Jun 29 2017

The Magical Power of Touch Points

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Last winter after I resigned from my job and decided to head overseas for an adventure, I volunteered at a 10-day silent meditation retreat as a transitional activity to ease my mind and to get comfortable with the complete change in my normal routine that would be coming soon. I had sat at a 10-day silent meditation retreat before as a student and I had volunteered half-time at another one, but I had never volunteered a full course. I expected the usual hard work in the kitchen where about six to seven of us would start the day at 4:30 in the morning to cook three meals per day for 70-plus students. While the work could be strenuous, it was fun to chat with my colleagues in the kitchen and have friendly banter. We also had three different times during the day where we were able to sit for a full hour and meditate with the students.

Soon enough my work-in-the-kitchen and meditate-on-the-side routine became very comfortable five days into the retreat, but on the sixth day that all came crashing down. The manager of all 40 of the female students took a nasty fall on some ice and all eyes (literally and figuratively) were on me to step in as the female manager as she ended up having to leave the retreat early. I had no experience at any point ever in my life of being the manager of anything. The stress of the situation felt very dense as it was the sixth day in and I could tell that many of the students’ mental states were being tested. The main female meditation teacher sent me on three different errands within the first hour of being the manager, mostly to help check in on girls that were having sickness or intense emotional trauma.

Just as with most big changes in my life, even ones that from an outsider’s perspective might seem small, my egoic mind started racing. Not only were the thoughts in my mind racing, but they were crashing into each other like children playing bumper cars for the first time. Here I thought that I was such a good meditator, but I figured out that this was a real-life situation where I was being tested on how skillful I had become with my mind. On the second day of being female manager, I almost had a sheer panic attack as I had to stand in front of 70 pairs of eyes peering at me as I counted to make sure that every female meditator was in the meditation hall and if they weren’t there I’d have to discuss with the teacher and go to find them.

I mentioned to the meditation teacher that second night of being female manager that I have an extreme fear of being in any spotlight, even at a silent meditation retreat. I told her about how I was on the verge of a panic attack a multitude of times that day. She had great advice which to this day still sticks with me. Her advice was that as soon as I felt that panicky feeling come on, to notice my extremities. She told me to feel where my fingers and toes were at the moment of panic or anxiety; for an example, right now I can sense my fingers tapping against this shiny keyboard and my feet…they are resting on top of each other on this cool pavement below me. It instantly brought me back into my body and out of my head.

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I have brought this tool with me throughout all the hustle and bustle of daily life. I often get anxiety attacks in grocery stores. Most recently I was at a grocery store on a weeknight around 6:00 and I was standing in line with crowds of people around me. I had that familiar panicky feeling come on, where I felt as if the floor below me was just about to collapse and the walls were going to come down, but before that full on anxiety attack could hit me, I brought awareness to the extremities and was instantly calmed. As soon as I sensed my fingers placed on the handle of my shopping cart and my toes were resting in my shoes that were flat on the shiny white floor, I felt soothed. I am so thankful for learning this technique and highly recommend it if you struggle with anxiety or panic attacks.

Peace out! 🙂

–Ilona

Jun 18 2017

Gratitude in Action

“I am so incredibly grateful that you and your car got us from Portland to this trailhead safely,” my friend Mary stated.

And now it was my turn...”I am so incredibly grateful that I have a refrigerator and cupboard stocked full of healthy foods.”

Another steep part of the hike was upon us, we both went back into the solitude of our minds until we reached flat land again.

“I am so grateful for the household that I live in,” Mary said.

“I am so grateful that I have my health to be able to do this awesome hike,” I said.

My friend Mary and I have been on many hikes throughout the Pacific Northwest together since I started hanging out with her almost three years ago. A few weeks ago we ventured on a hike and came up with a new way of hiking. Each time we came upon a new incline to hike up, we had to each think of something near and dear to our heart that we were grateful for and then once we reached flat land again, we’d share with each other what we were thinking. We did it in some back lands behind Silver Falls in Silverton, Oregon. The trail had many inclinations and there were no other souls around. I felt so light and as if my body was buzzing throughout the hike.

I have always known the power of gratitude as I have seen it work wonders in others’ lives and my own. Meditation has helped me to further integrate into the wonderful energy of gratitude. By being so completely present in the moment, everything seems like a miracle. Of course, the monkey mind comes back quite often (dang it, I’m still human!) But for the most part, ever since starting my meditation practice half a decade ago, everything…a spoonful of delicious soup, resting my body on a comfortable bed, or having a meaningful conversation with a dear friend have all become moments of gold.

A couple different spiritual teachers that I have been listening to lately have inspired me to start a new daily practice, I made up my own term for it, I call it “3 and 3.” It’s super easy, doesn’t take a lot of time and is incredibly powerful. I either do it at night or in the morning when I’m having my coffee. Basically, I list three things in which I am grateful for, but honestly it’s more than just listing them…I actually try to really feel how deep my gratitude is for them. Then I list three intentions that I have for that day (or if I’m doing this at night, I list three intentions for the next day.) I have found this to be a very powerful practice because more often than not I reach almost all of those intentions that day.

If that seems like a lot of extra activity to your already packed world, maybe just try to do it for the week. So before the week starts, list three things you intend to get done that week and three things that you are in gratitude of from the last week. I have found that actually writing them out, with pen and paper really seems to make it happen. Do whatever works for you yo, I just hope you do give it a shot and see for yourself!

Peace out!

Jun 10 2017

Listen to Your Heart! And Woah! I did a video?!

Took a hike to one of my favorite waterfalls and decided to try and attempt something that scares the crap outta me: vlogging! Click and watch a short 2-minute video done by a rookie. The message is all about following the heart!

Jun 5 2017

Materialistic Mindfulness

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After my first 10-day meditation retreat, something within me really snapped and shifted. All of a sudden I wanted to get rid of a ton of personal belongings. I still found a few items very meaningful: my journal, coffeemaker and hygienic tools were things that were important to me. However, my shelves upon shelves of dusty DVDs, CDs, books, and random knick-knacks felt heavy. Impulsively, I grabbed a few large garbage bags and just started pulling all of these items that felt heavy to me and gently placed them into the garbage bags. Without thinking twice, I jetted the collected items over to my local thrift store and dropped them all of without looking behind. I felt a lightness in my mental and physical state instantly.

Materialism has never been my thing, but especially since starting meditation in 2011, it seems that any fractal of interest in it has dwindled even more. Almost a year into my 20-minute daily meditation practice, I was inspired to write a piece for Lightworkers World about how I feel in regards to the idea of physical things creating inner happiness. The deeper and deeper that I have gone into the depths of my soul, the further I have gotten from caring about comparing what others’ have to what I have. I have instead thought more and more about how I appreciate the things that I do have and truly taste the blessings that I am given on a daily basis. The cravings for more lessen as I see how amazing it is that I have a fully stocked kitchen, efficient means of transportation, and ohhhhhh so much more!

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When I was visiting my sister on the East Coast over this past winter, I had a couple of Netflix binges and upon doing so came across an incredibly inspiring documentary entitled “Minimalism: A Documentary About the Important Things.” The main two cast members of the documentary Joshua Fields Millburn and Ryan Nicodermus also have an inspiring website, The Minimalists, which you should definitely check out if you have time. A lot of what they mentioned in their documentary was exactly the same thoughts that I had been having shortly after my first 10-day meditation retreat. They touch upon the last few decades of American culture and how it has heavily influenced our consumer mindset. We have somehow been driven to think that things create happiness, but as the late George Carlin would state “trying to be happy by accumulating possessions is like trying to satisfy hunger by taping sandwiches all of your body.”

Over the last six years, I have moved about eight times (what can I say, a spiritual awakening can cause a bit of chaos, hehe) and one of the moves was cross-country. With each move, my amount of possessions has lessened and I find myself only holding onto the things that I find necessary. Not having a whole lot of clothes makes life so much easier to me and the few clothing items that I do have are my absolute favorite, so I get excited to wear them. Everything that I own, besides some old mementos stored in family and friends’ attics, fits into my vehicle. It feels so freeing to be able to pick up and go to a new place if my heart is calling it, I feel incredibly blessed to be able to do this.

I am excited to see a lot of other people feeling the same way about materialism, how it’s not truly all that it’s cracked up to be. Advertisements are unfortunately always going to be around as long as money is around, but at least as we get more and more in touch with ourselves and remembering who we truly are, we will be able to get less swayed by those advertisements. How are you feeling about all the things that surround you right now? Do you truly need all of it? Or might you be able to donate some of those extra items that you haven’t touched in ages?

344 Everything that I owned in 2011 as I made my way from the Midwest to the West Coast of the U.S.

As always, please comment and share your thoughts with me, I love feedback 🙂

Take care, much peace and love! ❤

May 29 2017

Meditate With Me!

Wooh! Spring is in the air, summer is right around the corner and the collective energy feels exciting. With that excitement, there is a slight undertone of feeling scattered. It feels like everyone is making plans for the future: backpacking trips, camping trips, road trips. All of these thoughts of making future plans makes it feel difficult to stay focused in the here and now. This is how the last couple of weeks has felt for me at least. Whenever I start to feel overwhelmed and as if I am being pulled in a million different directions I try to find a spare 10 minutes to sit and meditate, adding this onto my other daily habit of 20 minutes of meditation in the morning.

In the spirit of community I thought it would be awesome to record a 10-minute guided meditation. This meditation is one that I have shared with countless friends and acquaintances when they have asked me if I could instruct them in meditating. I learned this one from the “Insight” meditation group that I joined in Portland, Oregon back in 2012. What exactly is “Insight” meditation might you ask? It is derived from one of India’s most ancient techniques of meditation called “Vipassana” meditation. Vipassana involves focusing on the deep interconnection between mind and body. It involves focusing on your breath and anytime your attention wavers, you gently bring yourself back to your breath.

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I start out the meditation with having us take a few deep breaths together which helps to ground us into the present moment. I then ask us to notice three touch-points, noticing your connection to whichever surface they might be on (i.e. your hands resting against your knees or thighs, your bottom on a cushion or a chair.) We then will bring our attention up to our nostrils and become aware of the cool air coming in and the warm air as we breathe out. Paying attention to the sensation of the in and out breath is the main focus for the rest of the 10 minutes. Some might not like this type of meditation, but I am hoping that it does help a few. There are an incredible number of different types of meditation and mindfulness techniques, so if one doesn’t work for you, don’t you worry because there are countless others to try.

Click on the recording below (best listened to with headphones) and join me for 10 minutes of meditation, I hope this helps you!! 🙂

Apr 6 2017

Freak Alley

On a recent solo road trip I took to visit a friend in Salt Lake City, I stopped in Boise as an interval to break up the long drive. I had never been to Boise, I honestly wasn’t quite sure what to expect except for maybe a lot of potato references. There was actually no mention of potatoes my whole time there. Instead, I met a handful of joyful and friendly residents of Boise, some of who showed me the beautiful culture of the city. One friend brought me down a road called “Freak Alley” which is a whole alleyway dedicated to graffiti art drawn by local residents. As we strolled down the alleyway, I got absolute chills (it helped that a group of three young men were in a circle in the middle of the alleyway serenading us with jazz tunes–one on drums, one on guitar and one on the trumpet.)

I went back the next afternoon to snap shots of all the art that moved me. I had been feeling pretty lonely during a lot of my solo road trip and this art work I came across touched me in a way that I needed it to the most at that time. I realized that this is the beauty of art–these artists, who knows where they are right now, but they were with me that night and day that I viewed their work. Kindred spirits, all of them. Check out their amazing work below:

Mar 2 2017

Meditation Musings

My friend and I reached the top of the hilly incline to a viewpoint that overlooked the Pacific Ocean. The vastness of the ocean view and the sound of the waves was something to meditate on. I set my maroon colored water bottle on the ground beside me and sat down on a big boulder, asking my friend if she’d mind if I meditated for a few minutes. She gave me the go ahead, “of course not, that’s a great idea!” I closed my eyes and became aware of touch points–my bottom on the boulder, my feet planted firmly on the ground, and my right hand cupped in my left hand with the back of my hands on my lap. When I felt 100% grounded, I started focusing on my breath, the cold air gently moving up through my nostrils and the warm air moving out. After a few minutes, I opened my eyes again.

“Sooooo, how do you meditate exactly?” My friend questioned. I hadn’t realized that my friend of fifteen years didn’t actually know what I was doing on the boulder. “Do you just try to think of nothing?” She asked. I felt a surge of excitement in my belly and started telling her about all that I had been learning about meditation since I moved to Oregon six months prior. Moving to a new state without a job secured and not knowing a single soul was a pretty traumatic shock to my system, but had I not pushed myself to do it, I don’t think I would have landed on the path that brought me to a practice that has brought me the most healing in my life: the practice of meditation.

After stopping a tobacco addiction, an addiction to pills, and ending a long-term relationship with an alcoholic over the course of time between my sixteenth and twenty-sixth years on this planet, coming to Oregon alone was like a re-birth into a new life. I forced myself to join community groups and among them, found a meditation group that met every Tuesday. I had been reading a lot of self-help books about meditation and listening to a guided meditation CD that my mom gifted me with before I made my trek from the Midwest to the West Coast. At the Tuesday night meditation group, I learned so much more about meditation and am forever grateful for the veteran teacher that created the group.

I explained to my friend about what I do during my meditation, that I constantly pay attention to my in-breath and out-breath (I do the Vipassana technique, one of India’s most ancient techniques of meditation.) That thinking about nothing isn’t the purpose of my meditation, the purpose is to become aware. Stories, ideas, to-do lists, what someone said to me earlier that day that hurt me, someone that I need to contact later, and many other things will come up in my meditation. The point though is to not get stuck or attached to any of those things, to just be aware of them and continually coming back to breath, to presence. Eventually, with a daily practice, you truly become aware of the nature of the mind and how easy it is to come back into the moment of NOW with the breath.

The practice of meditation has helped and healed me so much, layers upon layers of my self have been coming off. Just when I think that I have come to the deepest aspects of my soul, of consciousness, new ideas and concepts come to me. Out of all the travels that I have done, meditation has been the most intense journey out of all of them. It hasn’t been easy picking up this practice, but I can definitely tell you that it has been worth it. I want to help people bring this healing modality into their lives, so anytime a friend asks me about….it’s guaranteed I will turn into a motor mouth and this blog is another avenue in how I want to help people with this. If this post has helped even just one person in getting interested in meditation….then I have done my job. 🙂

Mar 1 2017

Waking from the Dream

“Ever drifting down the stream
Lingering in the golden gleam
Life, what is it but a dream?”

–Lewis Carroll

Feb 15 2017

Some Notes from the Astral World

Swoosh! All of a sudden I was up in the sky and not in my bed anymore. I was comforted in a blanket of light all around me, I was floating and feeling at one with everything. I realized that somehow, I had been given this opportunity to explore the vastness of the universe while still remembering who I was as a physical body. I had been given this lucky chance to explore the sky and above. I realized that I was at one with the stars. As I started to move about so freely, a loud buzzing similar to the sound of television static overcame my ears and I fell into my body again. My eyes flipped open and I realized I was lying in my bed. I closed my eyes again, drifted back to sleep and heard the loud buzzing again. I was back in the expanse of warm light and stars, but then the buzzing started and I was lying solid in my bed again.

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I grabbed a bottle of water resting next to me on my night stand and chugged down the remainder of it. I had heard about out-of-body experiences (OBEs) before, in fact I had a few off and on since I was a child, but this one in particular seemed the most lucid. I got up out of bed and walked on the cold wooden floor toward my bay windows. I yanked on the curtain cord, dust flew about and streaks of sunlight poured into my large bedroom. I pulled my notebook off of my black dresser and started writing down the experience that I just had. I had remembered in one of the lucid dream books that I had checked out from the library years ago, it had mentioned to always write down your dreams when you wake up in the morning, no matter if they are lucid or not. By writing your dreams down, you have more of a chance to give your subconscious mind opportunities to provide future lucid dreams.

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One month prior I had a different experience with an OBE while I was traveling in Southeast Asia for a month. It was in a hostel room that I was sharing with Katie, a fellow traveler from the United Kingdom who had tagged along with me and my American friends. Katie and I were sharing a twin-sized bed, as to make the already thrifty hostel even more of a bargain for us. I was lying next to the window and Katie was next to the door of the room. I had been dreaming that I was back in Minnesota visiting family and friends when all of a sudden, as if by a click of a switch, I realized that I was floating above the bed that Katie and I were sleeping on.

As I was floating above the bed, my rational mind was completely lucid, I knew that I resided in Saigon, Vietnam and what my name was. I knew that my physical body was below me, lying there alongside Katie who was snoring softly with her arm flailed above her head. I heard the construction work outside of our window, which had been going on since we checked into the hostel two days prior. I saw the white “Zen Plaza” sign on the side of the tall building across from our hostel. All of a sudden I panicked and a wave of paralysis took over my whole body. I thought to myself, I don’t want to die in Saigon, Vietnam! I haven’t lived up to what I have intended! I can’t die here, this isn’t right.

The view from our first hostel in Phnom Penh The view from my hostel room in Saigon, Vietnam.

My eyes darted open and I took the deepest breath of my life, as if I was a deep sea diver that had lost her oxygen minutes ago and finally got above water. My whole body felt so heavy, it hurt to get up. I looked over to my left, Katie was still snoring and her arm was still resting above her head just as it was when I was viewing it from above. The construction workers outside were still making noise and the white “Zen Plaza” sign was smack dab in my line of vision as I peered out the hostel’s double windows.

Before that experience in Southeast Asia, the last dream of that kind was in the fall of 2007. I had rested my eyes as I was lying down reading a book and I drifted off into a dream. In the first part of my dream, I was running around the cardiology clinic that I worked at in real life. I was feeling very frazzled as multiple doctors kept asking me to draw blood or to perform electrocardiograms on patients. I was then in the kitchen of the duplex that I rented at the time and my roommate Rachael was talking with me in the kitchen as she was grabbing food off the bottom shelf of our fridge. Then something sounded like it snapped in my head and there was a loud buzzing. I remember the distinct feeling of being very free and comforted by beings whom surrounded me. They started giving me information about the nature of reality at an alarming rate, they playfully laughed, as in “awwww, she’s just a cute ol’ human being that thinks at a slower vibration than us….”

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Everything started happening incredibly fast, I was traveling through these alternate realities and in between these alternate realities, I was floating in outer space. I was surrounded by stars and comforting beings, they were palpable and they felt so comforting. They kept throwing information to me at an alarming rate, telepathically. It is very difficult to describe in words what had happened to me during this experience as there were no words being communicated—all information was being given to me in what felt like the speed of light, they would think something and in an instant I would feel what they were conveying. They kept flashing images of my life prior to up to that moment and then they started giving me images of people that I would be meeting in my future. They kept expressing immense gratitude and love towards me.

When I awoke from this dream, I gasped for air and felt the heavy lump of my body lying in my bed. I took a few deep breaths and felt stunned, I felt uncomfortable in my body. My body felt so dense compared to where I just was. I glanced over at my alarm clock that was resting on my night stand. I couldn’t believe my eyes, I felt that I was asleep for hours, but I discovered that I had only been asleep for a total of ten minutes. I felt overwhelmed and went downstairs to be around my roommates, I didn’t tell any of them what happened for fear of being sent to an asylum, but I just knew I wanted to be around people at that moment. I remember smiling a lot the two days after that experience, I felt in awe and gratitude that I got to experience something so profound.

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Feb 4 2017

It’s Now or Never

A friend in recent months told me “I’m not where I want to be in life.” Which is definitely something every human being can relate to. We all have dreams and desires, some going back all the way to when we were a child wanting to be “this” or “that” when we grew up. The only problem with dreams and desires, is that a lot of people want it right now and they don’t want to wait. Patience is for others to do, not for the ones who wants to be at a specific place right now. We are NEVER going to be where we want to be in life though if we aren’t happy with where we are right now in the moment. This is all we have, all we will ever have, this moment of now. The “not being where I want to be” attitude will get us nowhere, because that is a surefire sign that we will NEVER feel that we are where we should be.

I definitely stress and worry about not reaching goals and desires, but meditation has really awoken me to being happy with exactly where I am. For an example, one recent morning I was looking at my bank account and worrying about making ends meet. My rent is becoming much more expensive than I envisioned when I decided to move into a small studio apartment by myself and I have many upcoming travels that people are relying on me to be there for and that I am super excited for. I really started to get into this animalistic, poverty-thinking mode and then I took a deep breath and asked myself “but how am I doing right NOW?” Because really, I could get struck by a vehicle that forgets to stop at a red light tomorrow and then not even be able to go on the travels that I had planned in the coming months. I mean honestly, the more important thing is how am I doing right NOW?

Thinking in terms of being blessed where you are in the moment is a profound experience. It ends up bringing you even more blessings. That morning, I had decided to turn around my anxious thoughts about money and transformed them into being grateful in that “now” moment and it created even more positivity in my day. I went to work that morning and within a few short hours I was provided with an unexpected free lunch from business associates. Another couple hours go by and my manager asked me if I could work more hours in the coming months due to a co-worker leaving. Some could call it a coincidence, but truly I believe it’s the magic of what happens when you count your blessings. What you are thinking on the inside truly will manifest into the outer world, I state this because I have truly seen it happen….multiple times.

I feel absolutely rich this morning, sitting at my little studio kitchenette indulging in cup loads of home-made coffee, a breakfast made with fresh fruit from my fridge and food that’s filled in my cupboards. I have clothing on to keep me warm, fresh water beside me to keep me hydrated. I honestly feel like a queen right NOW in this moment of writing this and to be able to type away on this laptop, with internet connection. I have so much right now, so blessed with all of this right now. I am not concerned at the moment of what’s in my bank account or not being where I want to be in life.

Be happy with what you have right now, be happy with who you are right now, if you can’t do that now….don’t keep wishing for it to happen in the future that is non-existent. The only existence is right NOW.