• Dahn Yoga tip: Focus on Yourself

    Without a goal, we have no choice but to endlessly chase after the thoughts of others. We envy those who know more or have more than we do, and we live out our lives completely forgetting our own brains. Such things happen to us often unless we are focused on ourselves. - Dahn Yoga

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    Dahn Yoga for Multiple Sclerosis

    By Michela | October 1, 2008

    Today I read an article called ‘Meditation Can Calm Extremes of Reactivity” from the Fall 2001 Contact Newsletter By Ann Crickmer, MSW. This is a newsletter about the disease Multiple Sclerosis (MS).

    The article offered interesting insights about meditation, how it relates to MS, and how it can help people who live with this disease. Here is an excerpt that sounds especially illuminating, especially since it relates the healing philosophy of Dahn Yoga:

    “He (Jon Kabat-Zinn, founder and former director of the Stress Reduction Clinic at University Mass Memorial Medical Center, and the author of Full Catastrophe Living: Using the Wisdom of Your Body and Mind to  Face Stress, Pain and Illness) defines “healing” as reclaiming the present moment: your thoughts and anxieties for the future are not in the moment. “Mindfulness” is paying attention, doing things on purpose, non-judgmentally in the present moment. It is “falling awake”. Mindfulness is heartfulness. It’s not on the way to something; it is the thing. Kabat-Zinn traced the Indoeuropean roots of the word rehabilitation to habiter which means to learn to live inside yourself. We must learn to sit in the “full catastrophe” of our life and “own” our moments.”

    “Kabat-Zinn said that, from a meditation point of view, the whole society has Attention Deficit Disorder and “live at a distance from their bodies”. We need to move into our bodies to see what effect it has on our disease. You have only moments to live so that you must make choices of what to let go of. Once you realize that now is the only moment you have, you relate differently to your life and body, leading to better balance in your life.”

    Living in the moment is of course a constant practice, one which I think Dahn Yoga techniques can help us achieve.

    Topics: Health, Dahn Yoga |

    2 Responses to “Dahn Yoga for Multiple Sclerosis”

    1. Andrew Says:
      October 2nd, 2008 at 8:05 pm

      Hi Michela,

      I loved this entry, especially the idea of sitting in “full catastrophe”-there is so much wisdom in that statement!

      Love & Survival, by Dean Ornish quotes Kabat-Zinn at length. It’s a neat paperback-try to get your hands on it.

      I think you’re doing great work-keep it up!

      :)

    2. Michela Says:
      October 7th, 2008 at 5:12 pm

      Hi Andrew!

      Thank you for letting me know about Love & Survival by Dean Ornish.

      :)

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