Moment of Mind Summer 2024

Moment of Mind

Welcome to summer fellow northern hemisphere-ians!The invitation in this quarterly newsletter is to notice where you are already, or might want to, honor a significant life transition you’re experiencing. One way of honoring it can be through the creation of a ceremony.I launched Finding Mindful Now Now back in the summer of 2018, making this edition six years of newsletter invitations. In the winter solstice edition that year (you can read it on LinkedIn as I wasn’t posting them to the website then) I invited folks to create a ceremony for honoring intangible, private, wins whatever that meant for the reader. The secret, joyful, learning, or arrival moments.In this edition I invite you to expand beyond the private into a transition you might feel comfortable sharing with others. In part this is because one of the ways that ceremony can support well-being is through a community orientation. That was something I have been learning to grow into.

If you’d like a guidebook, I recommend Dr. Lewis Mehl-Madrona’s book Healing the Mind Through the Power of Story. 

I’ve been thinking a lot about ceremony and ritual as the planet takes me on this 49th trip around the sun. A friend was bringing up marking their 50th birthday in an intentional way and, being a bit of a joy-ner and en-joyer of great ideas, it sparked the creative flow over here. So I did it too. 

This April I started a challenge (uh hem, ceremony) to mark, and honor, the beginnings of this human body’s transition into elderhood, by way of a 50th birthday. The challenge is to swim in fifty different open waters by the time I reach 50 years next April. You can read more at this link, and follow along at that blog if interested.  

As I wrote back in the 2018 newsletter, ceremony is about respectfully acknowledging that something has happened, or is happening, that is not commonplace. Not everyone has the opportunity to pass through the 50th year, and it’s not something I take for granted.

In Dr. Mehl-Madrona’s book he devotes a chapter to encouraging people to craft their own ceremony, drawing on their heritage rather than stealing from indigenous community practices. His six essential elements, adapted for brevity, are described here. I’ve applied them to my year-long challenge as an example. Consider something bite size that you might explore as a starting practice. I used morning sunrises during the summer of 2020’s shut down as a learning space.

1. We start with sincere purpose and appropriate intention.

The purpose of this open water ceremony is to honor this temple we call a body, and all of its aliveness, while that’s still happening.

2. We participate in an experience, without attempting to explain it.

I may not be on the nose with this one as I do attempt to explain it in general terms. And there are so many experiences, embedded within each place, each meeting of someone to swim, and being in community with the more than human world that defy explanation and so – I keep that to myself. I revel, cry sometimes, appreciate, and feel all there is to feel.

3. We acknowledge our place in nature, with humility.

One aspect of river/lake/ocean swimming is the vulnerability, the alongsidedness of other beings who rely on it for their life. I am still working on this acknowledgment. 

4. We dialogue in a way that draws on the essence of all our ancestors.

The image at the top of this newsletter are my mother’s freshwater pearls from a strand she wore for at least three decades, possibly much longer (my memory says she had this when I was in high school but I could be wrong). She transitioned beyond her human body temple the year before last and I’m being open to her memory being a blessing. That’s only one ancestor among many, and I’m working with what else emerges.

5. We expand our awareness of life force, or spiritual awareness.

This is part of the purpose of the ceremony, and the process feels like a spiritual encountering of this awareness that we are. I don’t really have good words for it, so I’ll leave it there.

6. We create new and unexpected patterns through these dynamic relationships in practice. (Mehl-Madrona, 2010).

This is certainly happening – unexpected understanding about friendships, about community, about cold water immersion, even patterns of applying various sunscreens are new (although that one is expected). 

What transition might you want to honor in some ceremonial way?

Much love,

Tia

Love for Your Inner Science Activist Nerd

This year I’m focusing on continuing to learn more about skill building in friendships. It’s something I plan to do throughout life, and can’t say that I’m an expert by any stretch of the imagination. Instead of the actual book (because I haven’t read it yet), I’m sharing a podcast episode where the author of “The Other Significant Others: Reimagining Life With Friendship at the Center” is discussing intimate friendships with the host. These are the kind where the friend feels more like a family member or platonic partner. 

I invite you to notice what comes up for you in the listening – you can click on the large bolded text above and it will take you to the podcast episode. This conversation builds on some of the content from the book I shared in the last newsletter, How We Show Up, by Mia Birdsong. Many of her chapters dive into chosen family where friends are the closest, intimate connections that Mia leans on – beyond a romantic partner. Humans are social creatures that research indicates evolved to live in much closer community settings than modern societies support. It’s hard work building small villages in individualist-centered systems, and worth it!

Get Your Park Groove On

A new dock is opening on the Willamette River at Cathedral park (N Edison Street and Pittsburg Avenue) and there’s a grand opening from 2pm to 8pm, organized by the Human Access Project, this upcoming Saturday June 29th.  You can learn more here.

The park has accessible, mostly flat, paved trails, a recently planted native habitat area, views of the river, and views of the bridge. It’s a destination that is known locally because so many people ask their photo to be taken there marking significant life events with the bridge’s prominent arches behind them. I have passed many a quinceañera
and wedding gown on my walks. There are bathrooms on site, a small parking lot for regular cars, and a much bigger lot for boat trailers. I’ve worked with the many trees and river there in guiding folks on mindfulness walks. 

Cathedral Park is along the bank of the Willamette river, a short distance before it joins up with the Columbia on the water’s path to the ocean. It’s used by many, many Native Tribal groups now and stretching back into history.

Unfortunately, post-colonial economic marketplace activity resulted in PCB contaminants to the soil in and around the railroad next to, and in, the park. While testing doesn’t indicate health risks to the public, the site is under active decontamination through the Department of Environmental Quality’s Cleanup Program. Given the cleanup, the regular monitoring, and its results I feel comfortable Saturday participating in a swim marking the dock’s opening. Say hi if you’re there 🙂

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