Category: Journey to YOUR HeartLand

January 20, 2020

I need an app for instant posting to this blog. The WP app blocks me.

Anyway, I’ve heard from Roxanne about difficulty climbing. What an awesome mussionnitbwould be to transform her relationship with climbing, as I did with Mary!

Breathing. Stepping. Discovering a the pace that works for her body and soul together, so that walking up mountains is an eagerly awaited transformational event!

I believe that is an accessible practice by blending my Meet the Mountains technique with mindful sensory observation, nonsenory awareness, and the 13 Steps to Radical Forgiveness. read more

Cheryl hiked the entire AT over four years. Marked by interruptions from hurting knees and caring for her aging father, she had many opportunities to transform her fears, her discomforts, her concerns as she held fast to her dream of walking the Appalachian Trail. I met Cheryl as she prepared for her (third) year. She knew that she needed a change in perspective going back out to complete the White Mountains of New Hampshire. She remembers her feeling of pain and disappointment mixed in with the urgency of finding her way off the trail. Something she said in the women’s group motivated me to reach out to her and she responded. We talked! I could help her stay focused, have tools to transform her disappointment, stay true to her dream while also being available to care for her aged and ailing father. Her dad urged her to hike. It was her knees that drove her off. That year, she used yoga and nutrition to heal and strengthen her body. She returned to the trail. Again, the challenges of pain and responsibility cut her walk short. In Palmerton, PA she posted in the women’s group about her anxiety summiting the steep, rugged climb out of Lehigh Gap, a notorious obstacle for many AT hikers. I wrote, “You get to choose each step’s difficulty one at a time. What if you choose each step to be easy?” She now remembers that climb being easy and surprisingly quick. “I heard your voice, Regina, saying “make each step mindful. And I did that! That was my method of continuing that year. And I made it to Katahdin!” read more

October 23, 2019

I wrote this in response to a post by Kelly Joy Simmons as she explored and explained her identity.

Thanks for inviting me to look at my own relationship with identity. Mine has been a sort of opposite from yours, Kelly. 40 years ago, I quit my budding career enticing people to connect with Nature at an outdoor education center to be married. My husband “had a better job” I told everyone, “so we’ll live where he works.” For 35 years I was constantly creating my identity while I lavished my three sons with my presence in their lives. I loved being their mom, and learned to take a stand for my value as a mom, a house remodeler, teacher, budget keeper, and even a Nature interpreter sometimes! I had plenty of opportunities to claim my identity, my value, when responding to the usual reactions to my “Mom at home” introduction of “Oh, so you’re not working!” read more

October 23, 2019

I recently finished a long walk of the Oregon Coast Trail. If you haven’t yet, you can read my journal of that walk here: Regina’s Oregon Coast Trail Journal

Well, I used to feel let down when I got back home from one of my walks. I perceived separation between my trail world and my home world. That all changed when I got a job as a ridgerunner on the Appalachian Trail. My workplace was the Trail! One day, I stood at the base of Bluff Mountain, looked around at the rare spruce trees and reflected on the conversation I had just had with a hiker and realized, “I’m living my dream. I’m earning my living hiking!”  As the ridgerunning season passed and I went back to my house in Atlanta, I had a new view and a whole list of hikers I had met. They had shared their stories, their joys, their disappointments, their impressions of the Trail and what they thought about their hike. Mostly, I had listened to how they felt about their hikes. Some loved their walk! Others were disappointed with the difficulties they were having. I knew I could contribute to each of them! From this vantage point, the Trail world and the Home world seemed closer together! They depended on each other! Hikers needed people at home to support them. Hikers needed preparation at home After their hike they needed to go back and create something just as fulfilling as their hike; they needed to heal their disappointment if they quit; they needed to reconcile relationships with others. read more

Haha. Already did it a second time, and yes, it was very different! Three long sections over two years instead of a 7-month thru. Different season. Way less stress knowing how to accomplish town stops! More camping, fewer shelters. I loved revisiting familiar spots and having a different experience there. It was interesting how many details I had missed and that I remembered a lot too! And, we also tried new services, shuttles, car rental. The AT felt like home! Food and resupply was more familiar, so less stressful and more like a lifestyle than a new adventure. I had figured out my pace and how to climb mountains easily, so I could focus on the scenery and enjoyment, not struggling up the mountains and beating out the miles. And the Whites were still challenging with wind, staying at the huts, and figuring out where to spend the night. Glad we stayed at the Joe Dodge Lodge this time in the Whites. I’m guess every time would be different!! The trail is a blank canvas on which to paint our inner journeys! read more

September 13, 20196:45 p.m. Finished! We crossed the Oregon-California state line on the beach at Crissey Field State Park. There was no marker. John looked at Google Maps. We situated ourselves so the little blue dot hovered over the line. Done!

To get here we returned to the bus stop across the street from the Fred Meyer store in Brookings. That’s the furthest south we had been until today. That’s where we had caught the bus a few days ago on our van retrieval mission.From that point, John maneuvered around to the beach spots he had found either in Bonnie’s book or by studying Google Maps. The “official” trail had us walking the road pretty much all the way to Crissey Field State Park, a few miles south. We turned down side streets a few times and walked in little parks and beaches:* Chetco Point Park* McVay Point*Crissey Field State Park read more