Everyday Peace Brings Mindfulness to Central Oregon
After holding the Sisters Healing gathering for the past three years, Regina Callahan has decided to go in a different direction and bring new, self-empowering events to Bend. The new collaboration between Regina and healer Barbara Smith has brought on Everyday Peace, a program that will provide two, one-day classes at COCC focused on self healing practices.
Everyday Peace inspires people to prevent conflict with themselves and others in their day to day lives. The class provides the tools for students to shift their attentions and raise their self-awareness. The class is built around four main concepts: meditation, self-compassion, attention training and shift in operating system. Students will be taught the basics of mediation and how to be successful within those meditations. They will also have the chance to look inward and self-evaluate. “Many of us channel our love and kindness towards our family, friends and community,” states Callahan. “But we are our own worst critics. We need to learn to listen to our own voices and be compassionate to ourselves as well.”
Callahan also describes the concepts that are more focused on our minds. “Attention training opens our focus. It is a shift within our own nervous systems and brain activity that allows us to pay attention and be more self aware,” she states. This shift gives us an ease of being that we usually do not achieve in the chaos of everyday life. It gives the brain a chance to focus on responding to a situation, rather than reacting to it. A similar tool is learning to shift our operating systems.
Just like a computer, our brains have a unique operating system that tends to run on autopilot. Taking the time to shift that operating system and look inward allows us to run the show and have more control than we normally would.
Callahan and Smith’s inspiration of trying to instill inner peace to those in the community comes from many sources. “We are bringing together different worlds, seeking inner peace and getting back in touch with the rhythm of nature. We really want others to start paying attention to what nature can teach us,” says Callahan. The duo will also be offering a three-day retreat that focuses on all of the Everyday Peace concepts sometime in April.
Everyday Peace classes will be held at Central Oregon Community College in November and December.
www.reginacallahan.com
msreginacallahan@gmail.com
(Photo above | Cascade Business News)
