September 13th

I'm now 1 month into my holiday and have done so much since my last post. I'm writing this in the Rocky mountains Colorado.

Going back to Michigan first.

My first retreat , "Mindfulness in action" (15-23 August)

This course was an huge challenge and felt like mind boot camp. The retreat went from 9am-9pm, 8 of those hours were either sitting or walking meditation. We had lovely meals with "functional talking" only. A determined mind, pain killers, chocolate and coffee got me through.

I sat and sat and sat some more and after 9 days I had a smile and my abdominal muscles still worked.

I met some wonderful people.

We ate great food and we did laugh.

This 9 days was a wonderful experience, the aim for me was to learn meditation. I certainly threw myself in there with very little sitting endurance. Now the challenge will be to keep practising.

24th August:

Visit a hockey centre at  Kent state University.

I flew from Kalamazoo, Michigan to Cleveland, Ohio and stayed 15mins from the university. 

Firstly, I did a hike through Virginia Kendall Park. 

I now know what a "overlook" is!!!

Kent state University hockey program has a budget of $600,000/Annam. 

Three full time quality hockey  coaches, part time strength and conditioning coach, psychologist and nutritionist. This 1 team gets 15-20 hours of coaching /week for 6 months of the year. Interesting answer by 1 of the coaches when I asked what he would like to add to the program. "Have the psychologist be full time" Inferring that lack of confidence in the athletes, is a big limiting factor to their performance.

Strength and conditioning session started the session.

Warm up. Love the facilities.

On the turf for 2 hours.

Smiling faces after.