Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, July 19, 1993 TAG: 9309170405
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: 1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: ALMENA HUGHES STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Lusk is far from frazzled because she practices the techniques that she's preached for 16 years. She offsets her juggling act of work, travel, family, volunteer activities and personal interests with days that usually start with yoga stretches. For 10 years she has kept a personal journal, and she routinely integrates short pauses for reflection and relaxation into her daily routine.
"People don't take time to relax," she observes, although data and research show that they need to. "Taking time seems foreign and brings on feelings of guilt, although paying attention to their own well-being makes them more productive and improves what they can give to others," she says.
Mostly, though, she's found that people don't relax simply because they don't know how.
"People will go to workshops, read a book or a magazine article and try to learn cognizantly how to relax. But what they really need is the real-life experience and practical application of relaxation and what it feels like," she says.
"They need to be more aware of their bodies from minute to minute and know how they feel when they're tense. The idea is to feel the tension and let the emotions and reactions happen, but then let them pass on through."
"30 Scripts for Relaxation, Imagery & Inner Healing," Volumes 1 and 2, for which Lusk both wrote and edited, are designed to help people achieve the relaxation experience. The scripts also aim to help users "get centered," relieve stress, manage their weight, stop smoking, connect with nature, change their behavior, increase their self-esteem and heal themselves.
The scripts originally were intended to be read aloud or recorded by qualified relaxation or imaging-group leaders, counselors, doctors, psychologists, Lamaze teachers, biofeedback therapists, actors and others who use relaxation and imaging techniques. Several scripts also are available on audio cassettes. Lusk believes the scripts are more beneficial heard and participated in than simply read.
She divides relaxation into two types: active might mean going to the movies, to the mall or engaging in some form of sport or other diversion; passive might involve prayer, reflection, meditation, deep breathing and quieting kinds of things. People normally will rely on one or two favorites - even something harmful like cigarettes and alcohol - she says. But she recommends trying new forms of relaxation, including passive and active types.
For example, she says, "A person might think he's tired and needs to sleep more when, in fact, what's needed is physical activity to get his energy levels up."
Relaxation isn't something only done during vacation; it's an ongoing awareness, Lusk says. Almost anywhere, anytime, you can practice deep breathing, inhaling positive thoughts along with oxygen to replenish and nourish cells and exhaling hurts and negative notions along with poisons, toxins and wastes.
Further, an ongoing awareness of when you are tense can give important clues to what's going on in your life so you can make adjustments and corrections.
\ The scripts in Lusk's books make relaxation a prerequisite for the imagery and inner-healing exercises, which use positive visualization and body-mind correlation.
To demonstrate the correlation, Lusk has me clasp my hands together with my index fingers pointing up and held apart. She tells me not to move the fingers, but to keep telling them - silently and mentally - to close. As she repeats the words, "close, close, close," the fingers eerily move toward each other, seemingly of their own volition.
"My point is that they are finding that the mind and the body are one, that the emotions you feel have a chemical response, too. We need to be aware and careful of the messages we are sending ourselves because our bodies listen to what our minds tell them. So what if we started training our minds to give out more positive thoughts?" Lusk says.
She clarifies that the correlation is not direct. For example, if you say your job is a pain in the neck, you won't automatically get a headache. Yet, people often feel tension at the base of their necks when forced to confront something that they consider a pain. It all ties together, Lusk says.
Because of her background in health and well-being teaching and counseling, she was aware of many relaxation and imaging scripts by various authors in diverse sources. She thought it would be helpful to have them all in one place. She wrote her suggestion to stress-management pioneer and publisher Donald A. Tubesing, who responded, "Great idea, you do it; a contract's in the mail."
She says she felt confident that she could handle the project if she paced herself and continued to practice her relaxation techniques.
While working in special services at Virginia Western Community College, she compiled and self-published a book of chapters from various community colleges in "The Handi Book Reference Manual for Working With Handicapped Students." And as founder and volunteer chairperson for the Alive & Well Coalition, she became proficient at getting people to work together and using their strengths.
Because the books were not directly related to her job at Lewis-Gale, Lusk mainly worked Sunday evenings, soliciting experts for their favorite scripts. Local contributors included James Borling, director of Radford University's Music Therapy Program; psychologist John Heil; Registered Nurse Flora Kay; guidance counselor Barbara Kyle, counselor and massage therapist Karen Lane and yoga teacher and guided-imagery leader Debbie Stevens. Lusk also received submissions from nationally and internationally known experts such as yoga instructor Lilias Folan and Tubesing and his wife, Nancy Loving Tubesing.
She made her first contacts in February, and within seven months the first book was ready to go. It was released in July '92, and Volume 2 was released this month. The books and tapes are available for $19.95 and $9.95 respectively at Ram's Head Book Shop, Phoenix-The Earth Store, Lewis-Gale Gift Shop and Printer's Ink, or through Tubesing's company, Whole Person Associates (800) 247-6789.
Lusk is scheduled to teach a course called "Healing and the Mind" this fall through the Hollins Women's Center. And she'll be signing books at Ram's Head Book Shop from 11 a.m.-1 p.m. on July 31. Which means she still has a little time left to spend with David Lusk, her husband of 16 years; to indulge in her hobbies of hiking, reading, and playing the flute; and, of course, to relax.
by CNB