What is ‘wellbeing’?

Wellbeing is a trainable skill we can all develop.

It is akin to growing a beautiful and nourishing garden. And just like a garden, it requires consistent attention and care. So often we are so focused on taking care of others that we neglect our own gardens. We forget we cannot truly serve others if we do not first take care of our own wellbeing.

Are you adequately tending to your garden? Are you intentional about what grows there? Are you tending to your physical body, your emotional needs, your spiritual growth? Are you cultivating nourishing and supportive relationships? Are you including practices that help you develop mindfulness and self-compassion?

It is hard to do this on our own. And yet, these are the things that will bring us to a place of greater peace, happiness and joy in all parts of our lives.

The services I offer—meditation courses, yoga classes, women’s retreats, workshops, life coaching—offer you the support you need—both one-on-one as well as in community with small groups of like-minded souls—to truly grow your most beautiful garden so that you can live in joy and offer the very best of yourself to the world.

Music, too, offers us healing on a very deep level—whether we are creating it or soaking it up from the outside. And so I add this to the mix, offering it in combination with the above whenever and wherever I am able.

Breathe. Live. Love.

These words sum it all up for me. They resonate deep within me as they represent the totality of what wellbeing is—this beautiful breathing in and breathing out of life, feeling alive and vibrant in all we do and are—our bodies, our minds, our spirits, our relationships, our work.

Breathe represents being - drawing sustaining nourishment in. Another word for breathing is inspiration which literally means to take in spirit - to 'fill with an animating, quickening or exalting influence.' Just thinking about these words makes me feel incredibly alive!

Live represents doing - now that we have breathed in nourishment, we can tap in to that which is ours to do, allowing life to live through us - living in the places in between the breaths - those rich moments where all of life's many experiences gel and form.

Love represents release, exhaling, giving back to the world, through the passion for the work that is ours to do and the joy and love we have for life and everything in it. It is here that we pass on the many gifts we have been given and all the experiences we have had as we offer ourselves - openly, freely, willingly - in loving service to the world.

Cover photo by Cindy Novelo (Multnomah Falls, Oregon)