Monday, April 30, 2012
Sunday, April 29, 2012
Friday, April 27, 2012
Thursday, April 26, 2012
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
The Hardest Part
Stretch Arm Strong--The Hardest Part
"Wake up!
Sometimes the hardest part
Is finally realizing that things are falling apart
And you have no control over the way things go.
Where do you go and what can you do
When it all comes down to you?
Fall back down, get back up, choke back the dust and stand up.
Will we ever pick ourselves back up?
[chorus]
And on those days that you feel like you can't go on, i'll do my best to be there.
And on those days that you can't go on, i'll do my best to be there.
We waste our days with sorrow in the back of our minds!
We struggle with tomorrow.
It's help us down for way to long.
Will we ever pick ourselves back up?
The sun's a little brighter, my loads just a little lighter,
And i can finally find my way back home.
No shame, no regret.
[chorus]
And on those days that you feel like you can't go on, i'll do my best to be there.
And on those days that you can't go on, i'll do my best to be there.
Hold on, hold on, hold on. all you can do is just be yourself.
Then it's said it's all you have left.
Fortune fades, nothing stays, and in the end, you're to blame.
How to Meditate Daily
Post written by Leo Babauta.
The habit of meditation is one of the most powerful things I’ve ever learned.
Amazingly, it’s also one of the most simple habits to do — you can do it anywhere, any time, and it will always have immediate benefits.
How many habits can you say that about?
While many people think of meditation as something you might do with a teacher, in a Zen Center, it can be as simple as paying attention to your breath while sitting in your car or on the train, or while sitting at the coffee shop or in your office, or while walking or showering.
It can take just one or two minutes if you’re busy. There’s no excuse for not doing it, when you simplify the meditation habit.
Why Meditate?
Why create a small daily meditation practice? There are countless reasons, but here are some of my favorite:
- It relieves stress and helps you to relax.
- When you practice mindfulness, you can carry it out to everyday life.
- Mindfulness helps you to savor life, change habits, live simply and slowly, be present in everything you do.
- Meditation has been shown to have mental benefits, such as improved focus, happiness, memory, self-control, academic performance and more.
- Some research on meditation has indicated that it may have other health benefits, including improved metabolism, heart rate, respiration, blood pressure and more.
Actually, some of the best benefits of meditation are hard to define — you begin to understand yourself better, for example, and form a self-awareness level you’ve never had before.
Most simply, sitting for just a few minutes of meditation is an oasis of calm and relaxation that we rarely find in our lives these days. And that, in itself, is enough.
How to Do It Daily
There are lots and lots of ways to meditate. But our concern is not to find a perfect form of meditation — it’s to form the daily habit of meditation. And so our method will be as simple as possible.
1. Commit to just 2 minutes a day. Start simply if you want the habit to stick. You can do it for 5 minutes if you feel good about it, but all you’re committing to is 2 minutes each day.
2. Pick a time and trigger. Not an exact time of day, but a general time, like morning when you wake up, or during your lunch hour. The trigger should be something you already do regularly, like drink your first cup of coffee, brush your teeth, have lunch, or arrive home from work.
3. Find a quiet spot. Sometimes early morning is best, before others in your house might be awake and making lots of noise. Others might find a spot in a park or on the beach or some other soothing setting. It really doesn’t matter where — as long as you can sit without being bothered for a few minutes. A few people walking by your park bench is fine.
4. Sit comfortably. Don’t fuss too much about how you sit, what you wear, what you sit on, etc. I personally like to sit on a pillow on the floor, with my back leaning against a wall, because I’m very inflexible. Others who can sit cross-legged comfortably might do that instead. Still others can sit on a chair or couch if sitting on the floor is uncomfortable. Zen practitioners often use a zafu, a round cushion filled with kapok or buckwheat. Don’t go out and buy one if you don’t already have one. Any cushion or pillow will do, and some people can sit on a bare floor comfortably.
5. Start with just 2 minutes. This is really important. Most people will think they can meditate for 15-30 minutes, and they can. But this is not a test of how strong you are at staying in meditation — we are trying to form a longer-lasting habit. And to do that, we want to start with just a two minutes. You’ll find it much easier to start this way, and forming a habit with a small start like this is a method much more likely to succeed. You can expand to 5-7 minutes if you can do it for 7 straight days, then 10 minutes if you can do it for 14 straight days, then 15 minutes if you can stick to it for 21 straight days, and 20 if you can do a full month.
6. Focus on your breath. As you breathe in, follow your breath in through your nostrils, then into your throat, then into your lungs and belly. Sit straight, keep your eyes open but looking at the ground and with a soft focus. If you want to close your eyes, that’s fine. As you breathe out, follow your breath out back into the world. If it helps, count … one breath in, two breath out, three breath in, four breath out … when you get to 10, start over. If you lose track, start over. If you find your mind wandering (and you will), just pay attention to your mind wandering, then bring it gently back to your breath. Repeat this process for the few minutes you meditate. You won’t be very good at it at first, most likely, but you’ll get better with practice.
And that’s it. It’s a very simple practice, but you want to do it for 2 minutes, every day, after the same trigger each day. Do this for a month and you’ll have a daily meditation habit.
Expanding Your Practice
Sitting and paying attention to your breath is really mindfulness practice. It’s a way to train yourself to focus your attention. Once you’ve practiced a bit while sitting in a quiet space, you can expand your mindfulness practice:
- When you feel stress, take a minute to pay attention to your breath, and return your mind to the present moment.
- Try taking a walk, and instead of thinking about things you need to do later, pay attention to your breath, your body’s sensations, the things around you.
- When you eat, just eat, and focus your attention on the food, on your feelings as you eat, on the sensations.
- Try a mindful tea ritual, where you focus your attention on your movements as you prepare the tea, on the tea as you smell and taste it, on your breath as you go through the ritual.
- Wash your dishes and sweep your floor mindfully.
This, of course, is just a start. There are many ways to practice mindfulness, including with other people, while you work, and so on.
10 Habits You Must Quit to Be Happy
When you quit doing the wrong things, you make more room for the things that make you happy. So starting today…
1. Quit procrastinating on your goals.
Some people dream of success while others wake up and work hard at it. Action and change are often resisted when they’re needed most. Get a hold of yourself and have discipline. Putting something off instantly makes it harder and scarier. What we don’t start today won’t be finished by tomorrow. And there’s nothing more stressful than the perpetual lingering of an unfinished task.
The secret to getting ahead is simply getting started. Starting, all by itself, is usually sufficient to build enough momentum to keep the ball rolling. So forget about the finish line and just concentrate on taking your first step. Say to yourself, “I choose to start this task with a small, imperfect step.” All those small steps will add up and you’ll actually get to see changes fairly quickly. Read Getting Things Done
2. Quit blaming others and making excuses.
Stop blaming others for what you have or don’t have, or for what you feel or don’t feel. When you blame others for what you’re going through, you deny responsibility and perpetuate the problem. Stop giving your power away and start taking responsibility for your life. Blaming is just another sorry excuse, and making excuses is the first step towards failure; you and only you are responsible for your life choices and decisions.
3. Quit trying to avoid change.
If nothing ever changed there would be no sunrise the next morning. Most of us are comfortable where we are even though the whole universe is constantly changing around us. Learning to accept this is vital to our happiness and general success. Because only when we change, do we grow, and begin to see a world we never knew was possible.
And don’t forget, however good or bad a situation is now, it will change. That’s the one thing you can count on. So embrace it, and realize that change happens for a reason. It won’t always be easy or obvious at first, but in the end it will be worth it.
4. Quit trying to control the uncontrollable.
If you try to control everything, and then worry about the things you can’t control, you are setting yourself up for a lifetime of frustration and misery.
Some forces are out of your control, but you can control how you react to things. Everyone’s life has positive and negative aspects – whether you’re happy or not depends greatly on which aspects you focus on. The best thing you can do is to let go of what you can’t control, and invest your energy in the things you can – like your attitude.
5. Quit talking down to yourself.
Nothing will bring you down quicker than berating yourself. The mind is a superb instrument if used right, but when used incorrectly, it becomes very destructive. Be aware of your mental self-talk. We all talk silently to ourselves in our heads, but we aren’t always conscious of what we’re saying or how it’s affecting us.
As Henry Ford once stated, “Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t, you’re right.” One of the major causes of why we fail is due to self-doubt and negative self-talk. The way to overcome negative thoughts and destructive emotions is to develop opposing, positive emotions that are stronger and more powerful. Listen to your self-talk and replace negative thoughts with positive ones, over time you will change the trajectory of your life. Read The How of Happiness
6. Quit criticizing others.
The negativity you bleed out toward others will gradually cripple your own happiness. When you truly feel comfortable with your own imperfections, you won’t feel threatened or offended by the imperfections you see in other people.
So stop worrying about the flaws you see in everyone else, and focus on yourself. Let the constant growth and improvement in your own life keep you so busy that you have no time left to criticize others.
7. Quit running from your problems and fears.
Trust me, if everyone threw their problems in a pile for you to see, you would grab yours back. Tackle your problems and fears swiftly, don’t run away from them. The best solution is to face them head on no matter how powerful they may seem.
Fears, in particularly, stop you from taking chances and making decisions. They keep you confined to just the small space where you feel completely comfortable. But your life’s story is simply the culmination of many small, unique experiences, many of which require you to stretch your comfort zone. Letting your fears and worries control you is not ‘living,’ it’s merely existing.
Bottom line: Either you own your problems and fears, or they will ultimately own you.
8. Quit living in another time and place.
Some people spend their entire lives trying to live in another time and place. They lament about what has been, what they could have done, or what might become. However, the past is gone, and the future doesn’t exist. No matter how much time we spend thinking and lamenting about either, it doesn’t change anything.
One of life’s sharpest paradoxes is that our brightest future hinges on our ability to pay attention to what we’re doing right now, today.
We need to live more in the moment. Living in the moment requires active, open, intentional awareness on the present. Don’t fantasize about being on vacation while at work, and don’t worry about the work piling up on your desk when you’re on vacation. Live for now. Notice the beauty unfolding around you.
9. Quit trying to be someone you’re not.
One of the greatest challenges in life is being yourself in a world that’s trying to make you like everyone else. Someone will always be prettier, someone will always be smarter, someone will always be younger, but they will never be you. Don’t change so people will like you. Be yourself and the right people will love you, and you’ll love yourself more too. The Road Less Traveled
10. Quit being ungrateful.
Not all the puzzle pieces of life will seem to fit together at first, but in time you’ll realize they do, perfectly. So thank the things that didn’t work out, because they just made room for the things that will. And thank the ones who walked away from you, because they just made room for the ones who won’t.
No matter how good or bad you have it, wake up each day thankful for your life. Someone somewhere else is desperately fighting for theirs. Instead of thinking about what you’re missing, try thinking about what you have that everyone else is missing.
Photo by: Jamie Adams
When you are willing
Even when you start with nothing, if you are willing there is a way to reach the goal. Even if you have lost everything, you still have the ability to make a difference, and to create new value.
There is nothing to be gained by filling yourself with despair about what is or what has been. Empower yourself by letting go of the need to pity yourself.
No matter where you have come from or where you are, right now you can take a positive, productive step forward. Right now you can choose to create value instead of excuses.
The best opportunities require effort and commitment and persistence. And the great thing is, you’re absolutely capable of making the commitment, of putting forth the effort, and of persisting for as long as necessary.
You are indeed capable of transforming even the most difficult situation into bright, shining, meaningful richness and joy. The thing you must decide in every moment is, are you willing?
Be willing, and live up to your beautiful, unique potential. Be willing to join forces with your best possibilities and to show life how great it can be.
— Ralph Marston
Atman is Brahman--Eric Allen Bell
If you consider yourself to be on any kind of spiritual path, you very likely have had a tendency to be too hard on yourself. You try not to think negative thoughts, to avoid judging others, to avoid "sin". One definition of the word "sin" is "separation from God". We want to avoid our dark side and become of "how we are supposed to be". This way of thinking occurs probably not as the result of religion, but religion has sprouted as the result of this way of thinking.
However, the "shadow" (your dark side) is as much a part of the human experience as is having two eyes. The light and the darkness that are basic components of the psyche, are what enable the human mind to perceive as it exists in material space. There exists both day and night down here on the ground, and the inner world of the human mind adjusts itself accordingly.
As part of our physical evolution, the brain has developed an ability to identify opposites in order to survive. While this platform of duality in perception has allowed us to make great breakthroughs technologically and in the arts and so much more, it is also the foundation of every war - mine versus yours, and us verses them.
Simply "us" or "ours" are very difficult concepts for the brain to hold onto without having to meditate, read spiritual books, go to Satsang, church, temple, etc. This Non-duality flies in the face of everything our brain has told us it needs, in order to navigate its way through material space. However when the body dies, when we leave this place, duality is baggage not required for the journey. Furthermore, you can realize the oneness of all things before having to wait until the body expires. It is possible to navigate through a world of opposites, play by its rules just enough to avoid hurting oneself or others, but also know that none of this is real. This world of the body located in time and space is just a tiny fraction of what is really going on.
Some of you reading this will be asking yourselves, "How do you know?" I know it because I can see it. But so can you, if you're willing to look.
God or Source, being Infinite, is that which you were never apart from in the first place. The illusion of separateness is a trick of the mind. You were never separated from Source. And this is the hallucination that fuels so much suffering in the world. It's what we've structured most of our civilizations on, it is a delusion that holds most of the religions establishment together and keeps them in power, and - it's a lie.
Imagine a world where we all felt safe enough to stop believing in the lie. By all outward appearances, the material world of today is not ready for such a revelation. But are you?
Atman is Brahman.
To know yourself is to know God, and to know God is to know yourself.
Peace,
Saturday, April 14, 2012
Talk About beating the odds
Transexual singer taking Angola by Storm: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-17628726
Thursday, April 12, 2012
The Starting Line--Something left to Give
"I've got stars in my great big sky
I shall gaze upon without leaving small ones behind
Because they're harder to find
Some were satellites, others planes
Some were twinkling while others were fading away
But they're all one of a kind
Oh it's not that interesting
But I'd like to keep it a secret
So I'll have something left to give
It's not that difficult when you've got a luck of this kind
We've got to take advantage, we've got such limited time
Oh I wonder, oh I wonder
How long to take me to die
Oh it's not that interesting
But I'd like to keep it a secret
So I'll have something left to give
And I'll hear my children and grandchildren sing
Blah la la la da da da
Blah la la la da da da
Blah la la la da da da
Blah la la la da da da
It's not that interesting but I'd like to keep it a secret
So I'll have something left to give
In my remaining years
When I am old and plain lazy
I'll have a little something left to give
To all those who loved me so much
I'd like to return the favor
And have something left to give
And I'll hear my children and grandchildren sing
Blah la la la da da da
Blah la la la da da da
It's not that difficult when you've got a luck of this kind
Blah la la la da da da
Blah la la la da da da
To all those who loved me so much, I'd like to return the favor
Blah la la la da da da
Blah la la la da da da
I wonder oh i wonder, how long to take me to die
Blah la la la da da da
Blah la la la da da da
It's not that interesting but I'd like to keep it a secret
And have something left to give"
Sunday, April 8, 2012
I think it’s great for two people to be together. That is a good number. I think, that to keep it alive though, you can’t spend every day together. It wears out the magic, Love means nothing to me if it’s not fortified with fierce, painful longing, brief explosive instances of furious passion and intimacy and then a sad parting for a time. In that way, you can give your life to it and still have a life of your own. I think some couples spend too much time together. They flatten out the potential for experience by constant closeness. Passion builds over time like steam. Let it rage until it’s exhausted and then leave it alone to let it build up again. Why can’t love be insane and distorted? How can it be vital if it has the same threshold as normal day-to-day experience
-Henry Rollins
-Henry Rollins
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