Wave better Surf therapy has emerged as a recent alternative to traditional therapies for a number of groups, including children with autism, survivors of cancer, and veterans and emergency workers with PTSD. Hosted by organizations around the world, including in the United States, Australia, and the UK, surf therapy aims to foster resilience, confidence, and a sense of community. At Salt Water Therapy in California, each surf lesson is followed by a guided meditation to help participants strengthen both body and mind....

The evening’s entertainment will include a cocktail reception and hors d’oeuvres, gourmet dinner, live auction of an original Enso Scroll by Kaz Tanahashi and dancing with music by The Mark Shilansky Band.

If you answered True: You are likely on the path to feeling a sense of overall empowerment. If you answered False: It might be time to reexamine the mission/purpose of your organization and explore more deeply where you feel connected or disconnected and begin to seek where there are paths for alignment. If you answered False, it doesn’t mean you have to quit your job, rather, pause and be willing to see it with new eyes....

Her years of mindfulness practice inspired her to study how putting pen to paper connects us to our natural awareness—which encourages judgment-free, creative thinking, notes Lloyd. “If you can take even 5 minutes for a healthy break, that’s where all those ‘a-ha’ moments happen,” Lloyd told Mindful. “It’s about bringing the person into the present moment through the doodling process.” Now Hear This The constant ringing or buzzing in the ears that is the hallmark of tinnitus can present itself as a low-level annoyance in some cases, but multiple scientific studies reveal that people with tinnitus have an increased risk of anxiety and depression....

Researchers used smartphones instead of in-person work to see if learning new skills would boost social contact and reduce loneliness. After two weeks, the acceptance and attention group participants had roughly two more social contacts per day, and were 22% less lonely. The other groups showed little change. Researchers concluded that having an attitude of acceptance and paying attention to our experience can increase social connection and reduce loneliness. Sport performance gets a boost from mindfulness Being an elite athlete comes with its share of stress....

Christopher Pepping and his colleagues at Griffith University in Australia conducted two studies to demonstrate that mindfulness skills help enhance self-esteem. In the first study, the researchers administered questionnaires to undergraduate students in an introductory psychology course to measure their mindfulness skills and their self-esteem. The researchers anticipated that four aspects of mindfulness would predict higher self-esteem: The four aspects of mindfulness that predict higher self-esteem 1) Labeling internal experiences with words, which might prevent people from getting consumed by self-critical thoughts and emotions; 2) Bringing a non-judgmental attitude toward thoughts and emotions, which could help individuals have a neutral, accepting attitude toward the self; 3) Sustaining attention on the present moment, which could help people avoid becoming caught up in self-critical thoughts that relate to events from the past or future; 4) Letting thoughts and emotions enter and leave awareness without reacting to them....

It is a pen and paper exercise. So we will be closing our eyes, doing a little reflection: opening our eyes, writing, closing our eyes, opening our eyes, writing and then closing your eyes again, and practicing with the phrases that we learned. So before we start, please make sure that you have a pen and paper available. Explore This Guided Meditation This practice originally appeared on ChrisGermer.com.

This week he sat down with singer-songwriter Jewel, and Wisdom 2.0 founder Soren Gordhamer, for an hour-long conversation about the hard work it takes to figure out who you truly are, what forgiveness means, and why perfectionism can be an inhibitor to mastery: Michael: Welcome to the Finding Mastery podcast. The idea behind these conversations is to learn from people who are on the path of mastery. We want to better understand the path they’ve lived and the path they’re carving....

Stress is one of the top contributors to insomnia, which impacts around 30% of US adults at any given time. If you’ve experienced a nerve-wracked night, it’s not too hard to understand why: high levels of stress makes it hard to mentally wind down, and it makes it difficult to physically relax before and during sleep as well. The relationship between stress and sleep works both ways, too. Missing out on rest compounds stress and affects physical and mental health over time, which can create a cycle that exacerbates both problems....

You easily dismiss certain possibilities, but your symptoms persist. With repeated searching, you might read “feeling tired” (yes), which “doesn’t get better with sleep” (yes again) and where you’re “craving salty snacks” (oh man, that’s me). And then you happen upon a term that covers all of the above: “adrenal fatigue.” You feel a little hope, until you discover that “adrenal fatigue” isn’t a medical term yet. It is becoming more recognized by physicians, according to Rael Cahn, an assistant professor of psychiatry at University of Southern California who’s researched how yoga and meditation can affect the brain and cortisol levels....

Novelty is thrilling. That’s why it’s so easy to fall in love. But your initial passion rests on a shaky and impermanent foundation— by definition, new cannot last. Routine, safety, and predictability— the foundation of a stable, committed relationship—can feel ho-hum. And ho-hum is not good for thrill. Routine is the antithesis of surprise. If your partner strides in the door, kisses you passionately, and hands you a fistful of fresh picked poppies, you are delighted....

It’s Monday. The infinitely long to-do list commences its familiar swirling through my slowly-waking brain. Time to bound out of bed and head straight into a full day of busyness. Like it or not, here we go…. Did your chest tighten in recognition while reading that? If so, you’re not alone. For many of us, much of our lives is spent sprinting on a self-created, stress-inducing hamster wheel. After a while, that stress can become a chronic state where we slip into persistent fight-or-flight mode, the body’s heightened response to perceived danger....

James Gimian: What was the motivating force behind your writing The Mind of the Leader with Rasmus Hourgaard? Jacqueline Carter: We wanted to find out what the key challenges were facing leaders today, and some of the things that could really support them to be able to be the more effective leader they wanted to be. What we found, in particular, when we started really getting into it, is there’s really a leadership crisis....

That’s a concept writer AJ Jacobs explores in his TED Talk and new book, Thanks a Thousand, based on his journey to thank everyone involved in getting that daily cup of joe into his hands. While Jacobs initially believed his choice to focus on a cup of coffee would be a simple task, he soon learned that there were hundreds of people involved in producing the hot drink most of us take for granted every day....

If so, you’re in good company. In this video from Ted-Ed, narrator Elizabeth Cox explains how feeling like a fraud is a phenomenon that plagues many successful people. She points to writer Maya Angelou and physicist Albert Einstein, both of whom believed they didn’t deserve the attention their work received. “Accomplishments at the level of Angelou’s or Einstein’s are rare, but their feeling of fraudulence is extremely common,” Cox says....

Stop: Just stop whatever you’re doing. I have stopped mid-step, mid-bite, and even mid-yell (usually at my kids, who are generally so surprised when it happens that we all crack up at how ridiculous I can be). Stopping, by definition, requires us to start again, and taking just a minute or two for a quick S.N.A.C.K. can help us reboot in a skillful and helpful way. Notice: The next step is to notice what is happening within and around us....

My preschooler, Opal, started plying me with questions when she was four. “Were you the one who died that mouse?” Or, “Do you think that moth knows he’s dead?” Cute out-of-the-mouths-of-babes comments tossed off as she buzzed on to her next activity. I’d gotten used to her frank, unemotional curiosity about death, but when her questions shifted from light banter to a source of terror, I was caught completely off-guard....