Saturday, June 26, 2010

Non-Resistance to the Bigger Picture

Checking In...

How have I been "creating me" so far?

I'm somewhere between fiction and non-fiction. Eckhart Tolle teaches that our "inner purpose" or staying present in the now is primary and our "outer purpose" or what we do in the world is secondary. I've been practicing staying present for over two years now and although, there is a deepening every single day and moment even, I still find myself getting lost on what it is I'm supposed to be doing and how is what I'm doing connected to the whole. And I know that being concerned about that is a sign that I am not present or aligned to my inner purpose, which is why I'm using it as a reminder to stay with the task at hand.

So now, I think of "creating me" as being the observer of my own experience. Being there as emotions and situations arise. The times when I'm not fully "there," anxiety, doubt, and fear starts to creep in. I catch myself thinking, "that will never work" or "How am I going to do that?" But the beautiful thing is that these thoughts have no power over me unless I believe them. However, the momentum of self-deprecating thoughts like that has certain energy and I cannot pretend that they are not there because that just adds to that energy. I have to let them be and watch them pass. The trick is to actually stay with them and face them completely, instead of turning away from them.

Here's what's been working for me so far:..

The way that I've been able to face these thoughts and emotions is by pacing. I am a full time pacer. Lately, I've been turning pacing into a walking meditation instead. If I'm going to pace anyway, I might as well make it useful. And for those of you who are not familiar with walking meditation, it's basically walking slowly back and forth, and paying attention to every step you make. Feeling the feet on the ground, feeling your arms swing to and fro, and feeling your overall body. Just like in sitting meditation, you watch your mind and let your thoughts come and go without judgment, condemnation, or clinging to any one thought.

Here's another thing that has been working for me in times of resistance:

Any uncomfortable or painful feeling that arises within us is another way in which our body tells us that we are resisting whatever is happening in the moment. It happens to me right before I sit down to work on a task I set out for myself that day. My mind takes me on a walkabout that's anything from, "Do I really want to do this?" to "Maybe this way will be better." Neither one of these thoughts serves me or helps me get on task. What does serve me is that whenever I feel resistant to do a particular task, I do a one-hour non-resistance exercise, which consists of doing whatever it is that I'm resisting (exercise, write, make calls, organize files, etcetera) for an hour. I set a timer and I turn the activity that I'm resisting into a one-hour meditation.

What I learned from doing the non-resistance exercise are two things: 1) If it's an activity that I actually enjoy, then the one hour turns into more hours 2) If it's an activity that I don't enjoy, but have to do and there is no way around it, then it gets done and then I don't have to worry about it.

How's life calling me to serve today?

I like to switch it from "this moment" to "this hour" to "this day" or "this week," etcetera because it's all now anyway, but it helps the mind to wrap its head around it.

The way that life is calling me is to look at the bigger picture. It's not about this story or this activity or that goal, but rather what I'm being drawn to right now. For me, it's about taking one inspirational thought and seeing where it fits in the projects that I'm currently working on instead of creating a whole new project around one idea.

Join me in looking at the bigger picture.

Thank you!

Sunday, June 20, 2010

Investing in Life

Checking in...

Yesterday, my sister and I went apartment hunting and during our lunch break I received the following words: Write, create, do whatever you want. Don't think about the results or how it all fits together or what's a better path. You're young. Invest everything and let the pieces fall where they may.

To clarify, when I say that I "received," I'm talking about the words that spontaneously arise out of my consciousness. I try and pay attention to those. These words are also the answer to the question I've been asking for months, "What should I do? or How's life calling me to serve?"

I've been so consumed with getting it right or trying to pin point exactly what it is I'm meant to be doing that I keep missing the obvious, which is "don't worry about how it's all going to align or not and just do what comes in each given moment." I like to put answers to my questions in quotations. It differentiates my personality voice from my higher voice.

Also, when I received "invest everything," I'm not talking about investing all my money into a stock and seeing what happens (although, that could be part of it), but to me, it means to put whatever I can give out there and not hold back or pre-judge what the results of that would be. To me, it means to invest in Life and trust that it's delivering.

What's a better investment than the one in your own life? Who knows you better than Life? Who can align you to the most harmonious path better than Life itself? Life knows you. Life knows what's best for you. Life gave your body life. Life created you in the only way it could in order for you to experience life fully. Then, why do we no trust it all the time? And why do we ever doubt that it could do a better job providing us with the most fulfilling experience possible?

Please join me in investing our trust in Life.

Thank you!

Sunday, June 13, 2010

Figment of my own imagination

"Our perception of the external world, and our relationship to it, is a product of our neurological circuitry. For all those years of my life, I really had been a figment of my own imagination." - Jill Bolte Taylor, My Stroke of Insight


Having read My Storke of Insight, reaffirmed my own insights about our fluid reality. We are all literally creating our realities every single moment. There is no out there. Doesn't that change everything? To me, it means that we cannot take anything that happens too seriously. However, knowing this truth intellectually is not enough. How do you come to a point of feeling it as your reality? Or for those of us who feel it intermittently, how do we hold on to the feeling? We can't. By letting it go each time is the only way anything can be held on to. If it sounds like a contradiction, it is. Everything in life and nature exists only because its opposite does too.


The question is: What do I want to do with this information? How do I want to create my life knowing that it is only a figment of my own imagination?

The only answer that's coming up is to follow my joy. Which is like, duh and then what? To me, it means making the impossible possible. There is nothing to fear, but fear itself is not just a saying, it's the truth. Resistance that comes up during the pursuit of my passion tells me that there are emotions I'm afraid to face. And knowing that, helps me face them. I'm realizing that what's hiding behind fear is excitement for being alive. All these years what I thought was fear was actually my inner child wanting to explore new things.

As adults we are afraid to look where we want to the most. That fear of the unknown is keeping us from reaching our soul's desires. But knowing that we are figments of our own imagination alleviates that fear for me. I'm not denying that physical reality does exist, but only to the extent as seen from the multi-layers of my mind. Once the layers are stripped, what's left is pure bliss for the breath that flows through my body and for all the little things I can do simply because I am alive.

So, how is life calling me to serve at this moment?

It's calling me to move, to meet new people, and to explore new places. For the past few months I've been enjoying being and now I'm ready to include doing to the being.

Join me in moving our bodies to the beat of our own unique heart.

Thank you!

Sunday, June 6, 2010

Tuning In

Checking in...

I like starting the posts with "checking in," because it sounds like "tuning in" or connecting to the all and everything. And it's true. Writing this blog is one of the ways that I check back into the present moment or tune in to Life.

Tuning in has been the main focus this past week. I've been reconnecting to "this is what I really WANT to be doing right now" versus "this is what I SHOULD be doing." I haven't been questioning why I would rather do this one thing versus another, I'm remembering to trust the process. How "this" is connected to "that" is none of my business until it becomes my business. It sure takes a load off when I'm no longer worried how what I'm doing or not doing is connected to my overall path. The saying "it's the journey, not the destination," is becoming more of the focus.

How's Life calling me to serve?

Yesterday, I had my first Reiki class. Reiki is the process of tuning to the source and allowing the source to guide you in healing yourself and others. During the session both my Reiki master, Patti Penn, and I noticed that I tend to get impatient. In the past, impatience drove me to make decisions that did not align with my higher good. In combination with my Reiki practice and the practice of living day-to-day, my intention is to watch for impatience if it arises. There is no point of fighting it because it's just going to come back ten-fold.

Join me in watching impatience as it arises and tuning in to the stillness behind impermanent states like impatience.

Thank you.