The past 2 weeks that I've spent at home have been amazing. I started off with a bit of confusion and cloudiness but have spent the most recent days in sunshine. Ironically, after the first 5 days of being home, I've had nothing but good times and moments with good people each and every day. I have yet to wake up and go to sleep sad or angry about anything or anyone.
Today, I decided to finally tackle some school work before it's time to start the spring semester. I woke up had breakfast at Panera with my mom which consisted of the best bagel in the world (cinnamon crunch bagel) with cranberry orange cream cheese and a wildberry smoothie. Afterwards, I proceeded to conduct 5 hours of writing and reading and more reading. Even though lately, this would depress me at 2:15pm when I got up to leave Panera, I was happy and proud of myself; proud that I actually stuck to what I said I would do and did it. I was productive and managed to get a few, albeit small, amount of things off of my list completed.
I then went to the nearby park with the Trinity River flowing through it and just sat at a bench facing it. I hadn't done my sadhana for the day, so I chose to do it all here with the exception of my yoga. Many people may have felt weird or too exposed, doing their sadhana out in the open, but for some reason I just didn't care. I love doing my sadhana outside, especially when its a sunny day with warm weather. Today was perfect. So I sat with the construction men behind me working, people jogging and riding their bikes behind me as I gazed at the river. I began my sadhana without worrying what people would think of this normally dressed black girl chanting with her eyes closed and her hands in weird positions.
Oddly enough, even though the mind wandered during my mantras, it was focused during my meditation. This seems backwards doesn't it? To be in a place with so much noise and movement in the background, to have the most focus when I can hear it all? Guess not, but something was occurring. I felt so in tune with what I'm not sure. But in my silence, I could literally feel a turtle diving underwater in the river, the footsteps of joggers encroaching upon me, the wheels of bikes turning, the flapping of birds in the trees. The most prominent of them all were the power tools of the construction men. Now yes, I know how obvious this would seem, but this was different. I wasn't just hearing the tools, I could feel the sparks reverberating through me as the tool met the metal.
If you've ever watched Avatar the Last Airbender Cartoon series, the way the blind girl, Toph, is able to earth bend is through her sense of the vibrations in the earth with every movement. It's painted like the ripples in the water. With each step anything makes, a set of vibrations emanate from touching everything in its path. This what the power tools were like for me during meditation. It was like the sparks were travelling from the ground through the cement bench and up my spine. The feeling could only be equated in words to a shiver, but it didn't make my body shake. I could just feel the vibrations working their way up spine. The feeling was amazing and completely made my day.
Today, I decided to finally tackle some school work before it's time to start the spring semester. I woke up had breakfast at Panera with my mom which consisted of the best bagel in the world (cinnamon crunch bagel) with cranberry orange cream cheese and a wildberry smoothie. Afterwards, I proceeded to conduct 5 hours of writing and reading and more reading. Even though lately, this would depress me at 2:15pm when I got up to leave Panera, I was happy and proud of myself; proud that I actually stuck to what I said I would do and did it. I was productive and managed to get a few, albeit small, amount of things off of my list completed.
I then went to the nearby park with the Trinity River flowing through it and just sat at a bench facing it. I hadn't done my sadhana for the day, so I chose to do it all here with the exception of my yoga. Many people may have felt weird or too exposed, doing their sadhana out in the open, but for some reason I just didn't care. I love doing my sadhana outside, especially when its a sunny day with warm weather. Today was perfect. So I sat with the construction men behind me working, people jogging and riding their bikes behind me as I gazed at the river. I began my sadhana without worrying what people would think of this normally dressed black girl chanting with her eyes closed and her hands in weird positions.
Oddly enough, even though the mind wandered during my mantras, it was focused during my meditation. This seems backwards doesn't it? To be in a place with so much noise and movement in the background, to have the most focus when I can hear it all? Guess not, but something was occurring. I felt so in tune with what I'm not sure. But in my silence, I could literally feel a turtle diving underwater in the river, the footsteps of joggers encroaching upon me, the wheels of bikes turning, the flapping of birds in the trees. The most prominent of them all were the power tools of the construction men. Now yes, I know how obvious this would seem, but this was different. I wasn't just hearing the tools, I could feel the sparks reverberating through me as the tool met the metal.
If you've ever watched Avatar the Last Airbender Cartoon series, the way the blind girl, Toph, is able to earth bend is through her sense of the vibrations in the earth with every movement. It's painted like the ripples in the water. With each step anything makes, a set of vibrations emanate from touching everything in its path. This what the power tools were like for me during meditation. It was like the sparks were travelling from the ground through the cement bench and up my spine. The feeling could only be equated in words to a shiver, but it didn't make my body shake. I could just feel the vibrations working their way up spine. The feeling was amazing and completely made my day. 
