Welcome to our new Blogger

Nothing like a week at Quest to inspire a blog!!

I have just been sent this beautiful composition on love and peace that I think everyone will enjoy:  http://positivepause.com/en

Our first and true nature of LOVE was very present in our hearts and minds last week at our Healing Your Life Program as we explored the ways in which we can be love in our lives.

I find the hardest part of being love is to be loving to myself.

I just don’t seem to have an ‘enough’ button i.e. ‘I have done enough for today, my body and mind are tired, I need to rest.’

There is always something else being flung into my mind to remember to do and then, before I know it, I am up and doing. Seemingly without conscious thought, now that’s a well worn neural pathway!! That’s a super highway, that doesn’t even bother to check in with me any more whether it’s ok to go there!

I find the process of challenging those thoughts and beliefs always inspires a feeling of guilt in me, and it is such a challenge to say to myself: “there I am in the ‘guilt room’, what a habit!” rather than believing that I have done something terribly wrong and the sky will fall in if I don’t do something about it now!

This is really at the heart of so much dis-ease, and some would even call it a busyness addiction as it has all the distorted thinking we find in other addictive processes.

So, coming back to love, getting my self to the ‘love room’ out of the ‘guilt room’ is an unknown pathway and usually requires some stepping back and doing some relaxation or meditation to make room for the incredible idea that I am not always doing something wrong!

I have just been down to the beach this morning, taking my dogs for a walk, before writing this, so that’s progress!

Cheers,

Aurora

Aurora Hammond has been a social worker, psychotherapist, group facilitator and trainer for over 30 years. She completed a Masters Degree in Holistic Psychology in the US in 1984 and was the founder and CEO of the College of Holistic Counselling for over 15 years.

She is the author of the book Good Grief, Healing the Broken Heart and the Pool Meditation CD.  Now working in private practice as a Medicare registered mental health social worker Aurora describes her way of working as holistic psychotherapy. She lives in Manly with her 24 year old son who has Aspergers Syndrome.

Aurora is joining our team as facilitator and counsellor and brings with her a wealth of experience and commitment to the principles of Quest.

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Brain Waves

“If you think you’re too small to have an impact, try going to bed with a mosquito in the room.”  Anita Roddick

Wendie Batho

As a result of a serious car accident over 35 years ago I was told I had permanent frontal lobe damage to my brain and the prognosis was a future of limitation in the cerebral department!

At the time I lived in Rabaul, Papua New Guinea, so it wasn’t good news. Tests in Sydney over a year later also revealed I was now verging on the ‘vegie’ and I should ‘retrain’ immediately if not sooner into a more suitable profession where having a fully functioning brain wasn’t a high criterion for employment. And that was the good news!

Fortunately in the last decade the whole notion of the ‘brain’; what it is, how it works how it grows and deteriorates, how it holds people with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in the grip of its neuronal pathways and how it can change, have all been turned around.

In a sense I was a perfect case study of how all that was simple ignorance and how far we have come in the meantime on just how resilient and plastic the brain is. I have had a very active career in education and now facilitating groups for Quest. I picked up 5 degrees along the way as well, 4 after the damage.

A recent book: The Brian That Changes Itself by Norman Doidge (Scribe) $35 is a must read for anyone interested in the brain or has been told any news about brain function.

The good news is that the brain can be trained to rewire itself. This rewiring can overcome illness, injury, (as in my case) and other limitations even at advanced age. The old notion that specific sensory functions are located in separate places in the brain has been overturned by Doidge’s ‘plasticity’ theory, that the brain functions can be relocated in various places. There is an enormous amount of science and case studies to substantiate brain plasticity.

So if brains are plastic and can change this means we can change! Now that is good, good news in my book.

The other important aspect about the brain is this. When we meditate the brain literally rests. Early last year I had an episode called a Trans Global Amnesia which meant I lost my memory for a day and was admitted to hospital for a raft of brain tests. Perfect really as all the results showed my brain function was normal. I wasn’t going to argue with that! However, what was remarkable was this. During an EEG (where my head was covered in electrodes), I was told at the end that my brain was in the resting mode for the entire test period of 40 minutes and she had never seen it before. I told the technician I was meditating. She didn’t respond and showed no interest in why meditation might have anything to do with a resting brain.

Meditation literally grows and strengthens brain function. Meditators experience a heightened capacity to give their focused attention for longer and in a more sustained time. This attribute lasts for a few weeks after a person stops meditating but then brain function returns to its previous level of activity before meditation. The regular practice of meditation changes brain chemistry and increases our ability to be wholeheartedly present to whatever presents itself.

When we relax the parasympathetic nervous system switches on. More good news!

Meditation is an essential component for physical, mental, emotional and spiritual health.

I’m wondering what other ‘myths’ about other organs in the body have turned around!

So use your brain as a muscle and exercise it to make it healthy and happy and rest it regularly through the skill of meditation.

Now that is really good news to me. What about you?

Wendie Batho

Wendie has co-facilitated residential programs with Petrea for more than sixteen years. Prior to that Wendie spent over 25 years as a teacher, school principal and was involved in educational leadership and facilitation of school executive groups.

Ten years of this time was spent in PNG where she taught and worked for the government. Wendie has been travelling since the early sixties and is especially attracted to Asian cultures. She holds degrees in Anthropology, Education, Sociology, Theology and Political Science. Her current passions are her grandchildren, travel biographies, exploring Asia, 4×4 driving, reading everything she can get her hands on, and watching movies on the big screen at home.

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Driving Meditation

I have discovered a wonderful place to practice a central Quest for Life teaching about reaction versus response.  As Petrea says “we don’t say… take react ability for your life…we say… take response ability don’t we?

So I have been watching myself as I drive my car along the road and it is amazing how often I allow my reactions to dictate my responses. On a bad day, I want to rush up and take revenge on the ‘bad driver’ who merges too arrogantly or speeds dangerously past me and I want to run up the backside of the driver travelling at the speed limit when I want to go faster! I mean, how dare they?

Can you sense the reactions in that last paragraph? I need a breath to calm down just writing it…

On a good day and when I feel fluffed up and in good shape (because I have been practicing all I have learned at Quest for Life about self care), I notice my incessant reactions and laugh out loud at myself! I then start ‘watching’ myself and my reactions and find I can allow some space around the reaction so that I can choose my response and relax a bit.

From this perspective, I am able to let people in without anger, let them go without competing, stop judging and taking others behaviour so personally and generally chill out while driving. Hallelujah for everyone including me!

Can you sense the peace emanating from that paragraph?  Mmmm…

I highly recommend this activity as a driving meditation (albeit open eyed!) and would love to hear your comments about what you discover in yourself.

Happy driving

Love

Margie Braunstein

Margie Braunstein

Margie is a somatic psychotherapist and counsellor providing psychotherapy services to the people of the Central Coast and Sydney.  Margie lives on the beautiful Central Coast with her husband, two children, two dogs and a cat.

Over the last 12 years, Margie has also been engaged in the design, delivery and marketing of transformational learning programs. During this time she has regularly facilitated personal development programs for up to 50 people on weekend workshops, week-long intensives and advanced programs of 3-4 months.

Margie has a Graduate Certificate in Adult Education from UTS, Diploma in Psychotherapy from the Australian College of Contemporary Somatic Psychotherapy and qualifications in somatic therapy, executive coaching and relationship counselling.

Margie has a passion for personal development and regards people with respect, empathy and compassion in the belief that while we all do the best we can, a little bit more kindness and care can lead to even greater peace and joy in life.

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Here’s an interesting News Release that came out recently….

Some of us need regular amounts of coffee or other chemical enhancers to make us cognitively sharper. A newly published study suggests perhaps a brief bit of meditation would prepare us just as well.

While past research using neuroimaging technology has shown that meditation techniques can promote significant changes in brain areas associated with concentration, it has always been assumed that extensive training was required to achieve this effect. Though many people would like to boost their cognitive abilities, the monk-like discipline required seems like a daunting time commitment and financial cost for this benefit.

Surprisingly, the benefits may be achievable even without all the work. Though it sounds almost like an advertisement for a “miracle” weight-loss product, new research now suggests that the mind may be easier to cognitively train than we previously believed.

Psychologists studying the effects of a meditation technique known as “mindfulness ” found that meditation-trained participants showed a significant improvement in their critical cognitive skills (and performed significantly higher in cognitive tests than a control group) after only four days of training for only 20 minutes each day.

“In the behavioral test results, what we are seeing is something that is somewhat comparable to results that have been documented after far more extensive training,” said Fadel Zeidan, a post-doctoral researcher at Wake Forest University School of Medicine, and a former doctoral student at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, where the research was conducted.

“Simply stated, the profound improvements that we found after just 4 days of meditation training are really surprising,” Zeidan noted. “It goes to show that the mind is, in fact, easily changeable and highly influenced, especially by meditation.”

The experiment involved 63 student volunteers, 49 of whom completed the experiment. Participants were randomly assigned in approximately equivalent numbers to one of two groups, one of which received the meditation training while the other group listened for equivalent periods of time to a book (J.R.R. Tolkein’s The Hobbit) being read aloud.

Prior to and following the meditation and reading sessions, the participants were subjected to a broad battery of behavioral tests assessing mood, memory, visual attention, attention processing, and vigilance.

Both groups performed equally on all measures at the beginning of the experiment. Both groups also improved following the meditation and reading experiences in measures of mood, but only the group that received the meditation training improved significantly in the cognitive measures. The meditation group scored consistently higher averages than the reading/listening group on all the cognitive tests and as much as ten times better on one challenging test that involved sustaining the ability to focus, while holding other information in mind.

“Findings like these suggest that meditation’s benefits may not require extensive training to be realized, and that meditation’s first benefits may be associated with increasing the ability to sustain attention,” Zeidan said.

StJohn Miall

Alexia and I are running an 8 week Meditation Course for Quest for Life, in Sydney starting 1st November.     Over the 8 weeks we’ll be teaching a number of different Meditation techniques to suit a range of needs and we’ll be looking in much more depth at how meditation works, and how you can use it to improve your sleep, manage stress, become less anxious, manage pain more effectively, have more energy and rest down into a quiet peaceful space each day that nurtures you right at your very core.

We’d love to have you come and join us. To see the results from the recently completed Quest for Life meditation course click here.

To register follow this link

All the best

StJohn

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St Theresa’s Prayer

This came across my inbox today and was very pertinent. If it is to me, it may be to you. We are all on the journey together!

‘May today there be peace within. May you trust that you are exactly where you are meant to be. May you not forget the infinite possibilities that are born of faith in yourself and others. May you use the gifts that you have received, and pass on the love that has been given to you. May you be content with yourself just the way you are. Let this knowledge settle into your bones, and allow your soul the freedom to sing, dance, praise and love.

It is there for each and every one of us.’

Kate vanderVoort

Kate vanderVoort

Kate is currently overseeing the development and implementation of the new strategic plan for Quest for Life including developing programs for other organisations, online services, community outreach and facilitator team development.

Kate completed a Bachelor of Social Work and has more than 15 years experience in working in health, cancer and youth related charities and service providers. She has also studied yoga, meditation and a variety of training, presentation and coaching modalities. She facilitated with the Quest for Life Foundation in 1999 – 2000 and has since worked with Quest for Life in business development and fundraising roles. With more than 12 years experience in leadership and program development roles in the youth sector, Kate has a passion for creating a world in which young people wish to belong, be a part of and contribute to.

Kate has a consulting business – 3 Degrees of Connection (www.3doc.com.au) – and connects people, passions and projects through strategy and social media marketing. She lives in Sydney with her pet rabbit Heff.

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