portion that lasts longest
in any of us, man or whale; shaped
like a squat spoon
with a pink scoop where
once, in the lively swimmer's head,
it joined its two sisters
in the house of hearing,
it was only
two inches long
and thought: the soul
might be like this
so hard, so necessary

3.

yet almost nothing.
Beside me
the gray sea
was opening and shutting its wave-doors,
unfolding over and over
its time-ridiculing roar;
I looked but I couldn't see anything
through its dark-knit glare;
yet don't we all know, the golden sand
is there at the bottom,
though our eyes have never seen it,
nor can our hands ever catch it

4.

lest we would sift it down
into fractions, and facts
certainties
and what the soul is, also
I believe I will never quite know.
Though I play at the edges of knowing,
truly I know
our part is not knowing,
but looking, and touching, and loving,
which is the way I walked on,
softly,
through the pale-pink morning light.

from Why I Wake Early by Mary Oliver (2004)

"Drink your tea slowly and reverently, as if it is the axis on which the whole earth revolves - slowly, evenly, without rushing towards the future." Thich Nhat Hanh

If you would like to share a cup of tea join us from the 4th of May 2017.

Our next eight week course begins 4 May 2017.
Email [email protected].

"Mindfulness is a translation of a word that simply means awareness. It is a direct, intuitive knowing of what you are doing while you are doing it. It is knowing what's going on in your mind and body and what's going on in the world outside as well."
Mark Williams

Our first course for 2017 begins on the 19th January in Kenilworth, Cape Town. If you would like to join us you can contact us via our website www.mbsr-south.co.za.

MBSR is suitable for those living with stress, pain, chronic illness or simply those wanting to live their lives more deeply.

Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Cape Town | MBSR South Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction in Cape Town. Mindfulness Meditation Training at MBSR South.

What is mindfulness?
Mindfulness is the ability to pay attention to what is happening right now, in the present moment, without judgement and without wanting it to be different. So many moments of our lives are lost to us as our minds focus on what has happened or what might happen. This tendency to dwell in the past or imagine the future is our brain's default mode. It allows us to learn, plan and innovate, but it is fertile ground for self-criticism and anxiety. It also limits our ability to respond appropriately to what is happening right now and to be present to those we are with in this moment. Instead we often function on automatic pilot with responses that are habitual - hence the difficulty we face in changing our ingrained response patterns, even (or especially) those we really want to change.

The cultivation of present moment awareness - mindfulness - is the practice of accepting and reclaiming all our moments and living more fully. We can still remember, plan and innovate but we can savour our experiences as they happen. We can learn to pause when we encounter a difficult scenario and, perhaps, choose a fresh response.

- See more at: http://www.mbsr-south.co.za/index.php .4M2l5tfW.dpuf

- See more at: http://www.mbsr-south.co.za/index.php .4M2l5tfW.dpuf

Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Cape Town | MBSR South Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction in Cape Town. Mindfulness Meditation Training at MBSR South.