Find Your Freedom & Cut The Chains That Bind You

one of the ultimate free souls. photo from store in Sarasota.

For many years as a kid and young adult, I kept my differences hidden in the proverbial closet. I followed a different drummer (mostly metal skin bashers) and pursued activities like ghost hunting in my friends’ old Victorian houses, keeping a worm farm, drawing weapons of war and superheroes, reading plenty of sci-fi, horror books and comics and being a KISSaholic. Not much has changed except that my illustrations are more creative, I burnt out on sci-fi book and comics and my musical tastes have expanded greatly.

When I finally got to American University, I started to become more comfortable with exposing my uniqueness. I made more friends who were also of the same ilk an we reveled in our differentness. As a psych major, I was a minority amongst the many international studies and political science majors. I worked at the school newspaper as a music and movie writer covering metal and extreme music shows and reviewing horror and sci-fi movies with the occasional drama thrown in for good measure.

Now, as a Buddhist with a general love of open spirituality and an artist and musician, I’m still in the minority and I’m happy about it. I realize that being a unique person has opened up many opportunities for me and enabled me to meet so many great people who are also free spirits.

So to all you dear readers out there, I say to you find what makes you different and revel in that. We are all unique but sometimes it takes more effort to get out of the comfort zones that can bind us. Pursue the activities that make you feel liberated. Spend time with the other free spirits out there. Meet new and interesting people. And, if you’re already doing this keep moving forward and help those who need to be liberated from the shackles of society.

OK now, enough reading. Get going y’all!

No Attachement 2 Dust

Searching For The Sandman While Suffering a Skull crusher

Last week I was miserably sick and I was in a world of hurt. Getting really ill doesn’t happen often but when it does, headache pain come in spades. I call these the skull crushers because it feels like my head is going to alternately explode and then implode in an infinite cycle. Even after popping a bunch of aspirin, the pain still seemed unbearable. Somehow I managed to endure the suffering, which meant that it was bearable. Unbearable pain is an illusion because if you’re surviving it then you’re bearing it.

When all else fails to reduce the suffering there’s only one option for me: you guessed it, meditation. Like most practitioners, I’d rather meditate when I’m feeling healthy. I’d even rather sit when my mind is obsessing with anxiety or I’m depressed. There’s nothing more challenging than sitting with physical pain and especially a headache. Meditating in this state of pain is a major challenge for me. It’s one of the reasons why I’ve recorded my Peace For Pain meditation in order to help myself and others who have their own physical suffering.

When my headaches consume me, my vision gets blurry, I’m overly sensitive to sounds and even my sense of smell is screwed up. Sometimes I try to use lavender oil to relax me ands ease the pain but this time around it made me gag.  While I was getting cold sweats and nausea, I decided to turn out my lights, forgo my usual incense and turn on some subtle ambient music. I sat half-lotus style in my bed, closed my eyes and took a focused on where the throbbing in my head originated. I’m happy to say that with the music and meditation, my head started to loll and the sweet magic of the sandman returned me to a peaceful slumber.

Question for My subscribers. What’s fun about meditation?

As I work on my book, I’m trying to find what people really enjoy about meditating and mindfulness. I’d love to get feedback from anyone who has thoughts about it.

Have any of you heard of funny anecdotes relating to it?

What do you think keeps people meditating?

What might appeal to young adults?

How can I appeal to people who think that meditation is only for intellectuals?

I think that there’s plenty of focus on the how wellness and mindfulness helps stress. I want to focus on the positives and how it enhances aspects of people’s lives.

Thanks so much everyone.

Pure Mindfulness According to Stephen Batchelor

“[Mindfulness] is not concerned with anything transcendent or divine. It serves as an antidote to theism, a cure for sentimental piety, a scalpel for excising the tumor of metaphysical belief. (130)”
― Stephen Batchelor, Confessions of a Buddhist Atheist

Peaceful Mind: The Running Brook Video Meditation

We Should Reach For Our Ideal Selves….Viktor Frankl

A Terrific, Small Book

I just finished this amazing, 100 page book by Pema Chödrön ”Practicing Peace In Times of War”. It looks at the war that people have inside and how we can help ourselves and others to find the peace. I love Shambala Publications, they are amazing too!

http://www.shambhala.com/html/catalog/results.cfm?keyword=practicing+peace&x=16&y=11

I’m A New Teacher!

Success, I’ve been hired by Phoenix Natural Medicine Center in Phoenix, AZ to be a part-time mindfulness meditation teacher! So, if you’re in town I’m teaching on Saturdays in March at 10am. More time slots coming soon.

 

Three Can Be As Great As Twenty

I had the great opportunity to teach a mindfulness class that I created I call Peaceful Minds to some people in the mental health field. This was my second time I got to teach it at the training center of Magellan Heath Services in Phoenix, AZ. The first time I taught, I had nearly twenty people and was really stoked but this time, I merely had three. I’ve taught a class on bipolar mania and had the same small amount and it didn’t phase me a bit. I taught these three enthusiastic ladies as if I had fifty people in the room and it was great. It is such a privilege and pleasure to teach people such positive material.

 

Hamming it up. Pic by Ian Lewis. Being silly is important!