Entries categorized as ‘Meditation’
I think all that turkey I ate on Thanksgiving killed my motivation to write. Just kidding. It was funny, I was watching Ainsley, pretty much a vegetarian since birth, as my mother-in-law pulled the turkey from the oven. They were poking and prodding it to make sure it was done. Ainsley’s face was slack-jawed. She looked at me with this “What the heck?!” look and I gave her the “Yeah, I know” look and nod. Twice we did this and then she said something about the legs on the poor bird. My neice tried to persuade her to eat a piece and Ains threw a fit until it was removed from her plate. Chloe too…of course she was free to eat whatever she felt like, but she didn’t eat turkey.
Holosync Update
Strangely, this week I have been unable to say alert during the whole hour of listening to the “Dive” and “Immersion” soundtracks. That’s completely normal though in the first few months. In fact, one factor in determining your readiness to move on to the next level is being able to stay awake for the entire hour. This usually happens at around 4 months. I’m between month 1 and 2.
One thing I notice improving is my awareness. In the past, if one or both of the girls would do something ultra-obnoxious, I would become annoyed. Now, as I become annoyed, I almost automatically SEE myself becoming annoyed. Sort of like my internal voice is pointing out that I’m becoming annoyed.
“Watch it Mike, you’re getting annoyed. Is it really worth the stress? Don’t forget, they’re just kids. They’re supposed to be obnoxious.”
I’ve been reading so much about mindfullness that I would be remiss to lavish all the praise on Holosync, but I have no doubt that this program is worth getting up at 5:30 for 7 days a week. (Actually, I did skip one day–the day after Thanksgiving, refered to around here as “Buy Nothing Day”)
Categories: Animals · Meditation · My Life · My daughters · happiness
Tagged: Bill Harris, centerpointe, Holosync, turkey, Vegan
This morning from 5:20 to 6:20 was my twentieth day into the Holosync Solution. I’m much too lazy to try to explain all of the benefits of, and science behind, Holosync. It’ all at the website anyway. The founder, Bill Harris, also has a great podcast (search for “Thresholds of the Mind” in iTunes). I highly recommend his blog as well. This guy really knows his stuff.
In a nutshell, you listen (meditate) to a CD every day (30 minutes for the first two weeks, 60 minutes from then on). The real technology, which is inaudible under sounds of bells (gongs maybe?) and rain, syncronize the two hemispheres of your brain. In science, they call this brain entrainment.
The benefits? There are many!
The benefit that most excites me, and usually manifests first, is that it raises your stress threshold. Everyone has a unique threshold, the point where outside events begin to stress you out, or, in more blunt terms, pisses you off. A simple example is being cut off on the highway. Someone, let’s call him a-hole, with a low threshold, after being cut off, will cuss and get angry, carrying some resentment with them all day. On the other hand, Joe Calm can have the same thing happen to him without so much as a blink. Most of us are somewhere in the middle.
Another benefit that I’ll try to explain is the greater awareness you will have at your disposal. (By the way, the benefits of meditation and Holosync are pretty much identical, but you get the results much easier and faster with Holosync.) Back to Mr. a-hole, after some time with Holosync, at the moment of stress, he will have a conscoius choice to react or not. Before, it’s simply an automatic response. He has no choice, he’s automatically pissed off. With more awareness, you might feel the anger rising, might be able to watch it, and then decide whether it’s beneficial to act on it (most of the time it’s not).
To me, this is exciting stuff.
Categories: Good Karma · Meditation · The Power of Now · happiness
Tagged: alpha, Bill Harris, brain entrainment, brain waves, delta, enlightenment, Holosync, Meditation, theta
For an artist or an athlete, being “in the zone” is a desirable state to be in. It’s also called “Flow.” From Wikipedia…
Flow is the mental state of operation in which the person is fully immersed in what he or she is doing by a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and success in the process of the activity.
I experienced this a lot in school, writing papers or short stories, designing websites, producing multimedia, stuff like that. Without entering this state, my papers would have sucked and they would have taken me twice as long to write.
Yesterday after finishing my post here, I experienced “flow.” Unfortunately, it caused me to forget about my daughter at school. I “flowed” right past our usual departure time of 2:30 and finally thought to look at a clock at 2:47, 2 minutes past dismissal. Of course, it turned out to be no big deal. Chloe handled it better than I expected; I was prepared for a lecture.
I was hanging hooks in the basement, dragging out winter clothes, sweeping, laundry, scooping cat poo…real cool stuff. When it occurred to me that I had another daughter, I was trying to get ink off the bill of a pink hat.
It did make me realize that I need to strive for this state of “flow” every day, or even better, two to three times a day. It’s about being “‘in the moment.” If you have lost all track of time, you’re doing something right, but don’t ask Chloe because she would strongly disagree.
Categories: Meditation · My Life · My daughters · The Power of Now · happiness
Tagged: cat poop, flow, in the zone, kitty litter, Mihály Csíkszentmihályi
Ah, it’s so much more enjoyable posting about getting rid of stuff.
I love to read. I read 7 days a week, 365 days a year, so you would think that I have tons of books. I used to, but I got tired of moving them from apartment to apartment–so HEAVY!! Here’s a list of ten books I recently donated to Goodwill. This brings me back down to 252 items.
- The Associated Press Stylebook & Libel Manual
- The Yoga Mini book for Stress Relief
- Living Well on a Shoestring – I have held onto this book for many years
- The Complete Home Decorator – Purchased was I was rehabbing a house in Pana.
- Decorating 1-2-3
- My Cat & Me – You’d think I would keep this with all the cats running around here lately.
- Better Homes & Gardens New Cookbook – No more use for a non-vegetarian cook book
- The New Oxford American Dictionary – I thought of all the new words added in the past 10 years, online dictionaries made this expendable.
- Meditation in Action – Not an easy read compared to the other meditation books I’ve read
- The Everything Zen Book – This was a recent purchase, good book, but not a good decision to buy.
Categories: 100 Thing Challenge · Clutter · Meditation · Simple Living
Tagged: books, Clutter, stuff
There was a time when I thought meditation was just plain weird. Therefore, anyone who meditated was a weirdo. Well, I was wrong. Besides recognizing the traditional pose and “om” mantra from television, I didn’t know a thing about meditation. Still, I judged. Many people attack what they don’t understand. If you’re not “like me” then you’re a misfit. Thankfully, I’m getting beyond all that nonsense. I may have my shorts on backwards and inside out. I may forget my name. I may fall and break a hip. But, at the age of 36 I’m learning how to be a truly compassionate human being. I’m not there yet, but I’m trying.
Tens reasons to meditate
By Sharon B. Gilbert, Ph.D.
- Oneness with God and creation
- Stress reduction and decreased anxiety
- Reduces the noise and chatter of our waking minds
- Pain reduction and management
- Supports the immune system
- Reduces blood pressure
- Improved memory and ability to learn
- Feelings of peace, calmness and an awareness of self
- Improves moodiness and irritability
- Feelings of rejuvenation
Categories: Good Karma · Meditation · My Life · The Power of Now
Tagged: compassion, Meditation, om
We’re consciously integrating more “quality family time” into our lives. Our first official “family day” was earlier this month when we spent the afternoon at the Missouri Botanical Gardens and the evening at the City Museum in St. Louis. The first park of our day was all about plants, plants, and more plants. This is from their website:
Founded in 1859, the Missouri Botanical Garden is the nation’s oldest botanical garden in continuous operation and a National Historic Landmark.
The Garden is a center for botanical research and science education, as well as an oasis in the city of St. Louis. The Garden offers 79 acres of beautiful horticultural display, including a 14-acre Japanese strolling garden, Henry Shaw’s original 1850 estate home, and one of the world’s largest collections of rare and endangered orchids.
Here is Chloe “meditating” next to a Niki de Saint Phalle sculpture. I’m a little jealous that I can’t get into the full lotus position like Chloe.
St. Louis County residents, which we are not, are given free admission into the Gardens two days a week. I would love to live in the neighborhood. It’s a beautiful, peaceful place. Here’s Ainsley in another “Niki” creation.
The 2nd half of our day was all about steel, tile, and more steel. It was a mighty juxtaposition going from the natural world of the Botanical Gardens to the man-made world of the City Museum. I have no pictures of this place because the camera would have been smashed to bits if I had tried to carry it around. This place is not a regular museum. It’s a place to get dirty and sweaty and that’s what we did. There’s a five-story slide, an underground tunnel, dark caves, an indoor “skateless” skate park and so much more. From the website:
Housed in the 600,000 square-foot former International Shoe Company, the museum is an eclectic mixture of children’s playground, funhouse, surrealistic pavilion, and architectural marvel made out of unique, found objects. The brainchild of internationally acclaimed artist Bob Cassilly, a classically trained sculptor and serial entrepreneur, the museum opened for visitors in 1997 to the riotous approval of young and old alike.
Cassilly and his longtime crew of 20 artisans have constructed the museum from the very stuff of the city; and, as a result, it has urban roots deeper than any other institutions’. Reaching no farther than municipal borders for its reclaimed building materials, CITY MUSEUM boasts features such as old chimneys, salvaged bridges, construction cranes, miles of tile, and even two abandoned planes!
This was my first visit to the City Museum and, amazingly, Chloe’s FOURTH.
Categories: Meditation · My Life · My daughters
Tagged: Botanical, City Museum, Gardens, Henry Shaw, Missouri, Niki de Saint Phalle, St. Louis
Ahhh. Some quiet time. Ainsley is taking a bath listening to Cookie Monster sing “Me left me cookie at the disco. Just as I started typing she yells “Daddy I’m dooone!” She can”t take a bath without having to get out halfway through to go potty. I have 12 ounces of cheap Aldi coffee here by me with hazelnut extract added to make it taste expensive. The dog is at my feet. I’m not hot, not cold.
Everything is perfect as long as I don’t think about what I “should” be doing or what I didn’t do yesterday. I’ve learned this year that it’s all about staying in the moment. It’s SOOO hard, though. Man, is it hard. I truly believe that it’s the key to happiness.
Strangely enough, I think I have to give credit to Oprah. Does anyone use her last name anymore? I never, ever, EVER thought I would be a big fan of Oprah, but her Soul Series Webcast has become an addiction of mine. I get the podcasts from iTunes and watch/listen while I work doing the t-shirt thing. On iTunes the podcast is called Oprah.com’s Spirit Channel. I highly recommend it to all…very interesting discussions. You the option between downloading an audio only, small screen (for your iPod), or the large screen version to watch on a full-size monitor.
Categories: Meditation · The Power of Now
Tagged: God, Meditation, Oprah, soul series, Spirit
The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other’s welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.
Categories: Meditation · Social Anxiety
Tagged: Derek Walcott, Love Thyself, poetry
Obviously, I don’t meditate in the lotus position or I wouldn’t have dosed off. Heck, I can’t (yet) GET into the lotus position. 
I kind of sit cross-legged in my cushy desk chair in front of the computer with my arms crossed. I guess you could say that I’m lazy for not (at least) attempting to meditate in an alternate acceptable position, but I’m in the dungeon basement, an underground cavity that was flooded just three weeks ago. I’ll work on that, don’t worry.
My daughter is really into the 500 apple challenge and my wife asked if I could push the start date back to May 1. I pointed out that she would just have to eat one apple today to catch up to me. Oh, I added another item to my list…drinking water. 
All winter I have been chiding myself daily for my lack of pure water intake. PLAIN WATER. Instead, I have been mixing water with those toxic pouches of tea powder. I love tea, especially white tea, but I’m a little leary of that powder.
So, my goal is to drink at least 114 gallons (14592 ounces) of plain tap water. That’s 40 ounces a day, a modest goal I know, but a challenge nonetheless. Pictured is the Brita water filter contraption that is taking up a large chunk of space in our fridge. Well, here’s Progress Report #2. I’m excited, but can I keep it up for a year…I think so.
Categories: Meditation · Progress
Tagged: Brita, Lotus, Meditation, Sleep, Water
