Been AWOL

Dear readers (do I have any, do I care?)

So how is mindful living going?  I am still living with greater awareness of when I am mindful and when I am not.

Whenever I realise that I have been 'mindless', I am 'back' to being aware, and I don't need to chastise myself or try to work out what has gone wrong.  It is HARD to be mindful for much of the day, especially for me (highly proficient at "splitting off"), however:

Awareness is primary

And must be my top priority over other gigs like fun, popularity/people-pleasing, ignorance, hoping, planning, stressing...

Running on adrenaline - and love-hating it

I have been running around trying to sort out a crisis at work.
Part of me loves it - feeling important, feeling focussed on something, having a challenge, letting boring stuff slide, feeling important!

Part of me doesn't like it, feeling anxious, rushing, feeling hyper-focussed, talking about it too much, needing to feel important.

Writing it down helps.  Shows me how ego-based it is.

Internal Barometer

Back when I had problems with binge eating and body image, a psychologist told me I was "lucky" to have the urge to overeat as an internal barometer of when I wasn't going well and needed to look inwards. Lucky, bah! These days my internal barometer is the urge to pick the skin around my fingernails. Yah, gross I know.  It's a reminder to breathe, and check in with myself.  Lucky me! At the moment I have no bandaids on my fingers compared with 5 a week ago when I was going particularly badly (jetlag and tiredness decrease my self-awareness). Progress not perfection, as an Overeaters Anonymous crew would say!

Another mindfulness trick

While at Plum Village, another mindfulness trick was using the non-dominant hand to eat food.  Really forces one to eat mindfully.  I haven't been doing it though; in fact I've started gobbling while speed-reading again.  Oh dear! At least I am doing it with some awareness.

http://theidproject.org/blog/marcel-votlucka/2013/06/26/finding-mindfulness-through-gnarly-bike-crash

http://theidproject.org/blog/brett-boyar/2013/06/19/use-your-non-dominant-hand

A most fabulous blog post (not mine!)

http://www.raptitude.com/2010/03/how-to-make-mindfulness-a-habit-with-only-a-tiny-commitment/

Here is a wonderful blog post with simple trick to getting more mindful. Simply be mindful when opening doors and sitting down.  I like the idea of starting simply. I'm also trying to be mindful when phone rings and when going to the bathroom. To try be mindful 24/7 is to set oneself up for failure.

Difficulty with mindful meat eating

As a massive animal lover, I have been struggling with mindful meat eating since leaving the Plum Village Summer Retreat, where only vegan food was served. It is just not nice to think about the fact that I am eating the muscle of a lamb, cow or chicken. Similarly with milk and eggs, if I really think about the source, I hate to think about dairy cows perpetually breast-feeding with mastitis, or chicken being kept in small cages. Sooooo, I'm currently eating a vegetarian + fish diet (too tired to check how to spell pescetarian!!). With sustainable fish only.  Fortunately this leaves oysters but knocks out prawns....can live with that.

Benefits of a slow start to the day

I've never managed this, but I'm going to try again to have a slow start to the day rather than rushing around. Need to try again to follow instructions about How to Get Up When Your Alarm Goes Off: http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2006/04/how-to-get-up-right-away-when-your-alarm-goes-off/

Managed a sweet 3 hour nap today thanks to "Deep Relaxation" by Sister Chan Khong, amazing Vietnamese lady I recently met at Plum Village.  Amazing what a nap can do.

I've also reinstated my Lumie lamp so I wake up with a sunrise, and installed a nicer alarm clock so I can wake up to fave music rather than horrible iPhone alarm clock sound.

The beginning

This is the journey (which I expect to last a lifetime) of a young woman who is embarking on a concerted effort to live more mindfully, rather than continue to rush and stress her way through life in a disembodied haze. Having suffered from dreaded anxiety and depression for a good part of my adult life, I have recently concluded that mindfulness / staying in the present / meditation / yadder yadder is the answer to most of the life challenges that plague me daily.  e.g. since a child, I've tended towards being clumsy, forgetful and not particularly observant, probably because I have subconsciously believed that the thoughts scurrying around my mind were so much more important that the trivial details of the world around me.  Time to change!

Today I am jetlagged and ultra tired.  I have knawed the skin around 5 of my fingernails in a tired daze.  Time to stop this horrible habit! I have taken 2 hours off work and gone back to bed to rest. I need to value mindfulness more, and getting enough rest is an essential ingredient for me.