Self Care and Usefulness in Everyday Ramblings

Happy Equinox! The equinoxes are my favorite times of the year because the light is so beautiful. And we have light today after enough rain to get the wildfires mostly under control. The air quality is so much better.

While I am sleeping fine I am still waking up tired. I think I am just plain tired. And I am wondering what would be helpful in terms of this. Not listening to the news?

I am half way through a 40-Day Kirtan Kriya meditation challenge. It is just less than 15 minutes a day and on most days I do it early, before 6AM. That is considered a most auspicious time for this sort of thing. The world is quiet and energetically one is more receptive.

It is a yogic meditation practice as opposed to a Buddhist one and involves touching each finger pad repeatedly as well as vocalizations of what are called seed syllables. First you repeat the syllables out loud, and then you whisper, then just in your mind, and after that you whisper again in a breathy fashion and finally return to repeating them out loud.

There have been some solid studies on this form of meditation and it is recommended as a preventative practice for Alzheimer’s.

It is also a very deep spiritual practice on all sorts of layers that it is not easy to describe in a practical you can touch this way.

The sounds are universal so this is not say a cleverly disguised Hindu practice that is inappropriate for Muslims or Christians. The body is the human body and we do respond universally to certain sounds. It this case Sa Ta Na Ma.

The cats have been very energetic lately and they want to be involved in whatever I am doing and if it is anywhere near food time they want me to know that they are ready. Lately I have constantly needed to pick them up off the kitchen counter and as I am typing this Diego just stepped into my lap. I love them and enjoy them but man do I love it when they take long naps!

Kes is coming up for a sleep over tomorrow and I am looking forward to sharing the wealth so to speak. If I have folks over Carlo in particular is quite good at remaining the center of attention. Last time she was here he would go get a toy out of his toy box and play with it in front of us for while and then another and…

I decided this week to start teaching back at work one class a week. And things are looking good for the Retirement Center nearby if I am patient. Maybe around the holidays I can pick up some sub work or a class there. They are changing up the way they staff their wellness center so I have to wait for all that to unfold.

It is a good thing because of various late summer travel and social commitments regular attendance has fallen off in my studio classes. I am not taking it personally but I want to teach and…

I listened to all 32 hours of the Self-Acceptance Summit. Wow. I learned a lot but it was pretty overwhelming. What was most interesting to me was to discover in clear relief how judgmental I am! Someone would come on and start talking and I would have so many opinions it is embarrassing and the person more often than not would have a perspective that was different and interesting or an experience that was compelling or engaging or some piece of information that was helpful.

There was just one guy that I couldn’t get over. Someone who purports to be a healer but I think is a pretty damaged person and a charlatan but I have thought that about him before. He says what people want to hear and he is, I admit, very skilled at that.

Anyway it was good to get deeply that all of us are self-critical and understand better the reasons for that. And now I have all kinds of tools to try out when I am feeling bad about myself.

This habit of mind is entrenched though so I’ll be working this for the rest of my life.

Listening to an interview with this bright articulate woman from Antigua talk today about the struggle to survive her island nation faces now after the hurricanes made me cry.

There is no lack of people and places and situations right now that need help. May we all find appropriate ways to be useful and be grateful for basic things like clean towels and enough food.

Last updated September 22, 2017