Author: pmcrose

Sometimes there’s nothing to say.

Enjoy the silence!

In meditation, we practice being the witness bringing nonjudgmental attention to our thoughts and feelings and life’s flow much like a beachcomber mesmerized and in awe of the ocean’s magnitude, waves, sounds, smells, and feel.

Fermentation takes time–whether it be beer, wine, sauerkraut, pickles….

The fermentation process begins with a few vital ingredients, and then waiting and trusting the process will happen and transform the ingredients into a new desired delicious product.

Such is yoga and meditation to our lives.

We are all fermenting on our yoga mats and meditation cushions letting go to their amazing powers to transform….

 

The more I practice yoga and meditation I find myself spellbound by their mysteries.

Their secrets are the subtlest of whispers.

Shh, I need to pay attention.  They are like the air against the feathers of a bird’s wings that lift it upward.

 

 

Every trip to the yoga mat or meditation cushion is like going to a retreat center, not to escape life and its “problems,” but to restore and reorient us to the North Star of our being.

We know yoga and meditation can help us relax.

However, practiced over time, they can profoundly transform how we respond to stress, and thereby how we live our lives!

The urgency to relax is an oxymoron.

 

We all know about unconditional love, but what about a happiness that knows no conditions?…

A happiness that is much deeper than our pains and sorrows, frustrations and struggles…

A happiness that brings the sweetest of compassionate smiles to our lips, our eyes, our being…

A happiness that carries us equally through our trials and our easy times…

This is a happiness that life seems to dare to test so many times and in so many ways.*

It defies understanding.

This is the happiness we all wish for on our deathbeds that can smile and swell the heart one last time for a life well-lived.

This is the happiness commitment!

 

*This is the happiness that yoga and meditation repeatedly connect me to and deepen my experience of and commitment to.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The mind likes to roam often going into anticipation of the next moment.  This is great in our everyday life for planning and getting excited about what is next to come.

However, we can get trapped in reveries about the future with our attention always a step or two, or even way way, ahead of us.

Attention when it is anticipating is attention that is not here now, not fully present to the moment at hand.

In meditation, as you notice the mind anticipating things to come, as your attention gets caught up in this, realize that even these thoughts of anticipation are happening now, not in the future, but right here in this very moment.

If we pause and catch the mind at its game, even anticipation can help us be more fully absorbed and present now!

 

A positive mind only dwells on the “problem” as necessary to find the choices for next courses of action.

Like a white water rafter, we need to be aware and flexible to discover and negotiate the currents that carry our craft safely forward.

Yoga and meditation train us to stay more present–more centered, calm, and clear minded–in the midst of turbulent waters.