Episode 109: Practices for Well-Being ~ Part 2 | Galaxy’s Edge – Thumbs Up or Down?

In Episode 109 of the Wandering But Not Lost Podcast, co-hosts Matt Emerson and Jan O’Brien conclude their 2-part discussion on well-being.  Creating balance and stabilizing your life will allow you to thrive in every area!  In our Zen we travel across the galaxy to Batuu where we experience the newest addition to Disney’s Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge – The Rise of the Resistance attraction.

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Missed Part 1?  Go to Episode 108 https://wbnlpodcast.com/episode108

Practice Mindfulness & Meditation

One basic definition of meditation, or mindfulness meditation, is focusing on doing one thing at a time – which brings us to the present moment. Distraction has become our new reality in a world where we are constantly checking and sending email, texts, and our social media updates.

Learning to quiet the mind has undeniable benefits at a time when our attention is on overload and overwhelm from multiple sources all day, every day.

Reality Check…Meditation can be as easy as just focusing on your breath!

Check out these articles and links to meditation resources:

Just Breathe

This exercise is a natural tranquilizer for the nervous system. Unlike tranquilizing drugs, which are often effective when you first take them but then lose their power over time, this exercise is subtle when you first try it but gains in power with repetition and practice. Do it at least twice a day. You cannot do it too frequently. Do not do more than four breaths at one time for the first month of practice. Later, if you wish, you can extend it to eight breaths. If you feel a little lightheaded when you first breathe this way, do not be concerned; it will pass.

Set S.M.A.R.T. Goals in all areas of your life

Identify clear, concise, SMART goals and know your WHY for each of them.

Specific/Simple 


Measurable/Meaningful to you 


Attainable/As if Now/All areas of your life 


Realistic/Responsible 


Timeframe/Toward what you want

Creative Visualization

Creative visualization is the technique of using your imagination to create what you want in your life. There is nothing at all new, strange, or unusual about creative visualization. You are already using it every day — every minute in fact. It is your natural power of imagination, the basic creative energy of the universe, which you use constantly, whether or not you are aware of it.

When we create something, we always create it first in thought-form. A thought or idea always precedes manifestation. – Shakti Gawain

http://www.shaktigawain.com/products/books/creative-visualization

Power of Affirmations

Affirmations simply put, are statements of belief.  The statement may be internal or external, positive or negative, personal or environmental. It may affirm and declare your success or your failure. The words you choose, the thoughts you think and the emotions you feel are powerful and create your reality.  Affirmations are self-fulfilling prophecies; they come true.

Affirmations are most effective in the FIRST PERSON, PRESENT TENSE.

Keep a Journal

Journaling is a cathartic and powerful practice to incorporate into your life.

Best Tips for Journaling

Ask for Help!

Don’t try to do it all by yourself. Collaboration with like-minded people has so many benefits including accountability, mutual support, creativity, and fun. The journey is so much more fun and enjoyable when you share it with others.

Get Up & Get Out!

At WBNL Coaching, we believe that getting up and getting out is an important part of reaching alignment and connection. In order for you to fire on all cylinders, you need to have an open mind & be refreshed so that you are ready to take on the world. 

When you have truly identified what you love to do a magical thing can occur. Work and play can become synonymous. We’ve found that most of the best ideas occur when you allow yourself to get away from your office and computer. Move around, get inspired by nature, take a hike – do whatever leisure time activity you enjoy. Americans are notorious for not taking enough time off. It is a part of the corporate structure that is stifling creativity and productivity. Block out time to get away and take a break. It will recharge you and you’ll find that you are happier, more rested, and more eager to get back to work. 

Some ideas to Get Up & Get Out!

Visit http://wanderingbutnotlost.com/

If you are a Disney or Star Wars fan or even fan adjacent you have probably been caught up in the hype over Disneyland’s Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge for years now.   The rumors, leaks and updates across fan sites and podcasts have been strong with this one.  From an expectation standpoint it is easy to understand that Imagineers had a huge undertaking on their hands.  In the end they created an incredibly immersive experience that stretched the boundaries of technology and theme park attraction storytelling.  With the Rise of the Resistance attraction opening here on the west coast back in January, phase 1 of the land is now complete.  We had an opportunity to secure a boarding group recently and in today’s Zen we’ll chat about our mission.  You have probably already seen much of what goes on in the attraction, but to be on the safe side, what you see and hear in this Zen won’t be filled with spoilers…

 

 

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Under Disney’s stewardship, the Star Wars franchise has flourished.  It has touched every possible media and market outlet; music, games, consumer products, animation, feature films, and theme parks.  At the theme park level, the franchise was shoehorned into Tomorrowland for years, much to the delight of fans and even the most devout Disney purest has softened to the idea of Mickey & Minnie coexisting with C3-PO and R2-D2.  When the initial plans for a Star Wars Land started to circulate there was pure fandamonium.

The ground was broken in both Disneyland and in Hollywood Studios Park in Florida for an epic 14-acre land that was billed to immerse guests into the world of Star Wars, unlike anything that had ever been attempted before.  Batuu, a planet created especially for this new area is the home of the Black Spire Outpost where you can get insights and interact with the First Order as well as the Resistance Fighters.  The area is set, storywise, in and around Episode 7 & 8 of the film series.  The official language of Batuu is Aurebesh and when the land opened that was pretty much all that you saw on the area’s signage.  They took immersion to the extreme.  Cast members all play roles within the land and stay in character as a native Batuuian (just go with that!  HA).  Hello or good morning is “Bright Suns” and goodbye or farewell is “‘Til the Spire”, “May the Spires Keep You”,  or “Good Journey”.  During my wanderings of the outpost, I’ve found this to a nice touch and A+ to the Theme Park Operations team for training this enormous team of cast members to get into character.  The merchandise sold in the area is themed to items that would actually be sold on Batuu.  So, that means that if you are looking for a Galaxy’s Edge hoodie or a Chewy backpack you’ll have to head back over to Tomorrowland to make your purchase.  To learn more about Galaxy’s Edge go to our post written just after the land opened last year –http://wanderingbutnotlost.com/project/wandering-the-black-spire-outpost/

The land opened with high expectations and much fanfare on both coasts.  Oh, it also opened without its signature attraction, Rise of the Resistance.  The Millennium Falcon:  Smuggler’s Run, a great team simulator ride that puts you in the cockpit of the Falcon was ready to go and the Imagineers did a fantastic job creating an authentic flight simulator experience and because there are multiple roles (Engineer, Gunner, & Pilot) you can experience it differently with each trip.  Due to some construction delays, the ROTR didn’t open until December in Walt Disney World and  January in Disneyland.  Reaction to the land was quite mixed and many stayed away until the signature experience opened. 

If there was any doubt about the success of Galaxy’s Edge I’m positive that the folks in Burbank are breathing a sigh of relief.  The parks on both coasts have been overwhelmed with guests ready to get into Batuu.  The queue for this attraction would no doubt carry a consistent several hour wait so the Ops team developed a boarding group process where you would use the Disney app to join and be notified when to come to the attraction to join the queue.  This, in theory, would allow guests to spend time doing other things in Batuu or around the park.    As it turns out, obtaining a  boarding group has become quite a thing!  Seems as though they are still working the kinks out of the attraction and there seems to be quite a bit of downtime each day.  This is quite normal with a new attraction and even more understandable considering the complexity of this one. 

Here is how you can secure a boarding group at Disneyland, the process is the same at Disney World except you obviously need to download the Walt Disney World App:

• First and foremost, make sure you have downloaded the Disneyland App before arriving at the Resort and this should go without saying but… if you are an annual passholder, check for blackout dates!
• Have an account set up and logged into the app.  It is wise that one person in your group is in charge of getting the boarding group.  To do so that lucky individual will need to have every person’s ticket linked to their account in the app.  This process isn’t difficult but make sure that you do it prior to getting there if possible, you will not want to be racing to get that done as you are watching the clock for park opening
• Once you have entered Disneyland (through the turnstiles and into the park, not Downtown Disney), open the official Disneyland app and look for the Star Wars block on the main page – currently is sits directly under the map of the parks.  Click the “Find Out More” button and then look for the “join boarding group” button. The “join boarding group” button will unlock at scheduled park opening and you will have access to join a boarding group. You will then be assigned a boarding group number which will be used to indicate when you can return to the attraction.  There is a second button you’ll see that is called “My Status” – AVOID this one for now
• At exactly Park opening you will be able to try to join a boarding group – along with everyone else!
• If you do not use a smartphone or cannot use the Disneyland App, passes are available at the Fastpass distribution area outside of Splash Mountain. It is unknown just how many boarding group slots are set aside for this option and I’ve read many reviews where using this technique has paid off with very low boarding group numbers. HOWEVER, this is a crapshoot and you take your chances making the dash to Splash.  Ever since opening day, on both coasts, ALL boarding groups were claimed within seconds of park opening.
• When a boarding group number is called, a push-notification will be sent to everyone with that specific number, letting them know that they have two hours to make their way to the attraction and redeem their boarding pass
• Be sure to check your phone often for the notification, and ensure that your phone isn’t on silent mode. This is a notification you don’t want to miss!
• In addition to the Disneyland App, there are signboards around the park indicating which boarding groups are currently being called

Easy peasy, right!?!?  Actually it is a pretty easy process and the excitement and energy among the guests is pretty cool – well perhaps not so much for those who get aced out of a boarding group.  Yes, that definitely happens and even getting a boarding group number doesn’t mean you will definitely be riding.  Remember, this is a new attraction and there are situations that come up that will shut it down for periods of time throughout the day.  They seem to have landed on 81 boarding groups as being the magic number and every group higher than that is classified as a stand-by or back-up group.  If your boarding group number is higher than 81 (ours was 89) don’t throw in the towel.  Many days they’ve gotten well into the 100’s and I’ve heard of it topping 150.  You just have to set your expectations and be ready for anything.

It was extremely busy the day that we decided to tackle it.  The park was set to open at 8am.   We arrived at the Mickey & Friends parking structure at 6:10 am and it took us a good 40 minutes to get into the structure, once in, it went smoothly.  The Security and the Tram process was also extremely efficient.  We stepped off the tram into the largest crowd of people that I’ve ever seen and the clock was ticking to 8 am.  There were so many people that the lines actually reach the DCA gates and then doubled back toward DL.  It was a bit chaotic and there were few cast members around to assist.  The half dozen or so turnstiles on the right-hand side were designated for Magic Morning guests which added to the chaos.  Here’s a Pro Tip – keep watching these lines because they are significantly shorter than the others.  At about 7:35 they started to convert these from Magic Morning to regular entry.  Our timing was perfect and we were able to get into the park at 7:55.  

Because you aren’t there to run to the attraction, all you need to do is be scanned in the front gate so there is no need to rush to the end of Main Street.  We casually walked down the street and when 8 am struck there was a sudden hush among the crowd.  Seconds later there was jubilation and cheering from the people that got low boarding group numbers and groans from those who did not.  We got group 89 so we gave it a little wince and then went on with our day of waiting.  Actually, it was an awesome one.  We booked Fastpass after Fastpass and rode more attractions than we have in years.  A byproduct of this process is that many of the people are there ONLY to ride ROTR and if they get aced out of a group or get a high number, they simply leave.  This makes is look packed at rope drop but in reality, the days have been turning out to be quite manageable –  well, Disneyland manageable anyway!

We watched the boarding groups get called throughout the morning and it looked like things were really moving along well.  Then about 1 pm, the numbers stalled for an hour or so.  Clearly there was an issue but we were good with that because Trader Sam’s was calling!  The afternoon went on and at about 6 pm we noticed that our boarding group was about 4 from being called.  At that point, we started to meander into Batuu and around 6:30 boarding group 89 was called!  Our time had come.  It was now time to get in the queue, which turned out to be another 45 minutes or so.  Here’s a sneak peek of the attraction and to hear our thoughts on the experience, you’ll have to listen or watch the episode!

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