Hi, I’m Renée LeBlanc, the owner of this website. Let me tell you a little bit about onemindfulness.com.
I’ve maintained websites online for over 30 years, posting and blogging about what it’s like to be present and practice mindfulness in everyday life.
Personal experience
I’ve been teaching and facilitating groups, retreats and workshops since the late 1990s. In my time working with others, I’ve come to have a keen interest in how our personal experience, choices and transformation affect how we approach the world. The global benefits of introducing mindfulness into our personal lives.
I believe it’s important for us to talk about mindfulness. To read journals, articles and news items about it. To study the idea of it, and learn the scientific principles behind it. But practicing it, well… that’s a whole other thing.
On this website, my focus isn’t so much on definitions and instruction than on offering you a more personal, firsthand viewpoint of what it’s like to put mindfulness into practice.
More than just mindfulness
This site is about more than just mindfulness, though. I have a particular interest in using mindfulness to enhance self-care. In local women’s circles and workshops, I’ve taught the importance of mindful self-care, what it is and, just as importantly, what it isn’t. How to practice it.
Why would I want to practice mindfulness and self-care? To what end? They have been some of the most important tools I’ve found to cultivate inner silence in my life. A deep sense of being okay in my own skin. Being at peace, even amongst chaos.
- Mindfulness clears our experience of chaos so that we are being present with what IS.
- Self-care helps to silence the inner critic that created the chaos in the first place.
- Both are deeply personal, important tools which work together to cultivate inner silence, the absence of chaos.
All three ideas, mindfulness, self-care and inner silence, are distinctly separate, but dovetail beautifully in practice. Through writing my experiences, I hope to be able to help you define mindfulness, self-care and inner silence for yourself.
Invitation to share your experience with me
The way mindfulness and self-care work in our lives is deeply personal. Your experience may not be mine. And, often, there’s a lot of healing in just being heard.
As you read through this site and try different things, I invite you to share your experiences with me. I really mean this. I want to interact and get to know who you are. Please share with me, whether in the comments on each post, by email or on social media. You matter.
I don’t need you to agree with me to interact here. At the bottom of every post it says:
The thoughts in this post may touch something inside you that makes you go, “Aha! Yes!” Some may irritate you because they don’t apply or you don’t agree.
Both perceptions are equally valuable.
If you don’t agree with something I’ve written, please discuss, challenge, enlighten. I thrive on constantly learning and growing by being open to different perspectives. I appreciate your input, and you may be helping me or others who read what you’ve written without even knowing it.
As well, I believe we sometimes learn as much by finding out what doesn’t make sense to us as from what does ring true. The way to do that is to listen to other viewpoints with respect and openness. I may not agree with you, but I will always listen and engage with you to learn more. I hear you.
So, I invite discussion of all kinds, as long as they’re respectful.
Welcome to ONEmindfulness.