Les Éventails, Portraits of Passion
Posted: October 10, 2013 Filed under: Random Workout, Yoga | Tags: Arts, Bird, blogging, compassion, exercise, family, friends, health, kindness, life, love, lululemon, meditation, motivation, music, musings, Nathalie Handal, natural, Omaha, passion, perspective, Poetry, Recreation, simplicity, Winds, Woodwinds, writing 3 Comments…
The shadows of birds fading on a fighter’s back
The undressing of words on an unstamped postcard
The wet swings in the distant park
The jealousy of raindrops on the umbrella of lovers
The laughter of a boy before a bird
The song of two flutes, two swords, two bracelets, two fingers
The stare of a wave before a pearl
The yearning between the legs of a farmer’s wife
The opening of doors closing midday
The sudden howling of our muse—and
les éventails—disturbing the guest inside of us
– Nathalie Handal
Thought(S)
Posted: October 9, 2013 Filed under: Random Workout | Tags: blogging, compassion, Critical thinking, culture, cycling, exercise, family, fitness, free range, freshly pressed, gluten free, happiness, health, Intelligence, intuition, kindness, life, love, lululemon, marathon, meditation, mind, Mindfulness, motivation, musings, natural, nature, Omaha, paleo, passion, perspective, pilates, recovery, Religion and Spirituality, rest, running, Social psychology, Thought, whole foods, WOD, writing, yoga 5 CommentsIf you do not tell the truth about yourself you cannot tell it about other people-
We tend to naturally treat some of our thoughts as superior to others. Moment of honesty folks – All of us at one time or another believed we were smarter and superior to those around us … At times these intuitions guide us fairly well and during other times, rather poorly. Gather around if you like, as I lament, once again about honing our intuition and judgment …
As much as we tend to think our perfect little lives are well – perfect. Our intuitions and actions have evolved, we have learned subtle adaptations honed slowly to fit the “imperfect” world we live in.
Touching on mindfulness once again … I firmly believe mindfulness is best cultivated through critical thinking, through taking inventory of our weaknesses, the places where we’re naturally prone to misinterpret reality. Thinking Slowly and Diligently rather than Fast and Easy. I – We automatically favor thinking fast, it’s what we have been programmed to do after all! We favor the path of least resistance, although with practice we can make the harder path easier … That’s why we do what we do right? We meditate because its easy, we perform yoga because we are super flexible, we max out the leg abductor machine because its easy, we write touching blog posts about painful situations we are too scared to confront in real life, it’s why we argue with loved ones via text than face to face, held close – The easier path …
Mindfulness practice is easy. Breathing is just being. It takes courage to let go of a pesky thought, the ability to say, “I’m thinking way too much about this” and to ultimately – let go, surrender.
Notes:
I wish more people would allow mindfulness to expose the “sad but true” moments in their lives. I passionately do … Be well today and please take care.
Decidir V. Decidido
Posted: October 8, 2013 Filed under: Random Workout, Yoga | Tags: blogging, crossfit, cycling, Facebook, family, fitness, free range, freshly pressed, friends, gluten free, happiness, health, hipster, kindness, Learning, life, love, lululemon, marathon, meditation, mind, Mindfulness, motivation, musings, natural, nature, Omaha, paleo, passion, perspective, philosophy, pilates, running, Thought, trail running, walking, whole foods, WOD, writing, yoga 9 CommentsIf someone comes along and shoots an arrow into your heart, it’s fruitless to stand there and yell at the person. It would be much better to turn your attention to the fact that there’s an arrow in your heart-
If through practicing mindfulness, we practice letting go of thoughts – hopefully? We need another practice for letting thoughts in, getting comfortable with threats from soccer moms, the risks associated with yoga class, discouraging and difficult thoughts during a recent early morning run. We need to exercise our ability to comprehend the tedious, harsh and more discouraging thoughts we encounter during the day more so than blasting reps and sets in a gym. Without ever practicing letting thoughts in? We tend to interpret the world through the lens of easy, wishful thinking …
We need to be brave enough to take our shoes off, expose our knackered and worn toenails to step confidently into dark, discouraging and confusing waters in our quests for uncertain gratification.
It’s not enough to be able to dismiss all the “thoughts” we process and return to the here and now as “mindfulness” practice encourages. Seriously folks – Please read the last sentence again. This is where many people get mindfulness wrong, horribly wrong: Mindfulness practice is most attractive and helpful to people who succumb to the weight of negative thoughts and feelings.
Consider that most often mindfulness is meant to discourage, discouragement.
You may be able to tell I am clearly frustrated with the current view, adopted by so many in regards to mindfulness. The power of neutral-thinking, an ability to, in effect pre-grieve the possibilities of not having the latest yoga fashion(s) so that we aren’t scared of living without them, limbering our minds much the way we learn to breathe into and surrender to the searing burn of a stretched hamstring during chair pose.
Notes:
By letting thoughts in, we have already visited failure, humiliation and injury. We are prepared to contemplate deeply even when it’s not cool or trendy. Here’s the harsh truth that many yogis, blog posts and tired yoga magazine articles fail to provide us: Mindfulness practice is not believing you can ward off undesirable outcomes by not thinking about them.
Grief
Posted: October 3, 2013 Filed under: Random Workout | Tags: blogging, compassion, family, freshly pressed, friends, Grief, happiness, health, hope, kindness, life, Loss, love, meditation, motivation, musings, natural, nature, passion, perspective, Poem, Poetry, Prose, recovery, running, simplicity, Stephen Dobyns, writing, yoga 8 Comments…
Trying to remember you
is like carrying water
in my hands a long distance
across sand. Somewhere people are waiting.
They have drunk nothing for days.
Your name was the food I lived on;
now my mouth is full of dirt and ash.
To say your name was to be surrounded
by feathers and silk; now, reaching out,
I touch glass and barbed wire.
Your name was the thread connecting my life;
now I am fragments on a tailor’s floor.
I was dancing when I
learned of your death; may
my feet be severed from my body.
(Auto) Porción
Posted: October 1, 2013 Filed under: Random Workout | Tags: Abstinence, blogging, compassion, Crafts, cycling, exercise, fitness, food, free range, freshly pressed, friends, gluten free, happiness, health, hipster, hope, kettlebell, kindness, life, Lifestyle (sociology), love, lululemon, marathon, meditation, motivation, musings, natural, nature, nutrition, Omaha, paleo, passion, perspective, pilates, running, Style, Support Groups, trail running, weight loss, whole foods, WOD, writing, yoga 4 CommentsLive to the point of tears-
Part of my philosophy here at CultFit is that I believe that people who engage in a healthy and active lifestyle and folks who don’t, can benefit from sharing stories with each other.
Quick example: If you’re struggling with injury, doubting yourself, stuck in a deep – treacherous training rut and wonder if it’s even possible to live a happy life without fretting over a tedious marathon training plan? It can be refreshing and helpful to hear from people who don’t train like a bunch of “freaks“. What do people do who merely run for fun? How do they relax the temptation to compete? On the other hand, if you don’t fancy running more than a meter, it can be affirming or simply a vicarious pleasure to hear the ups and downs of other people’s lives.
Exploring and surrendering to your own style can help you craft your own plan …
Notes:
When all is said and done, the most helpful thing we can do is ask ourselves: What makes me comfortable, given who I really am?
CultFit 