: Oooh :
Posted: January 21, 2015 Filed under: Kindness, Meditation, Yoga | Tags: beauty, Buddhism, cycling, Identity, life, love, meditation, Mindfulness, Omaha, passion, Rituals, writing, yoga, Zen 10 CommentsThe best way out is always through-
Early this morning, like most mornings, I eventually wake up (key word = eventually) and so begins a series of gentle actions that are my morning ritual.
As each cold foot plants shakily on the floor, I take a deep breath and smile. I raise my hips from the side of the warm bed and stretch my fingers and wiggle my achy toes while walking to ready the shower. Somewhere between the warm bed and the freezing shower, I set an intention for the morning, smile again and then its time to get moving.
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Starting a daily ritual, even when rubbing eye boogers from your tired eyes can help to shift our focus and energy. Rituals, however small and silly they may seem, are a powerful way to acknowledge and release negative feelings, failure and disappointment. If you spend a fair amount of time “hanging on” to “things” like I seem to do or you can’t quite seem to let go after a stressful day? Peaceful rituals help … Stopping mid-ride to bask in the beauty that nature graces us with. Taking a deep breath as you roll out your yoga mat before practice … Peaceful rituals.
Daily Meditation:
Rituals help to bring awareness and keep us engaged during everyday life. I suppose that’s why I always click in with my left foot first before a ride?!?
Spoken : Softly :
Posted: January 20, 2015 Filed under: Kindness, Meditation, Yoga | Tags: Body Image, compassion, Embarrassed, Embarrassment, gratitude, joy, Kidness, love, Omaha, social media, yoga 5 CommentsYou know on TV when there’s one of those awkward, shocking moments and all you hear are the crickets in the background? Well chirp f*cking chirp…this is one of those moments-
Being embarrassed in social situation(s) feels rather unpleasant. When someone remarks suddenly before class: “Your underwear is showing,” or while standing in line for a coffee … “Your barn door is open,” even better yet “Is that balsamic vinegar salad dressing in your hair?!?” Here let me smell. Few of us are likely to feel particularly joyful, to say the very least.
I’m recalling this morning with you, times during my life when I have felt the most embarrassed and to my surprise – Being embarrassed truly can be joyful!
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There are a few moments of feeling embarrassed that instantly come to mind. One, was the night my son was born about nine years ago I suppose. You see, I exude a fairly calm, cool and collected demeanor, most times that is. I was pretty chill during the birth and what stands out to me was when it was only my beautiful new-born son, myself and a caring nurse handing him to me for the first time – “Here is your son sir” placing him gently into me shaking hands, tears streaming down my face, having no clue in the world what to do. I was embarrassed in this truly joyful moment.
At the same time though, there are horrible feelings that also produce embarrassment, feelings of being humiliated …
I still remember like it was yesterday, the dreadful scene when some of my classmates in 6th grade took great pleasure in teasing me to tears, because I was “fat” and started to go through the throes of puberty – acne and all. Calling me “fatty” by the boys and girls, the incessant teasing, only served to make the humiliation more degrading. I was deeply embarrassed during these joyless childhood moments.
Daily Meditation:
What life, compassion, kindness and gratitude provide us is, if we reflect and allow the blushed cheeked, crying and shameful negative feelings of humiliation fade away. Is that, maybe, just maybe embarrassment really is an expression of – Joy.
The Fight
Posted: January 15, 2015 Filed under: Kindness, Meditation, Yoga | Tags: compassion, desire, family, Gregory Djanikian, kindness, life, love, Omaha, passion, Poem, Poetry, reading, The Fight Leave a comment…
It was over a girl,
One boy had spoken to her,
Had asked her out, the other
Had been feeling with her
The twitches of something serious.
It was a misunderstanding,
Something that might have been fixed,
Talked out or around,
But the whole school had turned out
To watch them settle it.
It was too late for talk,
It was no longer just their fight,
Something irrelevant and impure
Had entered it, honor, looking
More upright than the other,
Things which had nothing to do
With the girl, or desire,
Or what she had whispered to one of them
One night in a car.
So they faced each other,
Bringing their anger up
By saying what finally did not matter
But loudly enough so their bodies believed it.
There was a sudden coming together,
There were fists flailing
While everybody, hundreds, watched.
One was cut above the eye, the other’s
Knuckles were bloodied against teeth.
It lasted half a minute until
One of them pulled back and said
Something like “This is stupid”
And the other dropped his fists
And watched him walk away
Out : Sick :
Posted: January 13, 2015 Filed under: Kindness, Meditation, Yoga | Tags: compassion, Flu, gratitude, healing, kindness, Loss, love, Omaha, yoga 21 CommentsThe reason many people in our society are miserable, sick, and highly stressed is because of an unhealthy attachment to things they have no control over-
Gripped by the harsh reality of being diagnosed with the flu this past Friday I, along with many of you reading at home, are going through the tedious stages of not being able to do what we love to do.
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I am in denial … Surely these pesky symptoms will subside rather quickly, just like they have in the past. I am angry at myself this morning: This is a definitely a setback and an attack on my personal well-being. Thinking out-loud to myself as I rolled out of bed sore and stiff: If I could attend yoga class before work and get it out-of-the-way while I still have some energy? I would truly be one step closer to becoming healthier. Finally Dear Readers, I was depressed at the thought of not being able to do what I love to do.
Daily Mediation:
The flu, injuries, and the everyday occurrences of “life” do not reveal our best sides. Although, maybe the absence of compassion and kindness is adding insult to injury?
To the New Year
Posted: January 8, 2015 Filed under: Kindness, Meditation, Yoga | Tags: compassion, family, love, New Years Resolutions, Omaha, Poems, Poetry, reading, Storytelling, To the New Year, W.S. Merwin, writing, yoga 2 Comments…
With what stillness at last
you appear in the valley
your first sunlight reaching down
to touch the tips of a few
high leaves that do not stir
as though they had not noticed
and did not know you at all
then the voice of a dove calls
from far away in itself
to the hush of the morning
so this is the sound of you
here and now whether or not
anyone hears it this is
where we have come with our age
our knowledge such as it is
and our hopes such as they are
invisible before us
untouched and still possible
CultFit 