My last two blog contributions were morning ruminations. This one is a bit earlier…or later I suppose. As I am writing this, it is Wednesday evening and all is quiet. The pup and wife are in bed, and I am up ruminating. Ruminating about meaning and...
I saw a great movie a few days ago called The Sessions, which is based on the true life story of a poet and journalist named Mark O'Brien, who died in 1999 at the age of 49. Polio left him paralyzed since he was a very young boy, so...
I am annoyed with one of my co-workers. I feel my body tighten at the sound of his laugh, an email he forwarded. I am ready with a sigh before he even opens his mouth to speak. Even the sight of his slightly too-short Dockers starts my eyes rolling.
I work part time in the college admissions world, which means I encounter a lot of people who want to know what they can do in order to be happy in the future (or ensure their children’s future happiness). While doing some research for work this...
“Asian new year” is the commonly used nomenclature for the lunar new year celebrated in Asia - the world’s biggest and most populated continent in the world.
This woman is really annoying. That's the gist of what went through my mind as I sat in a noisy Chinese restaurant, at a big round table. It was Chinese New Year, and I was invited to eat and celebrate with a bunch of people. I knew some...
Unhappiness and gratitude simply cannot exist in the same moment. If you feel grateful, you are a happy person. If you feel grateful for what is possible for you in this moment, no matter what your challenges are, if you feel grateful that you are...
This week in Real Happiness we having been working on ‘mindfulness of body.’ Doing body scans, I have become very aware of how anxious and rushed I am. I realized this week how much I have been avoiding this giant piece of mindfulness lately and I...
On Valentine's Day, Facebook asked me if I wanted to send my spouse "a real Facebook gift." What does that mean? I asked myself (and then my Facebook friends -- who are almost real world friends). Does a "real" Facebook gift exist offline, ie IRL?...
So, this week, as part of the 28-Day Meditation Challenge, I stuck with the close technique (from Shambhala), and then mixed in whatever Salzberg recommended. Mindfulness of the body or whatever. Body scans, focusing on sensation, walking...
It's been a strange morning. A searching through Rumi quotes to send to loved ones in observance of Valentines. And a heartbreaking encounter made more so by the stories I've piled upon it. Simply stated, Lani's spent the bulk of this morning...
Greetings, IDP readers! I’m so delighted to have an opportunity to share with you some of my thoughts and reflections on the dharma at this uplifted location. A big thank-you to everyone at the Interdependence Project for the opportunity to join...
Dear IDP Community,As our online presence continues to grow, it's important that everyone understands The Interdependence Project website policy. We offer three ways to interact with us online: via the official Blog, through personal Journals...
Before I started meditating I took yoga classes for several years. I was no poster girl for yoga, but I did develop a familiarity with my body's mechanics. So I was pretty smug when I was introduced to mindfulness of body. I knew my body....
One evening after my Wednesday night meditation class, Amy, a member of our D.C. meditation community, asked if we might talk for a few minutes about her mother, a woman she often referred to as “a manipulative, narcissistic human.” Amy’s mother had...
We fully acknowledge now, without any reservation, and with the heaviest of hearts, that because of our failure to address our teacher’s sexual misconduct, women and also men have been hurt, women and men who trusted us with their Zen practices, and...
It’s no secret to those who know me well that I’ve loved the 19th century Irish playwright J.M. Synge ever since my freshman year of college. (Perhaps you have heard of The Playboy of the Western World?)
Pay attention. Sometime I feel like that is meditation. Don't turn away, don't make up stories in my head. Pay attention. When I'm wet, when I'm cold, when it's raining, when it's dark at 8am. When my feet move; when my arm itches.
Week 2 techniques...
Gratitude is a way of connecting to the world and those in it. It turns your mind toward what's going right in your life.
I am grateful for:
A warm house
Neighbors who help each other out
Music
Incongruities
