Eight Buddhist Prayers to Benefit the Dead

Posted on March 10, 2014 by webmaven

This is a beautiful e-book (about 30 pages) with prayers about death and dying from a Buddhist perspective:

Eight Buddhist Prayers to Benefit the Dead

medicine buddha

Prayers for the Dead

 

Posted in buddhism, buddhism, buddhist, death and dying, death and dying, hospice care, phowa, prayers for the dying, prayers for the dying, spiritual care, tibetan buddhism, tonglen | Comments Off on Eight Buddhist Prayers to Benefit the Dead

Restart Living – Chronic Disease Self-Management Information and Workshops

Posted on March 6, 2014 by webmaven

This looks like a good program for those with chronic medical conditions. Based on the work of Kate Lorig and others at Stanford, the chronic disease self management program. The site below will direct you to sign up for an online workshop that actually looks like it has real content and is authentic, ie not a corporate sponsored sham. Be sure to watch the videos to find out more:

Restart Living – Chronic Disease Self-Management Information and Workshops.

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3 Years in Print, A New Edition, and 25K visitors to our website!

Posted on February 22, 2014 by webmaven
caregiving, hospice, nursing and palliative care

Caregiver Revolution

We’re coming into a busy spring season for Caregiver Revolution as we celebrate our 3rd year in print and, very soon, over 25,000 visitors on the caregiver website. You could be the one who puts us over the mark!

We’re also scheduling events for the fall conference season and our publisher has just agreed to support a second edition (with TONS of new material) which which will be coming out later this year.

How you can help – healing orb runs and readings for the benefit of those you love.

Prayers for healing and for those who are dying.

Caregiving, Hospice, Nursing Conferences

Caregiver Tips and Tools

 

Thanks, everyone, for your support!

Posted in care giving, care giving, care giving, caregiver stress, caregiver stress, caregiving, death and dying, end of life care, End of Life Care, energy healing, healing, home care, hospice, Mindfulness, nursing, prayers for the dying, qi gong, spiritual care, stress relief exercises, tai chi, yoga | Comments Off on 3 Years in Print, A New Edition, and 25K visitors to our website!

At end of life, an Encoded Prayer?

Posted on January 29, 2014 by webmaven

Here’s an intereting story about the mysteries that surround life and death:

Internet community helps crack dying grandmother’s code on note cards 

Truth or conjecture, no matter what we think, it’s an interesting concept that communication can take place in all kinds of ways for those who cannot communicate through speech and normal writing.

And then there is the mystery of prayer. As the New Yorker eloquently writes:

“Now, every prayer is a mystery, even if it’s not written in a code that takes two decades to crack. Even the very impulse to pray is mysterious. The faithful may understand their prayers as an act of obedience, though even they may wonder why desires must be articulated to a deity who knows all. Others believe that prayer affects the one who offers it, not necessarily the one who receives it. How one should pray—not only which words, if any, to use, but also which postures to inhabit—remains an active conversation in many religious communities, and the yearning to pray “better” or more “effectively” sustains an industry of gurus and guides.

Prayers can be as private as a whisper or as public as a pop song. Dorothy Holm, the author of these cards, crafted a prayer that was both, but it was the conventional prayer that she recorded that allowed her code to be broken: the recognizable triple “amen” first oriented the code breakers, and the well-known “Our Father” confirmed their cryptographic instincts. If she had not used a conventional prayer, her code might never have been figured out.”

Posted in aging, death and dying, death and dying, dementia, dementia, end of life care, hospice, hospice care, prayers, prayers for the dying | Comments Off on At end of life, an Encoded Prayer?

Tai Chi and Mindfulness – daily practice

Posted on January 6, 2014 by webmaven

“Much, much there is, grasshopper, about this tai chi…”

In perusing the new popularity of tai chi it could be said that people think of it as a system of  kind-of-complicated movements devised to be performed verrrrrry slowly to teach concentration and breathing meditation which will give lots of related health benefits.

Well, guess what? This is actually just a small part of the story. Tai chi is an ancient, very complex system of developmental teaching which, as it is embodied in the movements, holds it’s secrets very well.

Approaching its comprehensive teachings you should understand that tai chi is an incredibly sophisticated philosophy and system of training with an amazing history spanning centuries of evolution through warlords, feuding families, esoteric monasteries and hidden schools of martial arts. A synopsis of this history is quite well described in Waysun Liao’s Tai Chi Classics, and his respect for the tradition coupled with the sincerity with which he conveys his knowledge are admirable.

Here we want to talk about a practical thing, about turning your tai chi practice into a daily, hourly, minute to minute affair of very beneficial mindfulness practice. Master Liao helps us by giving the following exercise (here he is talking specifically about coordination):

“For example, each time you go to answer the phone, the entire body moves forward to pick up the receiver. As the receiver is lifted from the cradle, you should imagine that it is very heavy and fragile and so requires your full attention and the entire strength of your body to lift it. The same type of practice can be applied when you use your silverware at meals and so on. Moving the body as one complete unit aids in the free unobstructed flow of ch’i. Therefore constantly practicing in this way will serve as a reminder to your mind and body systems and will increase natural coordination and consequently the awareness of ch’i within the body.” p.43

Liao talks about relaxation, shoong, just as descriptively. To practice tai chi one has to learn to be completely completely relaxed as if the muscles in the arms, for example, didn’t work at all. Feel as if the arms are completely useless…unable to move, totally heavy. Feel the shoulders drop. Feel how deeply relaxed that is. This approximates the total relaxation of a tai chi practitioner, who keeps this feeling active even while he is moving.

“In tai ch’i meditative movement practice, relaxation means to give yourself up completely both mentally and physically.It means to yield: yield totally to the entire universe, yield to the infinite.“p.31

Bringing this sense of awareness and relaxation to everyday tasks – this is the real practice. Stay mindful. Use your warrior’s perseverance to continue with your efforts despite the fact that you will inevitably forget time and time again. This is tai chi in every day life.

 

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A New Years Message from Mark Johnson (Tai Chi for Seniors)

Posted on January 1, 2014 by webmaven

Received the following email from Mark Johnson, who created one of the best and most widely watched videos in the field, Tai Chi for Seniors.

Happy New Year Grant,

I haven’t written in awhile because it seems the holidays are the only free time I have to sit and reflect on what to emphasize in my teaching schedule – so here is my New Year’s Tai Chi resolution…to write more, and to alert everyone to the importance of deep breathing.

As the decades fly by, I have become more aware of the truth of the old Chinese saying: “as you live so you breathe and how you breathe determines how you will live.”

You are all familiar with the adage “calm down by breathing deep” but do you know WHY it works? The latest discovery is that slow, deep, rhythmic belly breathing stimulates and massages your Vagus nerve which is the most complex nerve in your body. It runs down the entire length of your head and trunk, on both sides, and has access to all your major organs. Besides output to the various organs, the Vagus nerve conveys sensory information about the state of the body’s organs to the central nervous system.

Doctors have been using that information to stop epileptic seizures and recently found that stimulation of the Vagus nerve helps with depression. However, their electrical device that attaches to your neck (because the nerve is closest to the surface of your skin there) costs more than $3,000, so here is how to get the same results for nothing… breathe deep all the time.

The Vagus nerve dives deep through your diaphragm and when the diaphragm is expanded and contracted as it is when breathing deep, it stimulates the nerve constantly. So practice deep breathing until it is a constant IN ALL CIRCUMSTANCES.

It is easy to diagnose how a person lives by watching how they breathe. Short, rapid gasping breaths into the collarbone area are signs of chronic stress. Have you ever seen a person have a panic attack? All upper chest breathing is too shallow to get enough oxygen into your lungs to live a vital life.

I have also noticed that when practicing deep, belly breathing (the kind of breathing you did as a child) if the inhale is nonexistent and/or comes in spasms, you have a fear of life. If the exhale is nonexistent and/or spastic, you have a fear of death. A perfect deep breath takes about 2 seconds for the belly to expand out and 3 seconds to contract. It must also be rhythmic to make your life rhythmic or you will end up being a jerk – just like your breathing.

One of the great secrets of “My Life As Play” (get my book on Kindle) is that I have breathed deep for the past 40 years in all circumstances. When my airplane engine stopped and I flew into an industrial building, the helicopter rescue squad said I was breathing deep. The doctors the next day doing facial surgery on me said I breathed deep through the entire operation. It is one of the most useful habits a person can have.

So when practicing with my Tai Chi DVD exercises, take the deep breathing segments more seriously and your life will be long and sweet. Make 2014 a great year with deep breathing. I vow to write an article each month and I hope to see you on our next China trip.

Mark

In addition to your deep belly breathing, here is a longevity practice for you to try, Turtle Breathing Qigong. Many Qigong forms evolved from the ancient Chinese observation of animals and ones that live a long time were of special interest. Turtles live an exceptionally long and peaceful life for which they have become venerated in China. A longevity practice called Turtle Breathing developed from observing and understanding the habits of turtles. We hope you enjoy it and live a very long and happy life! http://www.qigongchinatrip.com/Turtle_Breathing_Qigong.pdf

Mayo Clinic recommends Tai Chi to help reduce stress and anxiety, and also helps flexibility and balance. “Tai chi involves a series of movements performed in a slow, focused manner. Often described as meditation in motion, tai chi promotes serenity through gentle, flowing movements.” http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/tai-chi/SA00087

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