But in a world where these modern day heroes face one crisis after another – stress takes its toll. First responders often suffer from a condition called CIS – Critical Incident Stress. With CIS, the body and mind react adversely to long-term exposure to stress – exhibiting symptoms that can be dangerous and debilitating over time, affecting their work and family lives. CIS is a growing concern in the first responder community, and recently they have reached out to seek alternative healing models to help them. Now, they will be learning to chant mantras or sound current meditation to experience inner peacefulness in the face of the turbulence of their everyday work.

The program that Dr. Khalsa and Kamaljit Kohli created takes the thousands-year-old traditions of meditation, Ayurveda, and yoga and highlights its most basic and important components: chanting, breathing, meditation, and a healing Ayurvedic diet. Dr. Khalsa explains “first responders learn to chant simple mantras, such as Sat Nam Wahe Guru, so they can calmly focus the mind and drink health-giving, Ayurvecic teas to help rebuild the nervous system.” Some of the techniques they learned can be practiced at work – and can be done in as little as three to five minutes so that the stress they experience is released instead of stored in the body.

According to Kamaljit Kohli, “The symptoms of stress are surpassing heart disease as the number one killer in the United States.” The healing science of Ayurveda combined with chanting, conscious breathing, and meditation, can help first responders to release the stress from their work.

The technology of Yoga and Meditation is being offered for the first time to help First Responders maintain resiliency and endurance. The New Mexico Office of Health Emergency Management is providing the classes through Create Inner Peace and Resiliency of Española. In this landmark project pioneered by the State of New Mexico, First Responders can attend FREE classes in four New Mexico cities: Taos, Espanola, Santa Fe, and Albuquerque. The results of recent studies and increasing requirements for first responders indicate that there is a need to give them better resources and technology to help them mitigate the effects and reduce their susceptibility to falling victim to Critical Incident Stress, according to the Center for Disease Control’s National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.Dr. Bibiji Inderjit Kaur, Founder of Create Inner Peace,says that millions are finding yoga and meditation to be effective tools for increasing resiliency and managing recovery from high stress/high risk incidents. First Responders will receive up to 12 Continuing Education credits for completing all sessions of the six-week course (Reviewed and Approved by the New Mexico EMS Bureau for Continuing Education).

First Responders are attending classes in Yoga and Meditation to help increase their stamina and build resiliency in four cities throughout Northern New Mexico. The technology of yoga and meditation is being offered for the first time by the State of New Mexico to give their First Responder better options for dealing with the overwhelming stress of their jobs. Police, fire fighters, paramedics, doctors, nurses, 911 dispatch operators, and many other emergency services personnel face the worst in our society day after day, and studies have shown they the stress takes a toll on the physical and mental health. Following the attacks of 9/11 and the disastrous hurricanes in Florida and Katrina and Rita in the Gulf Coast, Emergency Services Planners saw the terrible toll suffered by all of the first responder who went to the aid of those suffering and in many cases became victims themselves of the tragedies

In this landmark project pioneered by the State of New Mexico, First Responders are attending FREE classes in Espanola, Santa Fe, Albuquerque, and Taos; and they will receive up to 12 Continuing Education credits for each session they attend of the six-week program (Reviewed and Approved by the New Mexico EMS Bureau for Continuing Education).

Dr. Bibiji Inderjit Kaur, Founder of Create Inner Peace, says that millions are finding yoga and meditation to be effective tools for increasing resiliency and managing recovery from high stress/high pressure incidents. The results of recent studies and increasing requirements for first responders indicate that there is a need to give them better resources and technology to help them mitigate the effects and reduce their susceptibility to falling victim to Critical Incident Stress, according to the Center for Disease Control’s National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.