asking each day, to find out who is real and what we really are

if we are living right, we should be getting
at least one "No" a day
to some request we are making for something that
pushes some edge

"Would you like to OM?"
"Would you like to make out?"
"Would you like to make out for X minutes?"
"Would you like to have sex?"
"Would you like to spend the night together?"
"Would you give me your phone number?"
"Would you go to ..... with me?"

This kind of thing in the relationship world, and this:

"I offer ..... for $.......Would you like to buy?"

That's a good one, too.

That keeps things high sensation. And if we don't know yet how to ask and get turned on by our asking and let the yes / no chips fall where they may, we con't quite know how to live yet, don't you think?

Don;t you feel that that's true?
For you?s

Day 20 on mindfulness jag

(This is day 20, of 31 July postings about mindfulness, all at http://PoemsFromNow.com)

If we are trying to stay present, and we are "just" there,
just now,
just experiencing, awaring, nowing
the now of now

and all that
it's a quiet place

looking at a tree doesn't
come with a voice narration,
unless we are talking inside,

going about our business
doesn't come with voice narrations
on "I didn't do this well enough,"
or
"I wonder what so and so thinks
about this and that I did or said."
and the old bugaboo:
"I wonder if so and so even likes
me"

and then we aren't present

good,
we can be present to our discomfort
and feel the voice inside has something to do with it

today's game:

coming to the arms and legs and spine present
and sending a little "I love you"
"I approve of you"
to ourselves,
and then returning to as much silence
as we can find

not affirmation
not over and over,
just a shot of love
a shot of approval
for our thinking, our feeling, our awaring ,
our forgetting to aware,
whatever we are at that moment,
loving it

and then moving on

all restlessness
unhappiness
worry
doubt

all that converted into
self love

and then back to arms and fingers, legs and toes, spine and pelvis
head,

grounded in the bones
add on the breathing if you wish

and listen for the happiness in
the silence

and when the unsilence comes:
"I love you"
"I approve"
"You are wonderful"

Just a little whisper of self love

that's all

"Just" a whisper

and hey: let's add a Thich Nhat Hahn thing:
a hint of a smile on the outbreath as and after
we sent the whisper

"just" a hint of a smile

good

overcoming the stuck makes us happy, smart and strong, or something like that

Moshe Feldenkrais ends his book, the Potent Self, with a statement to the effect that
"One of the great joys in life is overcoming difficulties."

There you go.

Life is about challenges,
and even if the challenge is being delighted
in the present,
that challenge is always present.

We want to change weight.
Get jobs more in tune with our real nature.
Make more money.
Move more easily.
Improve golf, tennis, swimming, yoga, walking, dancing.

We want to relax more,
Be happier.

That's a good base line isn't it:

To be happy.

Happiness is who we are meant to be.

Unhappiness is the alarm signal:
not living life as it should be lived.

Joy is who we are meant to be.

Frustration means:
we want something more.

Can we be happy
and present
and excited
to take our frustration
and turn it into learning?

I think, feel and have experienced
that's a pretty nice way to live.

What do you think?


Ciao
for
NOW,

Chris

Chapter One: Beginning to Become the Real us

LOVING LIFE: ONE

Christianity, Buddhism, Being Now, Nature, Love

This is a book, that you will read, or not read, or listen to or not listen to. I’d love for you to read it or listen to it, and I’d love even more if you could go slowly enough in your reading, to be aware of yourself as a breathing, standing/ sitting/ lying down person on the Earth in the field of gravity as you read.

I’d love you to read this so slowly, that each page brought a smile to your face, not necessarily because I said/ wrote anything so grand and brilliant or funny, but because you were excited and pleased to be present while you were reading/ listening.

Hey, I’m tired of saying reading/ listening, and I’m just going to say listening to this book, because I want this book to be a gift to your life, and I want the pleasure you receive from these words to be the pleasure we all receive as human beings when we give ourselves the pleasure of listening, really listening to another human being.

Or ourselves.


Ah, to listen to ourselves could be the listening to a lot of complaining and worrying inside our heads. That wouldn’t make us very happy, would it.
So how can listening be a happy making opportunity.

First: listen to the life in you. What does that mean? Notice that you are breathing.

Second: notice and remember that you are alive.

Three: see if part of you can be aware that you have this amazing human ability: awareness.

Four: get curious: what are you are of now. Okay, maybe we need to go deeper than just these words, so please stop the book for a bit and look around, and spread your ears around, and feel your spine in gravity, and ask again: what are you aware of now?

Five: five rhymes with alive. What is happiest in you right now, about being alive?


Ah, so.

That’s a good start to a new life.

Read that list again, and imagine the various steps as something you could do several times a day.

Consider the possibility: my life could be sweeter and more amazing and more awake every day.

And a day is big. How about right now, these five ten minutes and can you stand to “waste” a little bit of “time” just hanging out in the moment with awaring onto what is happening right now? Sounds crazy doesn’t it, paying attention to where our attention is. And yet, and yet, and yet: this is what makes as, as humans, capable of many of the amazing things we do as humans.

Is that true?

I don’t know, and I suspect it’s so, and it doesn’t matter. This book is a gift to part of you that wants a sweetness that you know is or could be or should be at the center of your life.


And, the sub-title way at the top said something about Christianity, Buddhism, Being Now, Nature, Love. What does that all have to do with what we’ve listen to so far?

I don’t know, yet, I haven’t written it yet. I haven't listened to myself, to find out. And I will. I will.




You don’t know yet, you haven’t heard.

And, still, in your deepest self you do know, and so, before the book continues: enjoy imagining you have some idea, a sweet and vague, or a clear and bold, or any way you do it/ cut it, you have a hint or a clarity on how being present and Christianity, Buddhism, Being Now, Nature, Love all have something to say about each other.

Go ahead. Breathe easy. Take a walk. Let some answers percolate in you before we continue on.


Okay: did you come back? On the same day? Isn’t it easy to get distracted, and isn’t it hard to allow ourselves the luxury of going inside, or discovery, of self-nourishment each day?

And today: here we go again, I’ve written these words in my subtitle for today’s chapter, and let’s see what we can discover:
Christianity, Buddhism, Being Now, Nature, Love


Christianity.

Today is a foggy day on an island in the far northwestern part of the continental US, an island called Orcas Island, in what could be called the Puget Sound, or perhaps more accurately, the Salish Sea, anyway salt water between Seattle and Canada’s Vancouver Island. The fog comes and goes and it is over two thousand years since the man called Jesus Christ was alive on the planet Earth. Some people’s lives have been radically improved by knowing Jesus, or believing in Jesus, or walking the path they or their church or group imagine that Jesus walked. Some people have been burned at the stake, scorned, spat upon, ostracized, told they were going to hell, made to feel small bad dirty and evil by so called “Christians.”

You won’t have to guess hard to realize that this is going to be a book encouraging the non scolding, non judging part of Christianity, and yet, to many people “outside the fold,” this is an aspect they long for and don’t find in the “Christians” they meet: to be totally loved and accepted for who they are, right now, believe or not believing, behaving or not behaving.

Oh, well.

This theme will come up over and over in the book, and the meta concept and saving virtue for getting clear, free and awakened about all this is the last word in our bold faced list: love.

Jesus either said, or is said to have said (to my mind, this makes no difference): “Love your neighbor.” He went even farther: “Love your enemy.”

That’s it.

Love your neighbor.
Let’s put it in bold: Love your neighbor.
And, love your enemy. Love your enemy.

That could be it for all we really need to say about Christianity: if you can love your neighbor and love your enemy, then you are a “Christian,” and if you can’t, you aren’t.

And does that mean you are bad, stupid, sinful, lost or otherwise messed up if you can’t no?

It means you have something to learn.


And you aren’t alone.

Most people have only to try this: go through your phone directory, your personal one, and see if there are any names you cringe at, or get annoyed at, on want to pass over. Or “simply” think of everyone you know, and if you don’t feel happy to think of them, what do you feel.


To the extent we have grudges, and angers and annoyances and resentments and righteous little huffs (“if just they would shape up like this…..”) and on and on stories (“They did this and this to me and I didn’t deserve it or it wasn’t fair or kind or nice or human or ….), all that is very human, and the food of most of what passes as human conversation, but it is also exactly what stands between us and the idea and practice of “loving our neighbor” and “loving our enemy.”


Am I joking to seem to be implying that we could forgive and love everyone in our lives?

No.

And for now, just to entertain this as a possibility is plenty: we could love our neighbors, even the rotten bad noisy evil ones and we could love our enemies even the bad mean selfish arrogant spiteful badrotten bad ones of them


Good.

Next on our really big show: Buddhism.

Has something td do with Buddha, or meditation, or “loving kindness,” or being present or realize truths like: everything is impermanent, or our thinking really isn’t us. Good.

Good. These are possibilities for an amazing life.

Let’s just take that thought one: have a thought and then write it down, and then consider that this thought is just a thought and that you don’t “have to” believe it.

And that it is not you.

What are you? Who are we?

Wee: remember the five questions way back. Return to them, read and listen to them, play with what they suggest, discover if you find something closer to “who you really are” when you hang out with asking and discovering in the world of inquiry.


Who are we really?

This is an important question in serious Buddhist practice.

Serious Christianity practice, too.

And without any “religion:”

Who are you?


Being Now.

Nature.

These are the last two words on the list, and I think this chapter is long enough.

Mull over, with your eyes closed and following your breathing all the ideas you remember. Follow your breathing. Be curious about who you really are. Imagine a world where you don’t have any grudges or resentments or regret.

Would that be a world of Being Now?

How could connecting to and being in Nature help you return to both Love and the being Who You Really Are?

And the answer is a spring opening inside you, to water the soil or your soul. That is all.

That is a lot.

Go slowly. Go inside. Find something like a nourishing spring, near the heart or the breathing belly and imagine feeling that it is feeding and nourishing the Real You.

And what is the Real You?


Don’t worry, just ease into breathing and awaring in the moment with the thought idea question in the background: who is the real me?

Day Twenty-six: Loving the space in between

We do this. We do that. Yesterday we talked of not rushing from one to the next. Today let’s make the “pauses” between each activity a sweet and precious part of our lives.

We do A.

As per yesterday, we keep with A, let the next thing ( B ) be in the quiet distance.

No rush to it, no planning it while we are doing A.


And then A comes to an end. In life, little tangled threads often appear, and A has developed almost tendrils, reaching out for more and more. Oh, well. We have to learn to trust our feeling that “enough” has been done on A. (It can almost be like a getting “fed up” feeling, but if we don’t go too long, we can start to sense the “enough for now” feeling.)

Good… A is done.

B is waiting.

Today’s game, let it wait. Really wait. Take a walk. Sit and close your eyes and follow your breathing. Do a few pieces of one of the movement lessons we’ve been playing with. Call it meditation if you want.

And rest, pause, go into the quiet. Real quiet and let that be something that refills you before you do the “next thing.”

Enjoy.

Day Six: This is my life, hmmm, interesting

This is our life, today, now, this moment.

Sometimes we have this funny idea, as if we are in some sort of rehearsal, and that later, “sometime,” our real life will start. Almost as if we are in some sort of prison, or suspended animation, and when we get out, our “real life” will start. But hey, even in prison, each moment is our life. And that’s all our prison: forgetting this life, right now.


So, have fun, or feel the tragedy of how much we miss it, but play with awakening to the realization t:

This moment in our life.

Right now.


Play with this as many times as you would like and enjoy:

This moment, now, this is my life.

This can sometimes be an incentive for a different way of feeling and living. Even my writing, you reading,

this is our life.

Day 60: Life on its own terms, or Shut up and listen, or "Silence" as the path to....

What if we listened without an agenda?

In Quaker services, which I have never attended, people sit in silence until the “spirit” moves them, and then, from the “spirit” people say what needs to be said.

This seems like a good path to God., or to enlightenment, if there is such a thing.


A good path to speaking something worth saying.


So often when we speak, we are full, full of our previous ideas, full of our thoughts, full of ourselves in the this is me-me-me sense.

Not full of ourselves in the full of life sense.

Not full of life and gratitude and wonder, a wonder that is falling open to the next minute because this minute, this moment is so full with our present-ness.


And God: what if this is a fancy word for the state we reach when we come to something like an emptiness, something like a silence, and let the fullness of Life fill us up?


So, enough words. The experience is what we are after. Today, come back to the five lines, the arms, the legs, the spine.

Come back to light coming in our eyes.

Sounds coming in our ears. Can these include some sounds of nature, the birds, the waters, the trees in the breeze, our footsteps taking a walk outdoors?

Coming back to the world before we have words to capture and constrain it.

Just our experience of the present.

Can we feast on our life, and Life in general, in that silence and that fullness of the world as experience without words to wrap around it? Let’s give it a go.

How much silence can we feast on today?

Day 48: Five Lines to Waking up in the Day

a bunch of arms, legs and spines in joyous action

More alive, up and down and 5 lines

Today’s game is to pay attention to the good old five lines, as we’ve done several times, and this could be an underlying game every day.

Five lines: sense your two arms from shoulders to finger tips. Sense your two legs from hip joint to the tips of all ten toes. Sense your spine from pelvis to head.

Five lines.

Lie down on a comfortable surface and enjoy this: notice three differences:

One: what is different about letting yourself have this “time out” on the floor.

Two: notice differences right and left, right leg, and left leg, right arm and left arm.

Three: if you add on noticing your breathing, what difference does that make?

Now come back to concentrating on your five lines.

Then, keeping the sensing of your five lines going, come up to stand. Notice what you notice in standing. How did lying down help your standing be more awake and aware?

Now lie down again, and sense with any additional input from what you noticed standing. What would you like to be more aware of and where would you like to be more at ease in standing? Play with that in lying.

Again come back to standing, again keep awareness in both legs and both arms and your spine during the transition. Most people go to sleep in transitions.

Don’t.

Now in standing, sense your five lines and go about the day realizing your amazing gifts: these arms, these legs, this spine, this awareness that can sense and know all this.

And every once in awhile, lie down and recharge your awareness.

Good.

hi sweetie

you are apparently
over there
some
"other place"

and i am
"over here"
which seems
here enough to me
and could
be there
to you

and then
so often

we know
know
know

that we are exactly
together
no
matter
where
we
are


sweet
sweet
sweet

a good day

gave four lessons
meet two new wonderful people
tai chi on the beach
seaweed for my smoothie
walking in the rain
planting some seeds in the rain
helping make the garden wider

talked on the phone
took a walk
bought some eggs

does anyone care?
probably not.

even i
am amused
that life happened so fully
today
and it
doesn't matter

now
i'm tired

big deal

soon i'll sleep
and wake in the middle of the night

then the fun will begin
staying present
and doing
almost
nothing

with a lot of
knowing
that this
now
is
this
now

New Month, New Place: Hello Arcata (and rain)

Arcata sunset


ARCATA

a green town
a small town
a wet town

I took a long time to come to discover
public WiFi
which is right here, at the Co-op
one of the centers of the town

hello Co-op
hello green hills and fog and windy days
and a simple spirit,
almost pioneering

a great farmer's market
and
and
and


i'm either awake
or
not

simple
wonderful

thrilling
this
life
this chance

so many now's
and we can ride the wave
and be there
or
sort of be swirled
or fascinated
or plodded
or plotted
along

good
life
is choice

chose
a good
awareness

now


(if you think
it might serve you)

What is Truth?

this is a good question:

what is truth?

ah.

let's start simple:
somehow we are pressing down
in some part of our bodies
into the Earth, chair, floor, bed
whatever

this is a simple truth,
and the paying attention to it
can get us out of a lot of "stories"
in our head/ heart that make for misery

and we are either breathing in
or breathing out
or inbetween the two

this too
worthwhile to put attention on

okay, so we are breathing

beings

in a world of gravity and arms

and legs

and spine and head

what is a big Truth?

that we can know

we Are/

are what? is more complicated,

but Alive 

is a good start

we Are

we Are Alive

we can be Aware of this

AAA

plus gravity

plus breathing

and: there is a world out there

birdies

and plants

and trees

and billions of other 

people

they 2 are

AA and can be A

maybe we can be of us

to others

or the trees and birdies

and plants

who knows?

Things change, hmm

upside down, sort of, in a house we have long left behind:
things change,
hmmm


in life
and in love:
things can change

in life
and in learning:
change is what keeps
us sparkling and finding out more
and more of the richness of life

and does that mean
we have to leave behind anything
"good" that happens to us?

no.

And...everything "good"
that happens to us,
changes.

The seed becomes a tomato
and we eat it,
and compost the bush later.

The child is a baby,
and learns to learn
and crawl
and walk
and talk,
and goes off to college
and then is on the other end
of the phone
helping us when life gets "hard."

The loved one
decides:
ah, yes, this was sweet,
and now,
time for something else.

And they
don't need to know what that is:
loving them means this:
I want that for you,
sweetheart,
I want that for you.


hmmm.

a paradigm shift

as is the moving/ brain/ learning
work we do:

good

it's late,
the other post at
108 days: "This is the wrong time to end our relationship: Is that true?"

soft stomach, open heart, curiosity

loving what is:
the key to
changing
and to
being content,
change or no change


soft belly,
breathe easy,
be present:

in moving
and learning to be at ease
as we reach
and twist
and balance
and move in various directions:
keeping the head and neck free
keeping the stomach soft,
keeping the breathing easy,
being curious:
how could I make this a little easier,
how could I be a little more aware
how could I be a little more kind to myself
how could I allow the various parts of me to help with the whole of me

all this:
good

and when
a so called
"trouble" happens in our life

say
a beautiful partner
wishes to be on her own
and the "end" is what is
coming

again:
keeping the breathing
and the thinking soft:
no enemies
no blames
not even regrets

what has been wonderful:
good
what has been less than wonderful:
good, what can I learn from that

what mistakes have I made?
good:
softly examine,
no self hatred
how could I have been less about me
and more about her
curious:
what can I learn about
how to love
better

and when she was less than wonderful:
good,
what can I learn about being kind
to
a person
who is in a troubled place

as Jesus says,
anyone can love someone who's treating
you all peaches and cream
and
then
when you want to really learn about love,
love the one who is giving you a hard time

and now:
not to give me
a hard
time
or her

and the open heart:
how can I love
change
that my "mind"
"doesn't want"
how can I love
life
when it is
(as it always is)
out of my control

and the Neurological Upgrading Work?
ah,
soft belly,
stay in the present,
curious:
what can be just a little better
now
and
then
now
and
then
now


good,

lot's of learning
and loving possible

if I am to live happily
in what is supposed
to be an unhappy
time

the porpoise of life

to learn



to love



to take care




of the land




and each other






and
animals

yes

yes to the afternoon
sun

and a meeting
i
"don't want"
to go to

loving
what
"it"
doesn't like

la
la

it's a beautiful
afternoon
to ride
a bicycle
to a meeting about bicycles
and maybe some people will
come on bicycles
and maybe some
won't

good chance
i'll have
a
chance
to do the
Work of Byron Katie

and that will be
good

and breathing in
is
good
and knowing
we are breathing
in
is even better
maybe

feels better
to me

you decide
for you

which
you will
anyway

another beautiful
thing
about now

it's always
a complete
moment
unto
into
onto
itself

loving what
"it" doesn't
like

and "it"
only complains
when "it"
isn't now

what's now:

breathing in
fingers
sky
blue sky

sounds
birds outside
and
,,,,,,

Happiness, awaring, improving, loving

blah, blah
fancy words

and if i'm not
now
i'm
missing
...
my life

and if i'm not
happy
why am i alive

and it's thicker than
that

if i'm not happy
i'm probably in
"thinking"
as in:
this is not the way
i would command the world
to be
if I were God

and so
how
to get out of that

the work of Byron Katie

laughing

being honest

coming back to now


...........

coming to my possibilities:
i can be aware
and improve
and enjoy:

the way i move
and am
in my body


i can be
aware
and improve
and enjoy

the way i exist
and churn
and light up
or forget to light up

in my emotions

good stuff

fun
stuff


loving this moment
and let
the next take care of itself


and improvement:
from being curious:
how do i really do this

and what would change
if something else changed


as in:
feeling bad
and then starting the Katie work
and asking
"Is it true?"
and what change happens,
just with the first of four questions

curious
what will happen

not greedy:
to rid of unhappiness

same with body stuff:
sore back say:

one,
the old greed, make it go away thing:
drugs or do this this and this

or
try the tilt of your pelvis
as you sit there,
tilt forward on pelvis, lift sternum
what difference does that make

tilt back on pelvis,
lower and come in with sternum,
what difference does that make

awaring

being curious

hanging out in real information
in the real present

a path to bliss
a path to happiness
a path to enlightenment
a path to everyday improvement
and enjoyment


hmmmm


sounds good

dreaming vs. being awake

this is a big question
and a wonderful one

in our hearts
we wish
the best
for someone
hopefully not just ourselves

in our .....
we love
love
love
to be alive now

all is good

all is well

well come

all

parenting heaven, parenting hell

PARENTING HEAVEN, PARENTING HELL
This is parenting heaven: sweet and happy children. And parenting hell: rebellious or angry or sullen or disobedient or sad or miserable children.

Right?

Wrong.

Parenting hell is when we take whatever they do as an excuse to feel bad or sad or angry or frustrated or bitter or any of the number of ways we can feel when we go into our “feeling bad” mode. Different strokes for different folks. Some of us like to take feeling bad and drive ourselves to sadness; others go for anger; others go for numbing out with substances or media or overwork; others go into self-torture of the mental sort: what did I do wrong, how did I fail, I’m so bad at ….

Whatever our grooved in and conditioned path to unhappiness, one of the ways of using parenthood is to take the inevitable moments, hours, days, weeks, and so on, when our kids are neither behaving nor feeling in their tip top sunniest and sweetest moods as the input to boogie on down that groove.

So, what sort of life is this, if we can’t blame our kids’ lousy behavior for our feeling badly now and then? Not the “normal” life for sure. Not the “ordinary” life in the sense of average (though “ordinary” life, if we wake up to all these moments, is much more a miracle than we hardly ever give it credit for.). Not ordinary, but extra-ordinary would be our life if we could enjoy our children in their “worst” moments as much as we enjoy then in their “best.”

That sounds so weird doesn’t it? The little darlings/ angels/ devils are screaming their heads off, giving us the “no” tantrum to beat the band, and we are happily in love with ourselves and with them? Oh, well, let it sound and even be weird.

Think about them, our tortured darlings: they are having a bad batch and acting out the second half of, “When he/she was good, he/she was very, very good, and when he/she was bad, he/she was horrid.” When do they need our love and attention and listening, and yes, even approval, most? When they are in the funk, right? Anyone can love them when they are being “very, very good.” But if we can’t love them when they are being “horrid,” what are they going to learn about self-love?

They are going to learn to treat themselves like everyone else: if they are on the upswing, they can like and love themselves. If things go bad, they get into the grove they learned when young and hate themselves and feel even worse.

On the miraculous other hand, if somehow we can realize their misery/ rebellion/ funk/ whatever is their business, and we can settle into ourselves and being present and breathing and watching and loving them, think of that sweet lesson. When they grow up and are tempted to get down on themselves for being down, “making a mistake,” having a hard time, etc., they might remember our smile or our hug or our listening or our taking time to slow down to try to understand what’s really going on, and treat themselves that way.

And sometimes when we are in a funk, we just might remember to treat ourselves this way, too. Good learning all the way around. And so here we have our parenting heaven: practicing love without conditions, for the little darlings/devils, and for ourselves. Weird, yes. Wonderful? Yes.

Chris Elms, M.A., has a Master’s in Psychology, and coaches now and then a form of forgiveness and communication between parents and children, especially the “troubled teens” in our lives. Wednesdays here in this blog, are postings on the parenting thing (click Parenting, below, in labels, to get all so far), and answers to questions sent in could be a possibility.

dark day, rain play

wet day, grey, say "Hey"

remember when you were a kid
and didn't care if you were
"hungry"
because you were running around
doing something you enjoyed?

(the old,
having fun
idea
without any organizers,
plans,
or prerequisites)

you vaguely knew that lunch time
had come and gone
and so what
you were "into" whatever it was

today like
that
plants
from this place of Studley st
or from the Garden Park
out to the new place
we are moving too

not many plants
but loving
the idea
that all this buzzed about rain
will wash them
into their new
home
happily
wetly

anyway

came home "late"
and "starved"
and then did 20 minutes
play/ move/ learn / yoga/ feldenkrais
that felt good

then food wasn't bad
at the end
of all that

and life
was at the center
and food
fed me