Practicing Vipassana
Vipassana meditation is pretty straight-forward. At the retreat, you start working with your breath, and progress to passing your awareness through your body. The rough guide to Vipassana is: Awareness of breath (paying attention to your breathing). Focusing your breath awareness onto a smaller and smaller point at the base of your nose. Passing that same awareness slowly over the …
Vipassana retreat
The largest offering of Vipassana Meditation is that taught By S. N. Goenka, offering free 10-day courses (costs are covered through donations). It originated in India, but now there are meditation centers world-wide. At first glance, the daily schedule for the 10 days looks pretty demanding: 4:00 a.m. Morning wake-up bell 4:30 – 6:30 a.m. Meditate in the hall or …
Vipassana
Vipassana is a meditation centered around observation and awareness. It differs from focused meditations that use mantra’s, such as transcendental meditation, or meditations that focus on controlling the breathing, because it is precisely about NOT controlling anything, and just observing. Sounds easy enough, right? In Vipassana, for once your life you don’t have to DO anything. In fact, you’re specifically …
The regional adjustment burro
Credit card fraud with Capital One is very amusing. There is this entity called the regional adjustment burro who keeps trying collect on a debt for a credit card opened in my name last year at an address I lived over 6 years ago. For some reason, they don’t like to call me. Somehow they found my sister’s number in …
Dependability
I need a week-long topic on dependability. I went on a trip to New York City, fully thinking that I would keep my newly refurbished blog running smoothly. I had a great time, and started many posts in a good old fashion paper journal, but they haven’t made it yet online. I thought when I started this that I would …
The danger of thinking
Not to be able to stop thinking is a dreadful affliction, but we don’t realize this because almost everybody is suffering from it, so it is considered normal. – Eckhart Tolle So much for mindfulness. Yesterday I wrote a short post, and saved it, but didn’t think to publish it. That is known in scientific circles as the “absence of …
Mindfulness
How often are you caught up in your thoughts, worrying about tomorrow, regretting yesterday, or waiting for something to happen? Are you aware and conscious of what you are experiencing right now? Do you notice the strain on your eyes from staring at your computer for too long? Or is that just me? This week’s topic is about mindfulness. I’ll …
Bedtime meditation
As I lie in bed at night, I practice a simple gratitude meditation before I fall asleep. For about five minutes, I review my day, and focus on a few things that I am thankful for (trash cans, toilet paper, healthy toenails). It is not as important what my gratitude is about (whether it something small, like the London transport …
Thankful lists
There are quite a few lists of what people on the internet are thankful for. From my exhaustive search, I learned a number of quality things: People are notably more thankful around thanksgiving. People tend to be very thankful for their family and friends. Either that, or they’re concerned their family might discover their list and question why they’re not …
Off the ground
The more one does and sees and feels, the more one is able to do, and the more genuine may be one’s appreciation of fundamental things like home, and love, and understanding companionship. – Amelia Earhart Does that mean that when you fly to more daring heights you gain a deeper understanding of thankfulness when you come to rest on …