Getting off your gerbil wheel

Getting off your gerbil wheel

Day in and day out the monotonous routine continues. Mundane programming takes over and the daily grind of chores, habits, mindsets are set in motion. No variation from the habit patterns of the mind, leaves you much akin to a gerbil. 

Except you are the gerbil and your life is the wheel. Run as fast as you can, your treadmill of an existence does  not change. You can try altering directions, but in the end the wheel is still circular. Where you start is where you end up and vice versa. Disappointments and the sighs of dejection set in. This is usually accompanied by unhappiness and ill health of the mind, body and spirit. You have to be careful as if you ever lose focus of your routines, you fall off the wheel leading to a bad outcome. How can you change this concept such that your life is not the wheel, but the wheel becomes the vehicle to catapult you to the next level?

Faith is a feeling and quite powerful. Faith in the universe or the Creator only takes you so far. Faith that your life will get better, only gets you to the next rug of your wheel as you continue to go round and round. Faith in your Self gets you to the knowing that you can get off your wheel. Gratitude for the  next level before it even begins, gets you ready for the launch to get off your wheel of life. However, it is not until the leap is made that faith and gratitude can be energized into a manifestation through your actions. Where do you get this ability to leap, one might ask? Awareness and mindfulness are not adjectives  but in fact are the stepping stones for your leap. Letting go of your fears, your "buts", your doubts, and your "what ifs" releases the chains that are holding you down with such gravitational force that you accept it as doctrine. Gravity is ever present much like these fears and doubts  but if not tested and released you cannot achieve  escape velocity to fly.

 Running on your wheel is one thing, but flying off the wheel is another new exciting and exhilarating dimension that is begging for you to try. Divert from the norm. Try changing up your life right down to the daily ablutions. Let us say that you put your shirt on first, then your skirt or trousers, then your socks. What if you change it and do these things out of sequence. Since you are doing something different, the mind has to pay attention, lest you forget to wear trousers that day and step out of the house out of sorts. Try a different cup of coffee, or vary your breakfast routine. Try a different route to work, or a new exercise regime. The mind has now becomes aware of the moment. Becoming more care free and less in control, starts the power of faith that despite no control of the simplest of things the bigger things in your life will fall into place. The act of acknowledgement that everything will be in accordance with your ideals, activates the gratitude factor. Before you know it you are off your wheel and heading in a different direction altogether. Stay alert, awake and aware so that you do not unknowingly fall into another wheel of your own creation. 

It is your wheel of life, do you want to keep spinning in one location or jump off and see what else a gerbil can do ! 

Waiting for the printer

Waiting for the printer

You hit the print button on your chosen document. Sitting there you watch for the printer to start humming and feed the paper and start printing your request. Boredom, impatience, and frustration set in. How often do we experience these sensations that lead to our irritability, anger, and then furious state of our minds as we lash out at the printer for not doing its job in an expedient fashion. Why do we always expect everything and subsequently everyone to work at the speed of our mind, when we ourselves are unable to do so. If we are unable to even control our thoughts, how can we expect to handle the technology that we control. Technology of the present day is expected to work at lightning speeds and resolve our numerous issues. But the questions really that we should ask ourselves  is what is driving these issues and what are these impulses that are  driving us? 

The pressures and expectations to quickly get answers and results through either technology or tasks that we assign ourselves and unto each other are some of these issues. We live in a world that is so fast paced and spiraling out of control that we are lost and get caught up in the moment of the whirlwind  of technology. We have to answer that text message or email immediately. We get  suspicious if there is not a reply fast enough either. We neither afford the chance of a meaningful discussion, nor the ability for a sensible reply. Being in the moment is a good thing, but not being aware of the moment is a lost opportunity. Technology drives us, but where are we heading? The impulses that are driving us stem from the agitated mind and persona of our egos. They are the ones who are actually texting and emailing and communicating with all the other minds and egos. The middle man, albeit the most important, namely our nature of the soul, is unfortunately left out. 

By pausing for a moment, we instantly become aware of the moment. Mindful is  not the same as mind full. Through this momentary pause, we actually bring the spirit, our true Self into the picture and transition better into the next moment with meaning and purpose. Slowing down our reaction helps us realize that the technology that we have created is marvelous and to be equally respected. If you respect the inanimate, only then can you respect the nature of things around you, and respect others, ergo respect yourself. We are easily perturbed when it takes longer than a second  for the phone to dial out. When you realize that a signal from your phone has to be sent via energy waves beamed to space, bounce  off a satellite, and then find the other phone somewhere else on the planet is a feat unto itself. We have come a long way from carrier pigeons, but maybe the communicators in that era had time to think of their messages and sent more meaningful thought out replies. 

So the next time you are printing a document, calling someone on the cell phone, emailing a letter, or replying to a text, pause and allow yourSelf to participate in the process. Waiting to print a document may just give you the few seconds or minutes to be more mindful of your breathing. You do not need a set time or place to meditate .You can meditate anywhere or anytime, since your breath goes with you everywhere. Focussing on your breathing enables this shift of consciousness, and with each breath you become more aware. The more aware you afford yourSelf, the more you awaken. With more documents to print, the more you wait and breathe and awaken.  Maybe waiting for the printer is  not so bad after all. Now waiting for a photocopier to complete your task, now that is a different story. 

How many documents are you waiting to print today?

Idle conversations

Idle conversations

Whine, Whine, Whine. This particular habit is an infectious one. In any conversation with anyone, you will slowly find that the gist of the matters spoken slowly digress and flow towards unnecessary speculation and eventual gossip. It is human nature. It stems from primitive times and extends to modern day as an effort to keep our own personal egos ahead of the game. Misery loves company and so we generate negativity in discussions through conversation between two people, between a crowd, and between social groups on media sites. There is a fine line that we walk differentiating commenting about someone or some particular situation and complaining about the same. With the ever increasing popularity of the internet media groups we can complain or write a negative review very readily from our phones, tablets, computers with such rapidity that you do not even realize that someone or some establishment's reputation has been tarnished overnight. At what point does this circle of idle conversations eventually turn on itself, and you become the topic of discussion.

 

The lines between commenting and complaining are blurred when we are not aware that such a  line exists. No one is saying live in a box and do not speak to anyone, as this alone will eliminate idle conversations. On the contrary, join in the conversations and comment away, but doing so gives you the responsibility and the ability to avoid the speech from taking a sourly direction. If you choose to fill the idle conversations with complaining, also go right ahead, but be prepared when the wheel comes a full turn in your direction as it most certainly will. Where do these idle conversations even come from? They are basically speeches from the "idle" mind, and mixed in with others of "like" mind, a conversation ensues.  But how can a mind be idle? This is the one thing that we have that unfortunately does not slow down even for an instant. Humming birds and fire flies cannot keep up. With lightening speeds our minds race from topic to topic, and just like slowing down an uncontrollable car on a small stretch of road does have its perils,so does harnessing a raging bull of a mind, and the result is namely idle chit chat. We need to be able to regulate the diet of a conversation with controlling the direction and the speed of our minds. Becoming more alert when we talk, means we are more present in the moment with ourselves, which translates into a more "meaningful" conversation. We can then truly speak from soul to soul and not body to body.

 

There is an old phrase "Silence is golden." This does not mean shut up. This means pause, reflect, think and then speak if needed. It also means that silence and a quiet mind is very prize worthy and spirtually expensive. WE are all searching for enlightenment and a peaceful coexistence. An agitated mind does not allow for these qualities to foster and be promoted. Idle thinking, Idle conversation, idle activity. A natural progression, that we see in inner cities with gangs, riots and general misdemeanors. We hear people say "Watch what you say," giving the impression that harm may befall you if you do not. However, what if you simply watch what you think, and if you only think good thoughts, you speak in the same fashion, ergo good karmic activity. Many a time when you make international phone calls, or use phone card plans, you have to wait while you are punching in  numbers before you finally type in the number to whom you are calling. These extra numbers are similar to the extra few moments that one should pause before saying anything. 

Try this little exercise. Do not reply instantly or jump into a conversation in the heat of it. Pause a few moments, breathe, think and then act and you will find that your part of the conversation is more noteworthy and cherished. You will surprise yourself. You will automatically change from the habitual negative complaining, turning into a calmer more positive tone. Your entire under current and demeanor will change. An idle engine wastes fuel, and so is the same for your mind. An idle mind wastes the abilities to be creative, joyous and happy. An idle conversation wastes the chances of meaningful connections. An idle action wastes the opportunity to serve and do good.

Lets meet for some good conversation over a cup of coffee :)

Rock hopping

Rock hopping

I had been on vacation last year, and the most important aspect of that trip I vividly remember was the rock hopping. Beautiful sandy beaches extended out into the blue ocean.The beach rocks in all their shapes and sizes lay out there for at least a mile as they eventually formed the sea barrier with coastline. Jagged, sharp, smooth, flat, large, small, brown, grey, wet, dry,oval, square, rectangular, some up and down at different levels. They all sat there waiting to climbed. So that is exactly what I did. I jumped from rock to rock, watching my footing carefully, but very engrossed in the actual jumping and landing, obviously one wrong step and you fall on the wet rock. Before I knew it i had managed to traverse a kilometer. I paused to get my breath. I looked around and I realized I was out quite far on to a rock jetty into the ocean, leaving land some ways away. The view was breath taking as I was surrounded by only ocean. I sat down on the rocks and took it all in. Several things dawned on me.

 

Firstly, I was so focussed on the act of jumping and looking at the rocks, I did not see where my excitement and exercise was taking me. I was not focussed on the direction just the journey and even though I was in the moment and feeling very alive, I was not concentrating on my surroundings. I realized I had to find the balance  between being in the moment and seeing the big picture. But the jumping was so much fun, that I was really alive.  So being in the moment, makes you feel alive, which in turn makes you happy and fun. Doing what you love to do, and having fun doing it, makes you more alive.

 

Secondly, having reached the end of the rocks and found myself at this juncture with the ocean view, I decided to take it all in. Sometimes life takes you in directions where you did not intend but by being in the moment you are going to reach a good destination.  You are inherently being driven by yourself to where you wish to go by your own intentions, whether you are aware of it or not.  When you get to the destination, enjoy it, regardless of your original plans, since the universe sometimes helps you when you really are least expecting it.

The following days, I decided to have the same fun experience, and out I went each day with the same vigor. To my surprise I discovered that despite the destination was the same, the path I took was different each time. The rocks I was leaping onto were different each day. Sometimes I went further in one direction then turned towards another and sometimes I was able to track a faster course. It all depended on my moment to moment reactions to where I was going and the footing on the rocks before re-leaping. There was no fear in the decisions, and so each leap was a fresh calculated spontaneous successful course correction. This is the same in life when we have a plan to succeed and have a goal in mind yet the path to that goal varies each day. However with the right intentions, and clarity of thought, and pure of heart,  the path becomes amorphously more shaped and direct, and attainable. Just do not forget to enjoy the journey and the destination.  Look up from the rock hopping from time to time and know your position in relation to your surroundings and then happily continue. With the pure intention you will get to where you wish to go, with a impure intention you may get some where, not just where you think you ought to be, and perhaps hurt a lot of others and yourself on the way. 

Rock hopping was fun, now let us try rock climbing and get to the top.