Monday Mindfulness

Cultivating Strength, Joy, Peace & Resilience


1 Comment

Pretending to be bored

Waiting for my thoughts to quiet.

With each breath, feigning an attempt to soften the tension in my muscles.

Always on high alert, my body is the ever faithful soldier standing at attention, ready to advance, attack, or defend.

My thoughts and feeling providing constant counsel, conducting their business at all hours of the day and night as if essential personnel.

It is a strange request I make that all the components that serve me in my daily busy-ness are called upon now to rest.

They are troubled by this pause as it could imply they may no longer be needed. They resist – the body…the mind…the emotions that want to protect and define me.

And yet, a strange and delightful spaciousness coats my experience when I am willing to just sit down and breathe.

It frees them all to not disappear but to serve me better. They become my friends, sipping tea on the deck, holding hands and dancing in the absence of mission and doing.

Oh, the joy of knowing my thoughts, my feelings, my body in the absence of need.

We rest here for a bit together, finding a freshness in how we coexist…

…and then we agree to do this much more often.


1 Comment

Going the Distance

I feel your heart beating next to mine even though miles away.

I know your moments of pain and sorrow even without hearing you cry.

On the gentle breeze that blows, I encounter great waves of relief, joy, and peace as they ebb and flow in you.

Even out of site I know you are there.

We may be physically distanced, but energetically, emotionally, socially, we are closer than ever before.

Physical distancing,

Social connecting.

Today we may just be closer than ever before.


Leave a comment

Blossoming


bristled or spikey
soft or wispy
feelings bud and grow like flower blossoms
designed to attract
designed to protect
all showing up as the latest projections of my unfinished stories
all modeling the birth of new beliefs 
that I am free to cut 
or stop and take in
all the exquisite manifestation of who I think I am and who I know I can be
all beautiful
regardless of the adjectives I attach to their existence


Leave a comment

Living Gratitude

impatient

Thankful for the gifts of mistakes…poor choices…and illness.

Thankful for the lessons learned through the suffering of others as they have so generously lit the way to the path of something else.

Thankful for the eyes that see flawlessness in the presence of imperfections.

Thankful for every scar that contributes to this living road map.

Thankful for the loss that serves as a beacon of hope.

Thankful for quiet act of forgiveness.

Thankful for the essence of grace.

Thankful for the peace that rests at the core of existence.

Thankful for this life of privilege,

and that you and I can be just as we are.

Thankful we can be.

 


1 Comment

House Cleaning

Life is not about suffering. Yet, frequently I fall into a pattern of thinking I am not fully living my life if there is not conflict or hardship.

I have made up a story that there is no room for me to be happy, no time or purpose for self care, rest, nourishment, and companionship. No space for laughter, play, and love.

Yet without those features my life is not complete and I move farther and farther away from my natural state of being.

I don’t even realize that the life I think I should be leading, the life that constantly tells me I am not worthy and not enough, is shrouding me in darkness, not because that is who I am supposed to be but as a reminder of what I am deeper inside.

I am enough just the way I am. I am successful right here and now. I am capable of feeling strong, happy, and healthy always. I am worthy of goodness.

I am made of love and my real purpose here in this place and time is to be a source of love for myself and others.

All the other stuff – the striving, the suffering, and self-deprecation — is just like cobwebs and dust, painting a picture of dismay and decay. However, quite easily with a swift and conscious swipe I can clear them all away to restore the beauty of the forgotten objects that reside just below.

In this cleaning of my house, I once more feel the freshness, spaciousness, and goodness that is intended to be. In devoting just that little bit of time and attention, that quick swipe, to restoring the luster, everything seems to fall into place. When that shroud is removed all that remains is the goodness that is in fact my life and who I am supposed to be.