• Meditate on This

    • December 2, 2009 10:19 am

    Dearest Readers,

    Just over a year ago I joined Toastmasters in order to hone my skills as a professional speaker. At the meeting this morning our theme was “Meditation” and it got me thinking about my own practice.

    There are all kinds of ways to meditate. Meditation does not necessarily mean sitting cross-legged on a cushion with eyes closed and index finger and thumb gently touching in chin mudra. One can meditate upon a passage of words, or while walking in the woods, or standing in line at the post office.

    Meditating is really the practice of focusing deeply, whether it’s on your breath, a piece of text, the forest sounds or the man’s bald pate in front of you. When we meditate we are seeking the experience of being present in the here and now.

    Many people say, “I can’t meditate. My mind is too busy!” This is the point of meditation. To practice quieting the thinking mind. The nature of the mind is to think. Even great yogis have a mind that thinks thoughts all the time. With meditation, we are learning to let go of thinking and experience being.

    I know people who meditate for hours. This is not me. I once heard Goldie Hawn (of all people) say she meditated for five minutes a day and I thought, “I can do that.”

    Each morning upon waking and each evening before getting into bed I sit on a cushion and close my eyes and breathe, quieting the mind to the best of my ability. Sometimes I am there for five minutes, other times longer. But knowing I only have to be there for five minutes is what gets me to do it.

    Whenever I feel resistance or just too tired, I say, “It’s five minutes, Celia.” This makes it do-able. It makes it easy. I can’t argue with five minutes.

    So I sit and my mind races and it doesn’t. I am thinking the whole time or I’m not. I’m absolutely present or I’m miles away. It’s never the same. But it’s all beneficial.

    Committing to the practice has changed me for the better. Those five minutes have taught me to bring that kind of deep focus into my being at many different times during the day. It’s like a switch I can turn on anywhere, anytime.

    Like the new saying goes, “Practice makes progress.”

    Inspiring Message of the Day: The five-minute rule is a fantastic tool for motivating me to do the thing I think I cannot do. Regarding meditation, committing to just five minutes of quiet time a day improves my quality of life.

    Divine Diving

    • December 1, 2009 8:27 am

    Dearest Readers,

    Someone I know once told me of a dream she’d had of me in which I rolled by her on a skateboard sitting in “boat pose”.

    For those of you not familiar with yoga, the boat posture, Navasana, is where one sits in a V-shape, resting on sitz bones, legs lifted, upper body lifted, arms steady.

    It is an incredibly difficult sitting position that requires deep core strength. In waking life, I and this posture are not really good friends.

    My friend was blown away by the dream and in a light-hearted way saw me as super powerful forever after that. As much as I would like to be the skateboarding yogi in her dream I know the dream was about her power and her strength, not mine.

    Last night I had a similar dream about having that kind of physical power myself. In the dream, I did a free handstand at the edge of a swimming pool, lowered my legs halfway so that my body was in the shape of a ninety degree angle, propelled myself upright into the air about twenty feet above the pool, hovered for a second or two, and then sliced down into the water in a perfect foot-first dive.

    Wow. Totally fearless. Feeling no doubt whatsoever in my ability to do it. Supreme confidence. It was spectacular.

    The funny thing is, when I went to do the dive again moments later I was unable to do so. I couldn’t remember how I’d gotten up into the handstand, my strength failed me and I fell backward into the pool.

    Doubt and fear made it impossible for me to repeat the action.

    Years ago I took a dream workshop and learned the Carl Jung approach to dream interpretation and it’s a fascinating exercise to go through our dreams using this method. I won’t do that here but suffice it to say I believe the dream was about the varying limits of personal power.

    Is our personal power limitless? Am I the only limit to the power I have?

    I like to believe so.

    My doubt is the only thing stopping me from doing a splendid hand-stand, perfect dive. My fear is what stops me from hovering above life’s problems.

    When “I” get out of the way, when I allow the Life Force Energy of the Universe to work through me, there are no limits to what I am able to achieve.

    I awoke this morning with that dream still vivid, that feeling of fearlessness permeating my cells. I’m going to carry it with me all day.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: Let me be fearless today. Let me believe that I am able to anything. Anything! Even hover above Earth’s problems, with strength supreme.

    Give it Away Now

    • November 30, 2009 8:00 am

    Dearest Readers,

    I hope you all had a wonderful Sunday. It’s the start of a new week and though I like to live one day at a time (to the best of my ability) it’s beginning to feel a lot (more) like Christmas.

    The lights are up, the music is playing in the stores, the countdown is on.

    I can actually get into the Christmas spirit. It’s not about the shopping for me at all but that feeling of excitement that can only be felt around this time of year.

    Not everyone feels it. I know a woman who associates Christmas with the death of her father and being drunk for many years and so ruining it for her kid. I heard her say, “I’m sure everybody hates Christmas.” That’s how much she hated it. So much that she believed everyone else did, too.

    And no doubt the homeless living in this city and others have no love for this time of year. And the incarcerated. This season is about togetherness and connectedness with family and friends and anyone who is in a situation where this is impossible acutely feels the loss of it and therefore is not happy about the advent of the holidays.

    I’m going to be staying home this year. I’ve decided not to travel to be with my family and so it’ll be just me and the cat. I’ve got lots of friends with whom I can spend the time and so I’ll do that but I’m also going to nest and enjoy the solitude.

    Since I have no obligations I’m also looking to where I can be of service. How can I help? How can I give away some of the “spirit” I’m feeling? What can I do to share the love and hope in my life with others who feel they have none? This is my prayer.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: As the holiday season approaches I will look for opportunities to be of service to others. I will share the spirit of the season by giving of myself when I am called to do so.

    Play for Keeps

    • November 28, 2009 8:40 am

    Dearest Readers,

    It’s Saturday. I love Saturdays. I think it has to be my favourite day of the week. I’m self-employed so Saturday is a work day for me but I’m choosing to work. M-F I feel like I have to work because everyone else does, too. The work I do on Saturdays feels like fun.

    Because I’m doing fun things on Saturdays in between the work tasks. I’m watching You Tube and e-shopping. And I stay in my PJ’s until I have to go out, if I do. I’m playing.

    That’s what Saturday is. It’s Play Day.

    When I was a kid growing up in Toronto (after we left the Yukon) there was an actual day at the end of the school year called Play Day. I think I looked forward to that day from just about the first school day in September. It was a beacon of light at the end of a long tunnel of lessons.

    Play Day took place at a location we called the Reservoir, just near the famous Casa Loma. We’d all traipse up there from our little school in Rosedale and play games all day. There were water-balloon fights and three-legged races, races with an egg held on a teaspoon, and races in burlap sacs. Lots of races!

    It was always sunny, the beginning of summer days to come. There were vats of that orange McDonald’s drink that’s not quite pop but not quite juice either. It was glorious.

    So I usually waken on Saturdays with that orange-McDonald’s-drink feeling. I would never ingest that stuff today but the memory of it is enough to make a girl go out and find a friend, tie our outside legs together and run in three-legged style across an open field.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: Do something FUN today. A kid’s game. Something that evokes the feeling of childhood freedom and innocent times. Make it a Play Day!

    "Connect. Only Connect."

    • November 27, 2009 10:28 am

    Dearest Readers,

    The title of today’s post comes from a quote by the great author E.M. Forster, writer of brilliant novels like “A Passage to India” and “Howard’s End”. The reason for the quote? Read on.

    One of the many things I’ve learned on the healing path is that I can start my day over again at any time during the course of said day.

    This news was a revelation to me, a gal who could carry her bad moods into next week and hold on to resentments for years. I didn’t know about letting go. I didn’t know about starting over. Every moment a new opportunity to begin again? Wow. What a concept.

    Well, I’ve started my day over about 14 times already and it’s only 9 o’clock.

    It began with waking up later than I’d planned. The barfing-jump-on-my-stomach cat-alarm-clock took the day off so I woke up at 7:30 instead of 6:30. If you’d ever have told me that there’d be a time in my life when getting up at 7:30 a.m. would be “sleeping in” I’d not have believed you.

    “You can start your day over, Celia. Start it now.”

    The next thing was realizing how tired I actually am. Bone tired. So that got the fear flowing because I’ve got a full day planned.

    “Start your day over, Celia. Start it now.”

    But… that’s really it. Other than waking up late and feeling tired, things are just fine. There’s nothing wrong. I didn’t break a dish, spill the milk, step in it, or experience any other minor catastrophe that would necessitate the “start your day over” practice. I simply woke up late and I’m tired.

    “Start your day over, Celia. Start it now.”

    So I’m starting over in this moment by using today’s blog for me. I need inspiring. And you know what’s going to inspire me? YOU.

    I happened to meet another reader yesterday and she took the time to tell me she’s been following and enjoying and feeling inspired by the posts. Her comments made me so happy I cannot tell you.

    Just knowing you’re all out there fills me with such appreciation and joyfulness. I’m so thankful for the opportunity to connect with all of you each day. It’s enough to turn any grey day into sunshine.

    So that’s where the Forster quote comes in. My energy is low but connecting with you, Dearest Readers, is the springboard I need to live the day fully and passionately. So thank you for being there.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: Knowing I am not alone in the world alters my being. Connecting with others uplifts the spirits and heals the heart.

    Every Cloud…

    • November 26, 2009 8:00 am

    Dearest Readers,

    There’s nothing like waking up to the sound of a hairball making its way up a cat’s gullet at 5:30 a.m. Probably a good thing. I would have ignored the alarm clock.

    Instead, I woke up like a shot to push the cat off the bed so he wouldn’t barf up the hairball on the comforter. He kindly did his business on the floor and I got out of bed.

    If everything happens for a reason then that cat exists to get me out of bed.

    Does everything happen for a reason?

    Recently, I was working with a group of young women on a show they’re creating about safe sex. We were sitting in a sharing circle, which started our day of activities, and I asked them each to answer me two things: what did she fear and in what did she have faith?

    We went around the circle and most were very open about the fear part. Some were as open about the faith answer but many of them couldn’t come up with anything at all.

    One gal said she believed everything happens for a reason and at the end of the discussion I asked how many others believed this as well. Some put up their hands, others didn’t. One was particularly vocal about why she absolutely didn’t believe this to be true.

    I’m not sure if I believe it myself. I subscribe to something similar but it may be described in a slightly different way. I believe that some purpose can be drawn from everything that happens; something positive can always be found from the seemingly negative.

    Every cloud has a silver lining? Yes, I think that’s right.

    I’ll never forget one of the first times I began to see this belief system in action. I was living in Edmonton at the time, in pretty dire circumstances, but it was also a time of awakening to the idea that Greater Purpose may be found in the things that challenge us.

    It was late winter/early spring in 1997. The apartment in which I was living had no furniture and a small TV with no cable. I would come home from the Chinese restaurant where I was working and watch the National and go to bed. (The longer story would fill a novel.)

    At that time, the Red River in Manitoba was flooding. People were losing their homes. It was terrible to witness. I remember thinking how unjust the world was, how unforgiving and cruel.

    One of the worst things a person can imagine is losing a home and all her belongings but as I watched this drama unfold on that little box I saw that this circumstance might not be the worst thing after all.

    The CBC was talking to the people who were affected by the disaster and do you know what they were saying?

    They were saying things like, “This flood has brought people together like never before.” Or, “It has shown us that we’re a community and that we can work together.” “There are neighbours helping each other that haven’t spoken in years.”

    The Great Mystery. We simply do not know. But how we perceive things is up to us. This is where we do have power. We have the power to see the positive in the negative. This is how we change the world.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: When something “bad” happens I will use it as an opportunity to seek out the good. I will look for the silver lining.

    Believe in Something

    • November 25, 2009 9:45 am

    Dearest Readers,

    “I’ve decided that I’m going to do battle for my philosophy. You ought to believe something in life, believe that thing so fervently that you will stand up with it ’til the end of your days.”

    That’s Martin Luther King Jr. speaking about his faith.

    Yesterday I blogged about my own faith and later in the day as I reflected upon the post I wondered how many readers might be put off by this. Talking about a Higher Power is a deeply personal subject and not one that every person likes to explore or even hear about.

    But Dr. King’s words came to me this morning and they validated my efforts. How necessary it is to be true to oneself!

    Now Dr. King believed so passionately in his God and his God’s message of love and justice that he died for it. Am I willing to die for what I believe? Am I willing stand up for it until the end of my days?

    The idea terrifies me. It goes right to the heart of my fear. But I am willing to say, “yes”. If I have to, I will lay down my life for a truth that I believe in. Why? Because I would rather die than hide behind my fear. I am assured that there is great purpose in such action. Those who have done so have changed the world.

    This brings to mind the suicide-bombers. Aren’t they, too, doing as such? It could be argued that they are. But the message is hate and therefore unjustifiable and indefensible.

    I do fear alienating some readers with talk of faith and Higher Guidance. I do want everyone to like me. I am a people-pleaser. But I’m learning to let go of caring what others think of me. I’ve learned there is little satisfaction in seeking approval from others. It’s never enough and it brings me no peace.

    Peace comes for me when I walk through that fear of being judged and I say, “This is what I believe. And I believe it with all of my heart. And you do not have to believe what I believe. We can believe different things. I will respect your beliefs and I ask that you respect mine.”

    Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated for his beliefs. His death was a knife to the heart of hope. But not if we carry on for him, not if we live out his message of Love and Justice. Not if we take a stand, challenge the fear and believe in something deeply enough that we, too, are willing to die for it.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: I will continue to contemplate what it means to believe in something so deeply that I would die for it. I will continue to pray for the willingness to have that kind of courage.

    Woodpecker Faith

    • November 24, 2009 8:11 am

    Yesterday I saw a woodpecker. A woodpecker. In Whitehorse, Yukon. North of the 60th Parallel. In November. -14 C.

    It wasn’t so much the phenomenon of seeing such a bird in this climate so late in the year that put the gigantic smile on my face as it was the symbol of the bird itself.

    There are certain signs and symbols that I like to see as proof that the Life Force Energy of the Universe is working with me, guiding me and showing me Itself, and the woodpecker is one of them.

    It started with my seeing a woodpecker a number of years ago when I was living in a small town east of Toronto. I was walking home one day and came across a staggering amount of wood chips covering the sidewalk and the grass around it. I looked up to see this gigantic bird pecking the tree at a mile a minute causing the wood chips to fly in all directions.

    I started to laugh out loud. Have you ever seen a woodpecker doing its thing up close? They hammer their heads against solid wood at the speed of lightening and with incredible force. No wonder Woody the Woodpecker was created as an entertaining cartoon. This is one hilarious bird.

    In that moment, I was filled with a real happiness. My laughter lifted me upward, past the woodpecker in the tree, ever higher to a place of such knowing, such faith. The truest kind of peace overcame me and I felt a deep love for all things, a connectedness with all time, and a profound oneness with the Great Mystery.

    And because of this episode of spiritual awakening, for ever after, when I would see a woodpecker or hear one, I would be returned to this state of knowing, of being in the experience of a Higher Love.

    So yesterday, in this northern clime, temperatures well below freezing, blustery snow whipping drifts up the sides of buildings and streets, I see this creature that has come to symbolize this Power. I see it flying to a telephone pole and jamming its beak into the wood, looking for food.

    And the joy that I felt. I cannot rightly describe it. My smile was electrifying, you should have seen it. Because once again I was reminded that all things merge into Oneness and the Universe is a Living Energy that knows us.

    Don’t you just love a Power that works through woodpeckers? This Power of coincidence, of serendipity, of unity of time, place, thing, symbol, word. This Power is in us and we are of this Power.

    Hallelujah, brothers and sisters.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: Look for the symbols that speak to you of a Higher Power working in your life. What are they? Observe when and how they return to you. Use them as proof of Higher Guidance and opportunities for gratitude and joy.

    Run for Your Life

    • November 23, 2009 9:48 am

    Dearest Readers,

    Yoga is pretty much my only form of exercise. I don’t own a vehicle so I do a lot of walking and bike riding (when the weather is fair) but I don’t go to the gym and I’m not a jogger.

    Despite yoga’s immense benefits it does not really get my heart rate going fast enough or long enough to be considered a cardiovascular exercise and I have been told by various doctors that I ought to engage in some kind of work-out that gets my heart pumping.

    Whitehorse has super hiking trails and so I often go for mini-hikes and use the hills and cliffs as a way to get more “cardio”. And they tire me out. I recently ran straight up a cliff to catch a sunset and was so out of breath when I got to the top that I thought I might collapse.

    This came as a shock to me. I like to think I’m in great shape. I may be flexible enough to bend my body in half but my heart and lungs are sorely in need of some serious action.

    That episode up the cliffs reminded me of a movie I’d seen in grade school on physical fitness. (God, we loved it when we got to watch movies in the classroom! The sound of the projector in the dark, permission to rest head on desk, a break from the monotony of lessons…)

    This particular film was based on the true story of a man with a family and a good job who suffered from depression and wished to kill himself.

    The man gets the bright idea that he’s going to do the deed by giving himself a heart attack. He decides he will run himself to death. Not your typical route to suicide but there you have it.

    So we see the dramatization of the man waking up in the middle of the night and going outside to run. He runs and runs and runs until he collapses. But as he lies on the grass preparing to die his exhaustion goes away and he recovers.

    So he gets up and goes home vowing to do the same thing the next night. And the next night he runs again until he collapses. But again he doesn’t die. You can probably guess what happens.

    He repeats this “suicide attempt” every night until he finds he is able to run for longer and longer periods of time. He gets faster. He loses weight. And his depression disappears. He no longer wants to die.

    So when I climb a hill and reach the top and find myself so out of breath I think I might puke I tell myself, “If you do this more often, this will change.”

    And so I’ve made a commitment to go on one cardio-cliff-climbing excursion a week. It’s not a lot but it’s a start.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: The more we do something the easier it becomes. Something new may feel like a punishment but we are adaptable and the activity will eventually have its rewards.

    The Babe

    • November 21, 2009 8:42 am

    Dearest Readers,

    Every Christmas my mother gives me and my sisters something called the “Chicago Datebook.” It’s a handy little agenda whose beginning pages are filled with information about the city of Chicago, including maps of the transit systems, the suburbs and the downtown core; attractions, sport and entertainment guides and airport information.

    I have never used these tips. Even when I’ve gone to visit my parents in that fair city the Datebook has never been referred to when we’re making our plans.

    The rest of the agenda is the usual monthly and weekly breakdowns and I must admit I don’t use these either, at least not in the usual way. I already have a month-at-a-glance agenda that I’m quite attached to and every year for the last 10 years I have felt an odd excitement about starting a new one of these booklets.

    I do, however, use the Chicago Datebook in another way. I use it as a scratch pad, for taking notes at conferences, jotting down numbers for monthly finances, scheduling workshop details etc. For these things, it is a great assistant.

    But it means I am never working on the page of which date it happens to be. Sometimes I’ll be scribbling something and notice that I’m in July and it is actually October, which is fine, unless I happen to need the date for something and my own agenda is not handy so find myself having to flip through months of pages to figure it out.

    The Datebook, being all things that it is, also has an inspiring quote each week. Because I’m not using the book in its proper context I rarely look at the quote. This is a shame because I could be saving myself tons of time by simply passing it on to you folks each day without having to come up with my own!

    Last week I happened to glance at the top of the page (August in November) and see this little piece of advice from Babe Ruth:

    “Never let the fear of striking out get in your way.”

    I remembered this quote yesterday when I received news from a funding body that I’d passed the first round of adjudication, or the “creative hurdle”, as they call it.

    The project for which I applied for this funding is one that I nearly gave up on. Two different funding proposals had already been rejected and I had begun to think that maybe this was a sign to let it go.

    But then I would get another message, intuitive or otherwise, to continue. So I would keep doing the footwork, doing my best to let go of expectations and simply follow the guidance I felt I was receiving.

    If I had let the fear striking out be my guide, I’d never be in the position I’m in now, which is to potentially receive money to pay myself, keep the project afloat and take it to the next level.

    So despite my fear of rejection, I stepped up to the plate one more time and hit the ball. It’s still in the air and it could be a homer.

    Inspiring Message of the Day: Mother, if you’re reading this, I’ll take a 2010 Chicago Datebook for Christmas.