Start with either bare feet or stockinged/socked feet so that you can feel the ground under you.  Plan a path where you will be walking either in nature or indoors.  Even if the path is relatively short, you can traverse this distance and redouble on your tracks without a problem.  Just plan your path out in advance so that you don’t need to worry about where you will be going.

As you begin the exercise, remember to start with the fundamental of your breath.  Focus on the rhythm of your breathing and allowing yourself to breathe more quickly or more slowly depending on your body’s needs.  As you breathe, enjoy the rich breath that is giving you nourishment and life.  Then start to focus on your legs and toes as you walk over the terrain and enjoy the feeling of the ground under your feet and the related sensations.  As you walk, enjoy the feeling of walking.  If your mind wanders, bring it back to the focus of walking and the feeling of the air against your face if you are outside and the sounds around you or if you are inside just stay centered on your breathing and walking.  As you conclude the exercise, return your thoughts back to your breathing and finish with your breath meditation.

Here is a video guide to help you with this meditation.  Namaste.

We begin with the fundamental exercise, which is our breathing, enjoying and focusing on the rise and fall of our breath and the natural cadence that our breath takes.  From there, as our mind travels, we do not constrain it but let it be.  Wherever our mind goes, we allow it to “daydream” and when we arrive at a thought, we don’t judge the thought or deny the thought, we just allow.  We label the thought as “thinking” and we allow the thought to exist without force or implication.  If our mind goes elsewhere, we allow the thought to blossom.  If it is a negative thought, we do not label it as such but we allow it to be just there floating in front of us and around us.  We allow the thought to just be withholding fear, anxiety, or judgment.  We accept the thought as being part of us, our nature, our being.  We then close the exercise with a return to our breathing, focusing again on each in-breath (inhalation) and each out-breath (exhalation) before we return to our world.  

The following video is a guided tour to help you stay on a budgeted time of under 10 minutes and to help you stay on track during this exercise for those who can have the luxury of playing the video in their quiet place of meditation.  Namaste.

Also, I just started a new Facebook group that is non-profit (don’t worry no donations), non-sectarian (no religious affiliation), non-political and that is dedicated to promoting love and peace to everyone in the world.  I would greatly appreciate it if you joined the group and then invited ALL of your friends to join.  Let’s start a revolution!  Spread the word!  Here is the link to the page.

When I encounter nervous patients, I use this exercise as the middle of 3 as I need to.  I start with the breathing exercise and call it quits there if that is sufficient to get someone relaxed.  If not, I move onward to the body scan to help them relax each part of their body going from one muscle group to another.  I then work with them on a visualization exercise if they need it.  I think some of you remember the beach visualization exercise I did.  I actually helped another patient of mine who was a professional ballet dancer in youth return to her days of glory on stage through this exercise.  Okay, that is another meditation so let’s return to our hatha yoga exercise.

With this meditation, you can either stay seated or you can be fully recumbent (just don’t fall asleep!).  If you are in a cool place, make sure that you have blankets or whatever you need to make sure you stay comfortable and warm during the meditation.  The video I shot will help guide you in this exercise but for those who cannot watch the video or choose not to do so, let me summarize what I would like you to do.

First, calm your breathing and focus again on the primal breath.  Allow yourself a minute or two to just focus on the breath and your breathing, naming each breath as it goes in and out.  Then center your mind on each of the following body parts. Begin on your forehead and allow yourself to sweep your mind back and forth over each body part and allow yourself to start to relax your muscle and let go of the tension.  Repeat that same exercise as you move from your forehead to your nose, left cheek, right cheek, jaw (let your jaw go lax), neck, spine, right shoulder, right arm, right fingers, left shoulder, left arm, left fingers, chest muscles, abdomen, pelvis, right thigh, right leg, right toes, left thigh, left leg, and then left toes.  Bring your focus back to your breathing as you finish your meditation.

Namaste.

Let me publish the Texas Center for the Missing’s Internet safety tips for parents that I think are really good:

1.  Establish rules for Internet use including what sites can your child visit, who can they talk to, how long are they allowed online, clearly defining when and where they can use a computer, and keep these house rules posted near the computer.

2.  Keep the computer in a common room (not the child’s bedroom).

3.  Discuss the importance of telling you and or a trusted adult if anything ever makes your child or teen feel scared, uncomfortable, or confused while online.

4.  Communicate:  prepare yourself beforehand; talk openly with your kids and teens; keep cool and be cool so that they confide in you; warn your children about the risks of myspace.com and other social networking sites.

5.  Be informed:  learn how to set parental controls; know how to check history files (if the history is clear, that is a red flag); use the Internet to identify predators and warn your children:  www.nsopr.gov.

6.  Limit your child’s use of instant messaging.  Excessive IM’ing can be dangerous.

7.  Consider safeguarding options:  blocking/filtering/rating.  Visit www.thetexascenter.org/internetsafety.asp.  Create an email/user name that indicates you are law enforcement and have that “persona” be accepted as a friend on your child’s MySpace or Facebook page.

8.  Report suspicious persons or websites:  notify law enforcement; use cybertipline at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (1-800-843-5678 or www.cybertipline.com) 

9.  Know with whom your children chat online.

10.  Check your children’s email address for appropriateness.

11.  Don’t post your child’s email address in ANY directory.

12.  Always read a web site’s privacy policy:  don’t unsubscribe to unwanted email; don’t sign up for free things.

13.  Don’t forward email to everyone in your address book.

14.  Talk to your children about what personal information is and why it should never be given out.

15.  Make sure children only exchange email with people they know and let them use chat areas you supervise.

16.  Make sure you are aware of any other places your child may be using the Internet such as a friend’s house, school, or the library.

17.  Show your children how to turn off the monitor (but not the computer) when something or someone makes them feel scared, uncomfortable, or confused and REPORT!

Another disturbing trend is something I heard of for the first time “sexting”.  This refers to when an individual uses text messaging to deliver a nude photograph of himself/herself that despite whatever privacy that individual thinks he or she is using can trigger an arrest on the receiver’s end if the sender is underage.  For more in-depth information on Internet Safety Programs, check out presentations based on the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s NetSmartz Program at www.netsmartz.com.

If you stand on tiptoe, you cannot stand firmly.
If you take long steps, you cannot walk far.

Showing off does not reveal enlightenment.
Boasting will not produce accomplishment.
He who is self-righteous is not respected.
He who brags will not endure.

All these ways of acting are odious, distasteful.
They are superfluous excesses.
They are like a pain in the stomach,
a tumor in the body.

When walking the path of the Tao,
this is the very stuff that must be
uprooted, thrown out, and left behind.

Too often we live with too much pride and arrogance.  We must feel that we are superior over others and live life with selfish disregard for all those around us.  Do you live most of your day only looking at yourself?  Are you overly focused on your own successes, trophies, goals, and gains?  Have you thanked someone around you recently for being who they are in your life and contributing to this world?

Many of the books that I read must invariably decry plastic surgery as an excess.  Obviously, I work with this paradox in which I talk about internal self-actualization and also disregard to ego.  Perhaps that is ultimately a Tao principle of holding a paradox in your mind.  However, I simply do not see it as a paradox.  As I have repeatedly stated, plastic surgery done correctly and with correct moderation and perspective can change one’s life in a profound and tangible way.  However, when we seek plastic surgery to fulfill an internal want that is absent then we are in trouble.  I look at plastic surgery as a method for providing congruity between what we see in the mirror as what we feel in our heart.  But when body dysmorphic disorder or overly obsessing over a body part leads to social crippling then we have crossed that fine line.

It is important that when we attain our own enlightenment that acquisition and acquisition and acquisition of material goods and status not be the motivating factor or dominating factor in our life.  These blogs are meant to put you into a peaceful sense of gratitude for where you are and not where you need to be.  Being a man of ambition almost my entire life, it has been a profound shift in my own paradigm not constantly to want and desire and be insatiable in my appetite for wanting more.  Today I truly cherish where I am and what I have and am not in a desirous mood for this or that, certainly not as much as I did in the past.  

Today it would be great if you could offer your gratitude (yes, a fourth blog indirectly on this important subject today) for where you are but even as importantly offer that gratitude for someone near you for who they are and how special they are to you.  Offer that gratitude to someone you know or even you don’t know that well today.

To keep on filling
is not as good as stopping.
Overfilled, the cupped hands drip,
better to stop pouring.

Sharpen a blade too much
and its edge will soon be lost.
Fill your house with jade and gold
and it brings insecurity.
Puff yourself with honor and pride
and no one can save you from a fall.

Retire when the work is done;
this is the way of heaven.

I truly love the idea behind this verse.  It tells us that enough is enough.  Hording more acquisitions for the sake of doing so only leads to fear, insecurity, and pride.  It leads to fearing the loss of these acquired goods that can in turn lead us to misery.  I also like how Dyer focuses on eating.  I have eaten many times after I was sated only later to regret it both in terms of how I felt afterward and the ineluctable weight gain thereafter.  I am constantly reminded of the joy of eating just enough, wanting just enough, and being contented with everything.

How do I reconcile all of this with plastic surgery?  Easily.  I have many individuals who are obsessed with plastic surgery or become so.  They know that I will only engage in things that will help them look and feel better about themselves but not in excessive things that waste money and create unchecked boundaries of ongoing want.  In fact, I help guide them to what would be the best thing to make their external selves a reflection of their inner selves.  We have talked about that in previous blogs.  I am in love with the creative work in facial cosmetic enhancement because done in moderation and with skill and artistry, you can create a beauty that lovingly radiates to all those in their proximity.

When we read the newspaper (which I still do every day to keep abreast of world events), we get immersed in negativity and are controlled with the ideas of scarcity.  Today, you can’t escape the news that we don’t have enough and we are limited by those thoughts.  I truly have been blessed by all of you in that I am still booked out for 3 months and have overflowing abundance.  I feel as if all of you out there are connected with me and are connected in a fundamental way to my practice and my staff because we are all in an extended family.  I thank you for your loyalty to LFP and to me.  You are all part of my family, and I want to encourage all of you to see the abundance in the universe rather than the scarcity.

I hope that this blog serves as an antidote to the negative press out there, a small oasis and a tiny beacon to all those who have ears to hear it.  I believe that the manifesto of LFP is to seek and attain all that life was meant for you and designed for you.  Of course, for all of you that are in a perceived state of absence whether it be health or finances, look at what you have and attract abundance by focusing on it instead of what you don’t have.

Rhonda Byrne’s book, The Secret, is obviously famous for collectively putting many authors’ ideas under one cover and discussing the law of attraction and how we attract abundance or scarcity by our thoughts and intention.  I would like all of you out there to take a day (always start with an easy unit of time) and begin to see abundance in front of you, intend it deeply and attain that abundance.  Today, go out there and look for all signs of abundance.  Help another person out there who is focused on scarcity see his or her own abundance and be thankful for it!

Most oftentimes, we do not work at self-improvement but look at everyone around us as needing work.  Maxwell says that when we criticize someone else, that is called constructive criticism.  However, when someone criticizes us we call that destructive criticism.  I am certainly not perfect at taking criticism, but I am a lot better today than I was even last year and last year I was better than the year prior.  Remember from the 4 agreements, “never to take anything personally”.  That is very important in this case.  Too often when we judge others, we judge them by THEIR actions, whereas when we judge ourselves we judge ourselves by our intentions.  This two-tier system of criticism leads us to failure because we never meant anything by what we did or so we rationalize, but that person certainly should have known better.  We must strive to create a harmonious congruity by how we perceive ourselves and others.

Maxwell, a former preacher, still says that he ultimately does not trust himself to lead himself.  That is why he has established external accountability for his actions.  That is why I wrote about accountability a couple of weeks ago and why I emphasized how I am accountable to other business leaders/owners in my EO forum group.  How have you made yourself accountable?  To whom?  What interval?

We as leaders (and that means all of you too!) must hold ourselves to a higher level of accountability.  Linda, who is my spa director, asked me last year why I have apologized to my staff for seemingly small infractions, and I explained that as a leader I hold myself to a higher level of accountability of who I am and who I should aim to be.  There is no other person that can truly hold you to that level of accountability than yourself.

When we first lead ourselves, we can then have a chance at leading others around us.  I have learned a lot about real-life leadership this past year and have worked even more diligently at becoming a more centered leader.  By virtue of that, my patients and my staff and everyone around me has benefited.  I must start with myself.  You must start with yourself.  We must start with ourselves.  I look at my readership as part of my extended team at LFP because I would love for all of us to grow as humans in our common fraternity.