17 Seconds of Stillness

You know when you have one of those days where everything goes just right? Today was one of those days. From the outside people may not have noticed that my day was shaping up that way; it was hectic, many decisions to be made, lots of troubleshooting and what not - but, I love when things are like that - frantic... kinetic. It is easy to get lost in the ambling of events one to the next and before you know it, you look up and it's bedtime. What an amazing day.

In the midst of it all I found time to meditate and time to remember that I must settle inside myself. There is this person at work I see occasionally. She has told me sweet and kind things on more than one occasion for absolutely no reason. Whenever I walk past her or see her I note that there is a calmness about her - a stately awareness of who she is and a love that comes off of her. This is a gift to witness. For me she is a reminder of what I can achieve in my moments of stillness...that quiet "knowing"that brings you inner peace. I often wonder if it is prayer/meditation that brings us there.

Be still. Two small words with big meaning. Be still. It can mean to find a quietness and rest in it. Be still. Can I suppose that it means to continue to be? Quiet stillness. My pilates teacher tells us to strive for it in our postures. Be still... something different.

Make the effort to find 17 seconds of quiet stillness in your day. You will be surprised how long that can be! After 17 seconds, however, it gets much easier.

Try it, you might like it.

Awareness and Focus for my Everyday or Beware the Big, Bright, Green Pleasure Machine

I better amp this process up because at this rate - 100 days might take 100 years!

Back to basics... I have been doing daily meditations since I started this blog. Some days my meditations are 1 minute long - but most days they are about 15 minutes. Really, everyday. It has been wonderful for me. To me, conscious breathing meditation has made daily meditation simple.

It is easy to get caught up in the everyday distractions of our world: the noise of television, the allure of a digital world where we can share instantly with anyone we ever met, for example, not to mention email, text, BBMs, etc. How do we keep our awareness and self-focus in such a distracting environment? For me the question of keeping my focus has been a nagging one. I find it so easy to get distracted by the next best thing.

Have you ever had this experience? You are watching a TV program and you realize you are not interested in it - in fact, you don't want to watch it any more... but, you are unable or unwilling to turn it off? What is it that happens in us that allows us to let lousy TV into our life. We become what we perceive if we are not conscious and watching a TV program we are not interested in means we are not conscious in that moment. You can chose to be anything you want at any moment so why choose this?

Awareness means that we can look at something an become a part of it. If you are looking at anger - you can become anger and if you are looking at love you can become love. CHOOSE LOVE.

I learned a simple meditation I would love to share with you. I have been using it for a while now and it has helped me choose better things to be aware of and helped to ease my distractions. It involves four words of focus: calming, smiling, present, precious.  Breathing in I feel the calmness reach my fingertips (CALMING), breathing out I smile (SMILING), I am in the present moment (PRESENT) I look for the preciousness of this moment (PRECIOUS).

You can do this while you are driving, walking, in a meeting, fighting with your spouse. Remember, it takes fewer muscles to smile so it is very relaxing (think Mona Lisa).

Namaste

I once heard Namaste defined this way, "I honor that place in you where the whole Universe resides. And when I am in that place in me and you are in that place in you, there is only one of us."

My Birthday Wish

I have been asked many times in the past week - what do you want for your birthday? I have thought about this over and over. What do I want? Then, I realized, this is a very powerful question. What do I want, because if I focus my attention there - become a vibrational match to it - I will have it! So I made a list of things I want:

- I want to laugh with abandon - all the time.
- I want to dance and sing out loud whenever I feel like it and I want my children to stop telling me not to do that.
- I would like to play the "what if" game and have some of it come true... quickly.
- I want to let go of all things that worry me. Worrying is like a rocking chair - it gives you something but, it doesn't get you anywhere.

Most of all I want to share all the love I feel with all of you whenever I can - freely - remembering that we are all part of the same whole. The stuff that makes up the stars is the same stuff we are made of - we are stars. I want to remember that the light of the world shines from inside of each of us - whether I can see it at the moment or not... I want to remember that...

God is
Life is
I am

For you, Virginia, wherever you are...

Happy Birthday!