Monday Mindfulness

Cultivating Strength, Joy, Calm & Resilience


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Conviction

If our morals and beliefs suggest that we should all

love,

support,

and guide one another,

then wouldn’t true,

authentic

moral conviction

show up in the form of

grace

and forgiveness,

not shackles?

A calling back of the misguided to the embrace of

patience and gentleness,

not humiliation

and chastisement.

The invitation

to not be isolated,

but to come closer.

To take accountability.

To grieve in communion

for the loss

of others wounded by their actions

and

for their own internal suffering.

To wail in the arms of

a community

that shoulders mistakes,

missteps,

and misdeeds,

with understanding and humility,

no matter how egregious

on the surface.

To shed tears together to cleanse,

not punish,

embrace,

not discard,

teach,

not convict.


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Dear charioteer

Be firm in your direction of travel,

humbled confidence as your guide.

With peace, kindness, and assuredness,

go forth.

Fulfill your dreams.

Don your most regal robes of passion and creativity.

Harness the flames of focus and determination.

Let the earth quake and rumble,

the skies fill with darkness,

and ride not into conflict and challenge as a battle,

but as an opportunity to demonstrate your

strength,

intelligence,

and fortitude.


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Battle fatigue

The field is bloodied.

Swords scattered and strewn.

In the distance, flowers bloom and a river runs cool and deep.

Who are the victors and what have they gained?

What have the defeated truly lost?

Conflict is inevitable but the results are a choice.

To be a victor without gloating.

To be defeated without wallowing.

To receive and face all that comes without fear.

Each day I have the potential to find strength,

balance,

and humility,

regardless of which end of the sword I face.

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A pebble in my shoe.

Here I am, walking along, awareness softly tuned to my surroundings.

Without any warning, the easy state of awareness suddenly funnels with precision into the soul of my foot.

A slew of messages instantly travels light lightening through my body alerting me to intense sensation.

There is a pebble in my shoe.

With each step now, I have a choice.

Do I immediately freeze, paralyzed by this unanticipated happening, shutting down, urgently driven to remove the discomfort?

Do I pause, taking notice, receiving the sensations with curiosity and kindness, quietly ascertaining my next step?

Or do I continue walking, noticing, and finding unique learning in every step, even through the unsettledness and unease?

Can I cultivate gratitude for the ability to feel, to move, and motivate, to decide with every step?

Whatever I do, it should be with care, not reacting but receiving, even when unexpected and uncomfortable, a constant reminder of my free will.


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All Wrapped Up

All Wrapped Up

There comes a time and space where each of us longs to curl up in a snuggly blanket, to feel the pressure on our skin, the cocoon of warmth and connection.  This need for contact, pressure, and restriction is also the driver for the invitation of struggle, suffering, and conflict into our lives.

With difficulty pressing in upon me, I will always still find the same comfort and ease on the inside if I allow it.

It is simply a matter of the material of the wrap and the lens with which I see it that determines whether I feel it as nurturing or limiting.

The wrap is just a reminder to feel what’s on the inside – to know the true essence of me, undefined by the fabric of my experience.


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Flying above the hurricane

In the midst of the storm, I feel small and helpless. There is fear that the storm will overcome me.

I know of the danger in advance, but I ignore the warnings to back away. Instead, I hunker down. That is when the floods start, conflict swirls in all directions and visibility is reduced to nothing.

My heart pounds. I struggle to catch my breath, to make logical choices, and to know how to care for me and those around me.

And then I remember back to the time when as the hurricane developed I watched it from above. I saw it’s wild bands expanding, its dark center churning. From above I could see its boundaries. From above I noticed clusters of calm, bright sky swirling in the darkness.

In every storm since, I have acknowledged that I have a choice to turn away and even when I neglect that choice, I can find calm within the bands of chaos if I can just remember flying above it.


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Click, click, click…

2008-07-24-20-12-56

Ever notice how sometimes resistance appears just before the moment of most profound change?  Like the “click click click” of the wooden roller coaster as it chugs its way up to the top of the hill, dragging and pushing ever harder, and just when it seems to have no more momentum, it crests the highest hill and runs freely, wildly, ahead.  Resistance makes way for its counterpart…freedom.


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Our Opinions

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Do you really need to be right?

Is there just one answer to the question?

Can’t we find space for both our opinions?

Perhaps in this complex Universe

We are intended to have different perspectives.

Perhaps through our varying views

We can impact the greatest change.

It’s easy to partner with those who share

The same point of view.

Divinely powerful to embrace that which is different.

Could it be that our opinions intertwined,

Instead of butted against each other,

Can lead to greatness beyond each of us

As we stand in our opinions alone?

Let’s partner in our differences,

Nod to each other’s strengths.

Let’s meet at the top of that mountain,

grow the Universe stronger and brighter

With love, compassion, and respect

For one another and our opinions.