The Clergy Health Initiative health screening staff took to the highways in April and May. From the mountains to the coast and everywhere in between, they got to meet lots of Group 1 and Group 3 Spirited Life pastors, and they also had the chance to experience some of North Carolina’s finest treasures! Below are a few examples from their adventures. For more pictures, click here: Spring 2014 CHI Tarheel Tour Slideshow.
Looks like fun! Did you see your part of the state represented?
In this inspiring TED talk, multimedia artist, Phil Hansen, describes how a physical limitation actually helped him become a better artist. He uses his personal story to encourage us to look to our own limitations as a source of creativity.
Click on the image below for the 10-minute long video.
For other TED talks to “kickstart your creativity,” click here.
-Katie Huffman
Image courtesy of YouTube
Last week I mentioned that I’m dabbling a bit in container gardening this summer, and hopefully I’ll get a few tomatillos and a handful of cherry tomatoes out of it. For the majority of my family’s summer vegetable intake, though, we’ll be heading to our local farmers market a couple of Saturday mornings a month.
It seems like more and more farmers markets are cropping up, even in smaller towns, which is great news for people who want to buy fresh and local products such as produce, meat, dairy, flowers, and baked goods (To find your nearest farmers market, click here).
To get the biggest bang for your buck and to ensure you’re truly getting local and garden-fresh produce, here are a few tips to remember:
These and other tips can be found at About.com’s Local Foods section and News and Observer.
Want to grow your own vegetables this summer? Click here for last week’s post, full of gardening tips and ideas.
-Katie Huffman
First picture by Flickr user US Dept of Agriculture; second picture by Flickr user North Charleston, both via CC
My interest in the NCAA basketball tournament has nosedived. All of the ACC teams are eliminated — men and women — plus my brackets crashed and burned the first weekend. Thankfully, I have discovered a replacement pastime, which I hereby share with you.
Lent Madness was conceived by an Episcopal priest in Massachusetts. Lent Madness allows you to vote online for your favorites out of pairs of great Christian figures from history. The exercise is fun and educational: there are short profiles of each entrant, including many inspiring men and women with whom I was unfamiliar.
The competition continues through Easter. Even if, like me, you missed the beginning of the contest, you can still vote in the later rounds. Winners advance to the Saintly 16, the Elate 8, and the Faithful 4, in pursuit of ultimate glory, the Golden Halo.
Sadly for United Methodist fans, John Wesley and Charles Wesley faced off against each other in the opening round! (Charles won, in a mild upset.) Talk about your unfortunate seedings. Complaints have been lodged with the Selection Committee.
-John James
Top image courtesy of Lent Madness. Nuns Playing Basketball is from the National Library of Australia, shared via Flickr.
The following article was written by Mark Andrews, pastor at St. Luke’s UMC in Hickory, NC, and co-founder of Cycle to Lake Junaluska.
The Holy Rollers are a group of United Methodist cyclists who ride together once a year over the course of several days leading up to the annual meeting of the Virginia Conference. I first learned about the Holy Rollers several years ago and, as an avid recreational cyclist, thought how much fun it would be to do something similar leading up to our annual conference in Western North Carolina. Thinking it would be a formidable administrative task to sponsor such a ride I let the idea sit on the back burner until casually mentioning it to another cycling preacher and friend, Doug Miller.
Through Doug’s initiative, and in partnership with Brad Farrington of the Wesley Foundation at Appalachian State University, we have launched Cycle to Lake Junaluska. A 501(c) 3 non-profit organization through the Appalachian Wesley Foundation, Cycle to Lake Junaluska is designed to promote fellowship, physical fitness through cycling, and raise monies for various ministries of the United Methodist Church in the Western North Carolina Annual Conference (WNCC).
The first ever Cycle to Lake Junaluska benefit ride will take place this June 16-18, in the days leading up to Annual Conference. Over the course of three days and 160+ miles, we will ride from the WNC Conference Center in Charlotte to Casar UMC where we will spend the first night (62 miles). The next day will bring the challenging climb to Black Mountain UMC where we will spend our second night (53 miles). The last day will be an unhurried ride in the rolling valleys circumnavigating Asheville to Lake Junaluska (47 miles).
What’s Included In The Ride:
Riders may choose to ride one day or all three. T-Shirts and cycling jerseys are available for purchase. There will also be a “swag” bag of gifts from our sponsors, including the Clergy Health Initiative’s Pastor & Parish curriculum – a wonderful resource for strengthening relations between clergy and congregations and promoting the health of pastors. As a benefit ride in support of the various campus ministries in Western North Carolina, donations will be accepted.
This year’s route is outstanding and our overnight hosts will be providing great food and activities each evening. We may not be Holy Rollers but through three days of pedaling we may certainly become “spirited spinners” of our wheels. For brochures, registration and more information go to the C2LJ website and sign up today.
-Mark Andrews (pictured below with his bike)
Back at the beginning of January, I came across a new kind of calendar where you focus on a different wellness goal every day of the month. For each day, a healthy activity is suggested and you customize it by setting a goal that makes sense for you. The daily goals can be very simple and include things like hydration, having fun, eating healthy, staying active, and self-care… good habits that many of us in Spirited Life are striving for.
The blogger who creates these calendars says, “A healthy lifestyle is made up of a whole collection of small daily decisions… and when spread out over a week, month or year, it adds up to a healthy, happy you.” I found that even though I might only focus on hydration for one day, those actions I set up carry over into the following days and without meaning to, I’ve started a habit of drinking more water every day.
I enjoyed this exercise and plan on trying it again in February. Click here or on the image below to download a copy for yourself. And the good news is that this is for YOU, so if you don’t like one of the recommended activities, replace it with something of your choosing!
-Katie Huffman
(Find more calendars and healthy recipes at back to her roots)
With snow in the forecast for much of Central and Eastern North Carolina today, this is a timely reflection from Wellness Advocate, Lisa MacKenzie.
Last week I visited my daughter, her husband, and my 5-month-old granddaughter in Pennsylvania. It was bitterly cold and snowy, and I realized that I had been missing the crisp mid-winter chill and crunchy snow and the hush that comes with January storms in the northeast.
Looking out the kitchen window one morning, holding baby Guin, I watched cardinals in the 
front hedge against the pure white of fresh snow and thought about the 2 months of winter ahead and the storms that would inevitably come along with the disruption and inconvenience of slippery roads, school closings and frozen pipes. But in all the chaos of storms comes the blessing of solitude and stillness. I thought that morning that I had been given this gift of space and solitude many times but often didn’t acknowledge the gift—maybe it was the warmth and cuddliness of a baby and the smell of wood smoke along with the softness of the gentle light at dawn that became prayer in the quiet kitchen. That morning I didn’t miss the gift.
I read a recent post about snow days on a blog called the Busted Halo by Christina Gebel. She writes:
What I realized, or perhaps simply remembered, is that snow is a reminder to take pause, with others or even just with ourselves. The presence of snow can be a great spiritual exercise for us, inviting us to quiet down and be with ourselves.
If you want to accept the invitation to pause and go deeper, you might consider a few of these suggestions:
• Read a good book. Though it might sound cliché, how often have you “been meaning to” read something but never gotten around to it? Maybe there’s a spiritual read you’ve been meaning to pick up. Try starting the book on a snow day and then reading five pages each night as part of your nightly prayer.
• Have fun. There is no rule that only kids can have fun in the snow. When was the last time you went sledding? Went for a walk in the woods during winter? Went ice-skating? Built a snowman? A snow day is the time.
• Take a good look at snow. Snow is symbolic of so much of the spiritual beauty in our lives. Why do you think God made snow the way it is? Would it convey the same feelings if it were a different color? Different texture? Each snowflake is unique, reflecting the diversity of God’s creation. It’s made of water, which can be both soothing and powerful, reflecting the humility and omnipotence of God. Take a glove-full of fresh snow and meditate on the beauty and paradox of God’s creation.
• Be still. Be quiet. Snow has the ability to quiet a city, but it can also quiet our inner self. Go outside and stand in front of a winterscape. Or stay inside and feel the warmth and the absence of sounds outdoors. Repeat, to yourself, the line from the popular hymn, “For You, O Lord, my soul in stillness waits.”
So now I am home in Apex and it seems to me it’s time for a snow day… maybe you think so too.
-Lisa MacKenzie
Image by Flickr user rkramer62 via Creative Commons
The following post is by Spirited Life pastor Matt Smith, who serves as the Associate Pastor at Guilford College United Methodist Church in Greensboro, where he paces himself on runs of moderate distances. A version of this story appeared in the Crossroads Chronicle.
In each of the last three years, I have run in Western Carolina University’s Valley of the Lilies Half-Marathon. This year, for the first time, I wasn’t able to run that whole distance. On a seemingly endless hill, my calves got as tight as bowstrings, and I was forced to walk the last two miles. It may have been because I started too quickly or because I ate too little or (more likely) due to my inadequate training. I was disappointed, but my disappointment didn’t last long.
Having never walked much on Western’s campus, I had never realized how beautiful it is. I learned why the event is called “Valley of the Lilies” as I enjoyed the hundreds of white and yellow blooms lining the path. I encouraged the other runners as they passed me. I savored an energy bar. My feet were no longer racing, but my mind was. As someone who was gearing up for a new appointment, I thought about how it felt like my best running in this area is behind me.
My mild disappointment at my performance lead me to question other areas of my life where my efforts come in fits and spurts. In terms of my health: wouldn’t it be better for my health to commit to running three miles every other day throughout the year, rather than gearing up for such a long run annually? In terms of my motivations: in running so far this one day, was I just trying to prove something to myself or to others?
In terms of my work: hadn’t some of my most heroic efforts to do something novel and exciting fallen flat? In terms of discipleship: is it better to read a whole book of the Bible in one sitting or read a chapter every day? Maybe that’s why Eugene Peterson calls discipleship “a long obedience in the same direction.”
In a funny way, facing the answers to these questions wasn’t demoralizing but freeing. I beamed as I crossed the finish line, having been reminded that my worth doesn’t lie in my pushing myself to my limits or beyond them. It’s not our backbreaking toil, after all, but abiding in Jesus that enables us to bear great fruit.
Image by flickr user Jason A. Samfield, via Creative Commons.
Don’t miss the news about the winner of this week’s giveaway on Monday’s blog post! Thanks to everyone who participated in making this month-long celebration of our “blog-iversary” so much fun!
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
My new medical term for the month is “A-fib.” It’s short for atrial fibrillation, a type of cardiac arrhythmia. I’ve learned the term because Steve, a friend of mine at church, has the condition.
Doctors treat A-fib with electrical impulses to “tune” the heart back into its proper wave pattern. Steve has to ease carefully back into work and exercise. But he is confident he’ll master a new routine, with God’s help and support from friends and family. He is back at church now and feeling good.
My pastor offered a simple prayer for Steve that could apply for all of us:
“Give us good rhythm.”
The beating of a heart, the rhythms of breath, of laughter and crying, show us how vibration is at the core of our being. We hear and feel rhythm in nature: birds singing, crickets chirping. The philosopher Alan Watts has a lovely meditation on the delights of rhythm. Most forms of play and entertainment depend on rhythm — variety and complexity within a regular pattern. Watts concludes, “[A]n essential component of my heaven… would be absorption in rhythm.”
I am reminded that dance can be incorporated into Christian liturgy. Indeed, the origin of dance in human history may be rooted in spirituality and worship. Liturgical dance is not a recent innovation; it is a way of recovering an ancient tradition of communing with God through rhythm and body movement. Music and dance can be employed as therapy for mood disorders, neurological disorders, even in cases of stroke and heart disease.
Pastor/writer Jeffrey Cootsona shares his thoughts about the rhythms of leadership. Echoing Alan Watts, Cootsona reminds us that rhythm exists through a relationship between work and rest, sound and silence, yes and no, presence and absence.
We sometimes use balance as a metaphor for wellness and right living; Cootsona proposes rhythm as an alternative metaphor. Balance, after all, suggests something static, something delicate. If we lose our balance, there is often a painful fall. Rhythm is dynamic, it is robust. If we lose the beat, we often can recover it quickly. Indeed, there are often other people, partners in rhythm-making, to coach us back into the groove.
Cootsona cites neuroscience research, as well as advice from his father about carpentry, to make this point: Gritting our teeth to power our way through a creative block is counterproductive. It may even be unhealthy. Better to take a strategic break: Go for a walk. Listen to music. Fold a load of laundry. A well-timed break allows our stress to leach away, and our creativity to emerge.
How will you build constructive breaks into your routine?
A bigger question: Is there a “groove” in ministry where your best work happens, where your best self shines through, where a divine rhythm propels you or carries you along? Are there tricks or tactics to help you find the rhythm when you need it?
–John James
(Top image, “Endless Rhythm,” by Robert Delaunay, 1934, Tate Modern. Lower photo by Christophe Alary, both used with permission via Creative Commons.)
A recent study measured brain waves of healthy adults as they took a 25-minute walk through three different sections of Edinburgh, Scotland. Participants first traveled through an older, historic shopping district with light vehicle traffic, then down a path through a park-like setting, then through a busy, commercial district.
The researchers were attempting to identify whether a walk in the park could be an intervention for brain fatigue, a condition caused by the brain’s being overwhelmed by constant noise and input, resulting in distraction, forgetfulness, and flightiness.
When traveling through the urbanized, busy areas, brain wave patterns demonstrated higher arousal levels and more frustration. While in the park, the brain-wave readings became more meditative and quieter.
Jenny Roe, a lecturer at Heriot-Watt’s School of the Build Environment, commented to the New York Times Well Blog about the different ways the brain was engaged, based on environment:
“Natural environments still engage” the brain, she said, but the attention demanded “is effortless. It’s called involuntary attention in psychology. It holds our attention while at the same time allowing scope for reflection,” and providing a palliative to the nonstop attentional demands of typical, city streets.
Several of the comments on the blog echo what you may be thinking: “Nice to see this study, but I feel like it is confirming that the sun rises in the east,” or “What I get from this study is less about what a walk in the park does to our brain waves than amazement that so many of us still need science to ‘prove’ the validity of our experience.”
It doesn’t seem like rocket science, I agree, but I appreciate that it highlights an effective and low-cost strategy for how to reset our brain’s capacity to take in the world around us and make decisions with clarity. Our lives can quite easily be over-engaged with many responsibilities and being accessible all the time.
Dr. Roe also connects the seemingly obvious conclusion of the study with challenges for our daily lives:
“Right about now, you should consider taking a break from work,” Dr. Roe said, and “going for a walk in a green space or just sitting, or even viewing green spaces from your office window.” This is not unproductive lollygagging, Dr. Roe helpfully assured us. “It is likely to have a restorative effect and help with attention fatigue and stress recovery.” ‘
I’ll see you in ten minutes. I’m going for a walk.
–Catherine Wilson
Photo courtesy of Catherine Wilson, of one of her favorite mountain paths in western NC, and a favorite walking companion, Stella.