Our experiences as children are imprinted in our bodies as stored information and patterns of tension. We have all had the experience of cringing at a painful or embarrassing memory and the coping strategy that follows. We might push that memory away; find someone or something to blame; beat our selves up and vow to do better, or, sink into depression over our perceived failure as human beings. 

Day in and day out this cycle is repeated triggered by events, small or large, and, as if on automatic pilot, our systems react, our choices and actions follow and our world is shaped by early childhood experiences, for better or for worse, until we decide to change our minds, allow suppressed emotions to surface and be released from the grip of our resistance to feeling and, finally, relax and let stored tension discharge through our systems and complete their life cycle.

Our breath is the bridge to our inner workings and our inner world. When we bring attention to our breath we shift our awareness from the noise in our heads, from incessant and obsessive thinking to observing the feelings and sensations in our bodies. These are the very feelings and sensation we so often run from, generating mental noise as a distraction from our feelings; the very thing that defines us as conscious, sentient beings.  Through our breath we bring in life energy and renewal. Through our breath we facilitate movement and change.

The first step in changing our minds is the willingness to sit as compassionate, sentient beings with all the feelings and sensations in our body, with all the content that our mind is running and, love ourselves unconditionally as the wholly innocent divine beings we were born to be before we took on the past histories and burdens of the world we entered at the moment of our first breath. 

As children and adults we are ‘acted upon’ by our environment. As children we are designed to be taking in this information for survival.  As adults we take on the responsibility to discern the quality of the content of our mind. We are charged with the duty to pass on worthy and worthwhile information to the next generation, whether or not we  have children of our own. This is the responsibility of adulthood.  Before we can do this we must examine the quality and content of our own minds and heal the unresolved traumas of our childhood. Too many generations of adults have failed to do this and have been passing along information based on unresolved traumas and unhealed wounds; information that does not serve the present or future generations. We see this playing out in our personal lives and relationships. We see this playing out in world affairs. Changing our individual minds and coming fully into the present moment is the basis of becoming fully responsible healthy adults. One breath at a time we are changing the world.