{"id":274,"date":"2015-01-11T17:38:03","date_gmt":"2015-01-11T17:38:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.healingicons.org\/?p=274"},"modified":"2015-02-26T20:45:59","modified_gmt":"2015-02-26T20:45:59","slug":"perpetually-stressed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.healingicons.org\/perpetually-stressed\/","title":{"rendered":"Perpetually Stressed?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Overwhelmed? Overloaded? Over-scheduled? Overstimulated? We are bombarded every single day with information from a multitude of sources, and our minds have been trained to absorb this onslaught, this rapid-fire of words and images and sounds. As if this isn’t enough to overwhelm, most of us also have an insane To-Do List. Much is expected and much needs to be done, often just to catch up.<\/p>\n

All of this can be hard enough to navigate on its own; when you throw in a cancer diagnosis, our stress levels amplify. Many of our clients relate that they are perpetually stressed in their attempt to maintain their \u201cold life\u201d while going through the rigors of cancer treatment. Many have discovered that, in the midst of all this business of doing<\/em>, they have lost sight of what really matters<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Making Time for the Heart<\/h3>\n
\"I<\/a>

I took this photograph driving into Santa-Fe from Albuquerque. This open, spacious landscape never fails to replenish and nourish my spirit.<\/p><\/div>\n

I\u2019ve been reading A Life of Being, Having, and Doing Enough<\/em> by one of my all-time favorite authors, Wayne Muller<\/a>. That he lives in one of my most beloved cities in the U.S. \u2013 Santa Fe \u2013 is just one of the things I like about this man. I appreciate his direct approach, his simple yet deeply insightful way of looking at this crazy, full-throttle world we live in. He reminds us that there are different\u00a0kinds of time: mental time and emotional time. Mind time and heart time. Our culture, he points out, has taught us to live mostly in \u201cmind time.\u201d Our heads have been trained to keep up with this fast-paced information age we live in, and our \u201cheart time\u201d suffers because it cannot travel at light speed. It needs a slower rhythm \u201cto process, understand, and allow in the rich array of disparate feelings, emotions, spiritual events, however pleasant or deeply painful\u201d they may be. We need unhurried time to digest and fully appreciate the life we are living.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Milagros<\/a>

Milagros of the heart that I photographed while in Santa Fe.<\/p><\/div>\n

 
\nThe guidance of the human heart is one of the tools we have been given to teach us about how to experience time. Wayne Muller challenges us to think of time not as something we use or have but how we might be used or taught by time itself. At the end of the chapter \u201cThe Speed of the Mind and Heart,\u201d he offers a poem by Mark Nepo<\/a>, \u201cThe Practice Before The Practice.\u201d It’s a poem about being before doing<\/strong>. My favorite lines are:<\/p>\n

\n

\u2026In Africa, before the
\nchildren are allowed to drum, they must rub
\neach part of the skin and wood and dream
\nof the animals whose hearts will guide their
\nhands\u2026<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Going at a Slower Pace<\/h3>\n

Perpetually stressed? Consider traveling a bit more at the leisurely speed of the heart. At Healing Icons, we encourage quiet creative practices<\/a><\/strong> that allow open spaces where stresses can soften and begin to disappear.<\/p>\n

What are some of the things you do to let go of stress<\/strong>? Share it with us\u00a0in a comment below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Overwhelmed? Overloaded? Over-scheduled? Overstimulated? We are bombarded every single day with information from a multitude of sources, and our minds have been trained to absorb this onslaught, this rapid-fire of words and images and sounds. As if this isn’t enough to overwhelm, most of us also have an insane To-Do List. Much is expected and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":463,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[12],"tags":[13,16,20,14,17,18,15,19],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.healingicons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.healingicons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.healingicons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healingicons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healingicons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=274"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.healingicons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healingicons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/463"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.healingicons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=274"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healingicons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=274"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.healingicons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=274"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}