Monday, March 28, 2011

40 Days to Revolution 3


This week we have been asked to reflect on Grace… and to consider how to maintain balance and equanimity in our busy lives.  I reckon it gets easier with age.  I am not sure why that is.  Less busy? No, not really.  Realization of what is actually important?  Yes, likely. 

Meanwhile, the best part of my busy week was finding time to share with my yoga revolution buddy who is a sweetie and awfully talented.  We were present with each other.  We were alive and refreshed from Mary’s Iyengar yoga.  We were blessed with Grace in our shared time together.

Final stolen thoughts:
“Grace has been defined as the outward expression of the inward harmony of the soul.”
William Hazlitt

Sunday, March 20, 2011

 
40 Days to Revolution Circle of Life
 .Spirit.Joy.Relationships.Family.Home.Health.Athletics.Eating/Cooking.Education.
.Career.Finances.Creativity

Saturday, March 19, 2011

40 Days to Revolution 3/20/11

Courageous moments

Have you ever stood on a cliff
on the edge of the world wondering, what if?

One step and you fall into the abyss
or you fly into a future of bliss.

I have.
I have stood on a cliff holding my best friend’s hand
when we said, “I do” and, “yes we can.”

Have you ever faced a thicket--
a wall of bushes so high stretching left and right?

The intertwined branches and leaves
making a dense tangled fence.

I have.
I have faced the thicket of unknowns holding in one hand my child’s hand
and in the other a machete to wield against the wilderness.

Have you ever been in a celestial black hole
with dark shadows closing in on your soul?

Where the tiny light is brilliant and tender
where the time is short and honored.

I have.
I have hung upon that precipice of darkness
and laid to rest half my heart.

Have you ever been blinded with half a mind?
Felt permanently puzzled and paralyzed?

Wondering how am I to improvise?
What should I do? What’s the point?

I have.
Daily, I have stood in that lonely spot and felt lost
and unprepared, and yet have persevered.

These are my courageous moments.

Thursday, March 10, 2011

40 Days to Revolution 3/10/11

What is it to be living in the present?  Why do we want it?  Actually, why are we asking this question and why is it bugging me?

First, for there to be “living in the present”, there must be living in the past and living in the future.

Living in the past is reliving memories.  That can be good and bad, happy and sad.  We can learn from the past—that is good.  We can do that in the present:  analyzing a past event or action. We can’t change the past.  But we can’t stay there.  Living only in the past.  It’s only a third of life.

Living in the future is dreaming and hoping and planning.  It might be worrying.  It might be wishing.  We can do that in the present.  But we can’t live there either.  It’s only a third of life.

The third third… Living in the present.  I think the problem is that we live in the past and future half and half without enough present. We bring or allow the past and the future to dominate our thoughts in the present.  Therefore, the goal perhaps, is be aware of what is around us, when the world intrudes, but to maintain a mental distance. 

And yet there is something to be said for refection and daydreaming.  There is something to be said for “zoning out” when you are completely involved—so much so that you are lost in the present.