Passion, The Savior
Posted: October 1, 2014 Filed under: Meditation, Yoga | Tags: blogging, Buddhism, compassion, cycling, Cyclocross, exercise, Faiure, family, fitness, freshly pressed, gratitude, happiness, harmony, health, hipster, kindness, life, love, lululemon, marathon, meditation, motivation, musings, nature, Omaha, passion, pilates, running, trail running, Truth, writing, yoga, Zen 10 CommentsAlways aim at complete harmony of thought and word and deed. Always aim at purifying your thoughts and everything will be well-
Before a cyclocross race recently, I was listening to a close friend describing his favorite hobby – He likes to make wooden toys and other wooden “things“. Although, he starts many projects and simply lets them stack up, unfinished. “I don’t have a real passion for my hobby at times,” he said to me … His last words before we started the race planted a question in my head that I have often thought about: How do we cultivate and nurture our passion(s) in life?
…
You know it when you feel it don’t you? You get that butterfly sense deep inside that “something” significant is close and you gently move towards it. You make room for “it” and you fully awaken to its presence in your life. Maybe these new-found feelings affirm what we desired, or maybe they will completely change them? For some folks, a single passion burns for their entire lives. It’s their true essence, their true authentic self and they would never give it up …
Daily Meditation:
I know that whatever compels me toward these deeper experience(s) will likely wear thin at certain times during my life. But you know what? It’s totally fine with me.
The Last Swim of Summer
Posted: September 25, 2014 Filed under: Meditation, Yoga | Tags: blogging, compassion, exercise, family, fitness, freshly pressed, gluten free, happiness, Jonathan Galassi, kindness, life, love, lululemon, marathon, motivation, musings, natural, nature, nebraska, Omaha, passion, perspective, pilates, Poetry, recovery, rest, running, simplicity, The Last Swim of Summer, walking, whole foods, writing, yoga, Zen 4 Comments…
ought to be swum
without knowing it,
afternoon lost to
re-finding the rock
you can stand on
way out past the
raft, the flat one
that lines up four-
square with the door
of the boathouse.
Freestyle and back-
stroke and hours on
the dock nattering
on while the low sun
keeps setting fin-
gers and toes getting
number and number …
how could we know
we were swimming the
last swim of summer?
Midnight :Sun:
Posted: September 23, 2014 Filed under: Meditation, Yoga | Tags: blogging, Buddha, Buddhism, calm, compassion, fitness, free range, freshly pressed, gluten free, happiness, health, hipster, hope, kindness, life, love, lululemon, marathon, meditation, Mindfulness, natural, nature, Omaha, passion, perspective, running, trail running, yoga, Zen 11 CommentsDo not ruin today with mourning tomorrow-
Struggling to eliminate our flaws, tossing abrasive feelings to the side … Fighting ourselves into a place we deem more pleasant and less disruptive. Our instinctual fight or flight response operates in perpetual “autopilot” mode, navigating us toward safety. Although, what happens when we switch our autopilot system off?
…
I quite literally stumbled, and flicked my autopilot switch from “on” to “mindfulness” about five years ago. Mindfulness offered me a very specific and helpful way to accept, and value myself, by gently inviting me to pause … To look within my thoughts, and notice what I am experiencing moment to moment – The polar opposite of killing the gym and running myself into the ground. Rather than conclude something was “wrong” with me for experiencing troubling thoughts and feelings, I simply acknowledged and attended to whatever I happened to notice at the time. Acceptance of who I am is enormously freeing, as long as I pause long enough to recognize that the path forward is awakening to myself, and not who I want or wish I could be.
Daily Meditation:
As the many experiences in life arise and float away, we dip our toes into a pool of stillness that has long sat stagnant.
We Shall Be Released
Posted: September 18, 2014 Filed under: Meditation, Yoga | Tags: blogging, happiness, Joesph Stroud, kindness, life, love, meditation, Mindfulness, nature, nebraska, Omaha, Poetry, Spirituality, Zen 4 Comments…
Every afternoon that autumn
walking across campus
past the conservatory
I heard the soprano
practicing
her voice rising
making its way up the scale
straining to claim each note
weeks of work
of days
growing shorter
darker
storms slamming the campus
the semester staggering
to an end
everyone exhausted
drained
heading out and going home
the campus nearly deserted
but the soprano
still working the scales
when I passed under the trees
the liquidambars on fire
the clouds like great cities
sailing out to sea
and didn’t I ascend
with her
my own weariness
and sorrows
dropping away
didn’t we rise together
her voice straining
wavering
at the top of its range
almost reaching
almost claiming
that high
free-of-the-body
final note
West of the : Moon :
Posted: September 17, 2014 Filed under: Meditation, Yoga | Tags: blogging, Buddhism, compassion, cycling, Cyclocross, free range, freshly pressed, friends, gluten free, happiness, health, hope, kindness, life, love, lululemon, marathon, meditation, Mindfulness, motivation, musings, natural, nature, nebraska, Omaha, paleo, passion, perspective, pilates, social media, Star City CX, technology, trail running, yoga 9 CommentsWith enough courage, you can do without a reputation-
Does it seem as though we are constantly defining who we are by our actions? Why is it difficult telling, or explaining who we really are?
…
Being distracted, busy and stressed is a choice I often make without a second thought. No one is forcing me to take on all of these responsibilities and activities in my life. Sometimes it seems that being stressed out and busy is a symbol of status in our society. Raise your hand if you have uttered the following phrase(s): “I’m a _____” or “Look at all of these “things” I do.”
I’m a yoga instructor, pilates teacher, and coach. I’m an avid cyclist, a quasi racer and competitive. I’m an engineer of some sort … I …
Whatever happened to just being? I believe our identities have been so wrapped up in what we do that we have forgotten what it is like to just be.
Daily Meditation:
I need to pause now and – be, me.
CultFit 