Triumph of the Human Heart ~ (6/7) @iactivism Sometimes, the present moment is the only thing that can save us from our toughest memories. Oumda was imprisoned, tortured and almost executed in Khartoum before he escaped back to Darfur, where he led a community of over 7500 out of Sudan to Chad, fleeing their villages in a rain of bullets. 44 members of his family were murdered. Now, he says, “You are all my family” - all of us at iACT, as well as all the refugees. Oumda usually radiated good cheer and optimism, but once in a while, he would fall silent and look sad. When I asked him what was wrong, he said simply, “Flashback.” Could this be the reason the refugees said they loved mindfulness best of all the training? The focus on being grounded in the present moment helped when someone was having a flashback to their trauma. They learned to pause, take some conscious breaths with eyes open, tune into sensations in the body - feet on the ground, arms and shoulders relaxed, feeling their bellies as they breathe in and out, listening to the sounds of the present moment - opening all the senses to what was actually happening in the here and now where they were in relative safety. At first, I didn’t understand why, in a refugee camp without sufficient food or medicine, mindfulness was being treated as a priority as well. But this is where iACT was different. they didn’t just assume what refugees needed like so much foreign aid often does, instead they asked and they listened. As Oumda says in the video, when asked what they needed, their response was “We need education. We need sport. And we need justice”. Mindfulness and trauma resiliency was so much more essential than I had realized. I knew the value of mindfulness in my own life and I was reminded not to assume what was valuable in somebody else's. No one denied the necessity of safe food, water, and medicine—but emotional and physical wellbeing don’t have to be in opposition. If you would like to support iACT, please visit the link in my bio. #mindfulness #refugeecrisis #heartfulness