Hello and welcome to Mindfulness Plus. I'm your host, Thomas McConkey. Thanks so much for joining us today.

I want to talk about a phenomenon that occurs in our awareness that creates a lot of suffering

and makes our lives unnecessarily challenging.

I want to talk about that challenge and I want to talk about a solution or a response

that we can make to this challenge.

And I want to do that by way of telling a story.

Many of you who are local to the Salt Lake City or Utah area will know about Zion National Park

and a famous hike called the Narrows. It's a gorgeous

slot canyon down in Zion that people travel from all over the world to see. I remember I got a

permit with a friend of mine from Norway to hike this slot canyon a few years ago. And I'd heard about the dangers

of flash flooding and I went in, feeling a little bit nervous, going into the Ranger Station

to pick up my permit. And I had all these different things on my mind. Did I have the gear I needed?

You know, do I need a helmet? What are the

dangers? Is it raining this weekend? I had all these things going on in my mind. And I think the

ranger could read it on my face a little bit because as I picked up the permit, I asked her,

you know, do you have any final advice for me? This poor soul who's about to venture into the narrows and is

afraid for his life. And she kind of smiled at me and she said, yeah, don't forget to look up.

And I thought this was funny advice. It might have been the very last thing on my mind to actually

remember to pay attention to the beautiful scenery for this hike that I had gone to great lengths

to do and that people come from all over the world to do. But sure enough, the next morning,

when I got into the river with my friend, I noticed that

the path was really uneven.

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