Welcome to this week’s issue of Weekly Wellness Wisdom! Let’s refresh your memory with last week’s introduction, followed by this week’s highlighted article: “Finding your Contem-place”. Enjoy!
The path toward wellness is unique for each of us. Consider your authenticity – essentially, who you are when you’re truly real and honest with yourself. What if you brought that awareness into your decisions about wellness? When you are deeply connected with your values, your gifts, your vulnerabilities and your hopes (your authentic self), you are moving on a powerful path toward wellness. For each of us, this path is unique and continually unfolding within each moment.
What’s New from Centered Living
Are you a wellness coach? Interested in expanding your practice and your coaching skills? Please consider joining my new MasterMind program!
I held a Q&A session last week to detail this program. The positive response was overwhelming. There are still a few spaces left in the program, but I suspect they will be gone soon. To listen to the Q&A, simply click on this link:
www.drboothroyd.com/mastermind
Call or email me with your questions about this dynamic mentoring program!
Wellness Wisdom Feature Article
Finding your Contem-place: Stop Doing and Start Being
This may strike you as a silly question, but please pause for a moment or two and consider this inquiry:
When was the last time you were a human being and not a human doing?
Many of us with our harried lifestyles tend to have little or no contemplative, restorative experiences of quiet and solitude. We often have no physical place or space we’ve designated for intentional quiet, a spot especially to meditate, pray or simply be alone with our thoughts and feelings. We all need to find our ‘contem-place’ – a specific place or process designed just for peace and quiet.
The photo above is me spending a few moments sitting in the center of our stone labyrinth. I occasionally host retreats and work closely with my private clients using this labyrinth as a tool for centering and slowing down the mind and body. I built this labyrinth because I enjoy creating places that invite contemplation, quiet and the gentle restoration of body, mind and spirit.
So, do you have such a place? It doesn’t have to be fancy, but simply a place that cues you to slow down, to breathe and to just Be. This is how we reconnect with our authentic selves. Some of us need just a few minutes regularly; many of us needs more than that! Honor the quiet time you need to feel at peace. It is an essential first step in understanding our inner lives and to balance that with our busy outer lives.
Your wellness challenge this week is to ask yourself: Where is my Contemplace? How often would I like to go there? How can I create such a place? The quiet waits there for you and exists only for you to be still, to be at peace, and to go inward. It is the first step to Authentic Wellness.
I’d love to hear from you! Email me at lori@loriboothroyd.com and share your experiences of “Finding your Contem-place”. My thanks to all of you for sending notes of appreciation for this newsletter as well as sharing your thoughts and experiences.
What are some of the delightful results of spending a small amount of time regularly in quiet contemplation? And what does it really have to do with your wellness? Stay tuned next week and find out!
Personal Reflections
Happy Memorial Day weekend to all my U.S.A. readers! In Michigan, this holiday generally symbolizes the seasonal beginning of camping and outdoor recreation. Travelers in campers and motorhomes towing trailers topped with motorboats and other “toys” pack the major highways heading north to pitch tents, cook over a campfire while enjoying the sun and open water (though the water here is still a bit chilly!).
To kick off this recreational season, I’ve made a commitment to the “Strong America Challenge”. As part of a team, I will be walking an average of 8000 steps each day between Memorial Day and July 4th, representing a “virtual trip” from Philadelphia to Washington DC. I wear a pedometer each day, and then electronically “upload” the steps from the pedometer to a website to hold my grand total of steps. Have you ever worn a pedometer to take note of how many steps you take each day? If not, it is a fun way to challenge yourself to move just a little bit more. You can purchase an inexpensive pedometer at any sporting goods store or even online. Take note of your average daily steps and challenge yourself to add just a few more each day!
I’ll keep you posted on my challenge!
To your wellness,
Lori
About Lori
Dr. Lori Boothroyd is known as the “Coaching Psychologist”. She has served her clients and students well over the years through integrating her knowledge from earning a Ph.D. in psychology, as well as her advanced training in coaching and wellness psychology. Appreciated for her warmth and down-to-earth style as much as her expertise, Lori is a dynamic speaker, author and coach. She lives in Traverse City, Michigan with her husband, Dr. Gregory Boothroyd.
For a complimentary coaching consult, to inquire about programs or to ask any questions, please email: lori@loriboothroyd.com
