»Life is relationship — with the self, nature, creativity, and one another. Meditation can be defined as intimacy with life. Through meditation we pay attention to the current of vitality and love flowing through us, and ride it inward to our essences. This is an instinctive ability and everybody can do it — and yet, to live and love fully takes courage and all the inner resources we can muster.
Nature is wild and serene, and so too is our inner nature. To embrace the fullness of being — the vastness and vulnerability, sensuality, and surging power — we must be intimate with our inner nature.
We find more intimacy with ourselves and others by practicing meditations and asanas that gently awaken our senses, that open the flow of energy within our body and stretch our mind in wonder and awe.
It's from there that we tap into joy and inspiration!«
(Lorin Roche, Author of the Radiance Sutras)
22 January 2014
06 January 2014
Times of Trouble = Times of Transition?
It's not easy to stay awake and mindful in times of trouble and see them as the great opportunity they may actually be. I do my best to try and use my momentary difficulties to rethink and let go of old patterns, to purge and be intentional about what my "new normal" may be once I'm feeling stronger and clearer again.... and yet I feel lost and exhausted from time to time, so endlessly tired, wondering when exactly these strange days will be over. Maybe it's just the "winter blues", maybe there's more to it, maybe some answers are trying to find me... i really don't know.
Grief and sadness, fear and failure, loss and pain — they are all part of being human — and I'm aware it's up to myself how I decide to deal with the sources of my suffering. I can put up resistance but there's no way I can protect myself over any length of time. Life happens, sorrow will always find me. I know that when I struggle with what I cannot change, I'm bound to lose my joy as much as my spirit — I'm very aware of that — so all I can do right now is accept my own powerlessness and surrender to the moment, unconditionally, allowing myself to feel whatever it is I feel without creating a story, any kind of drama, around it.
Sometimes it's tough, though. I sit with the pain, I breathe, I try not to react, not to add to it in any way... and still find myself caught up in thoughts, in spite of my good intentions. Thoughts of hopelessness, of doubt, or self-pity. It's tempting to give in to the seemingly overwhelming pain — but in the end, I don't. In the end I'm always stronger than I think. Somewhere deep down I know that even though it might feel as if I'm stuck, I'm actually growing during these experiences that make me fall apart, that force me to question my priorities and make me leave my comfort zone.
Those are the moments when I have no choice but to surrender to the pain — surrender to change — and choose a different way to deal with these times of transition. Facing my doubts, losses and fears, instead of running away from them, allowing for my "self" to be broken open, looking at it as a chance, a new beginning — who knows, there's always the possibility that it's worth it, right?
Grief and sadness, fear and failure, loss and pain — they are all part of being human — and I'm aware it's up to myself how I decide to deal with the sources of my suffering. I can put up resistance but there's no way I can protect myself over any length of time. Life happens, sorrow will always find me. I know that when I struggle with what I cannot change, I'm bound to lose my joy as much as my spirit — I'm very aware of that — so all I can do right now is accept my own powerlessness and surrender to the moment, unconditionally, allowing myself to feel whatever it is I feel without creating a story, any kind of drama, around it.
Sometimes it's tough, though. I sit with the pain, I breathe, I try not to react, not to add to it in any way... and still find myself caught up in thoughts, in spite of my good intentions. Thoughts of hopelessness, of doubt, or self-pity. It's tempting to give in to the seemingly overwhelming pain — but in the end, I don't. In the end I'm always stronger than I think. Somewhere deep down I know that even though it might feel as if I'm stuck, I'm actually growing during these experiences that make me fall apart, that force me to question my priorities and make me leave my comfort zone.
Those are the moments when I have no choice but to surrender to the pain — surrender to change — and choose a different way to deal with these times of transition. Facing my doubts, losses and fears, instead of running away from them, allowing for my "self" to be broken open, looking at it as a chance, a new beginning — who knows, there's always the possibility that it's worth it, right?
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