Enlightenment Senryu

seek enlightenment

inside or outside myself

sometimes fragile peace

~cie~

note

There was a wall hanging depicting the picture above in the Buddhist Temple in Boulder. I used to enjoy going for Sunday meditation, although parking down there sucked. Then I had to start working nights again, and it just wasn't possible. Currently, these Haiku are my form of meditation.

Carpe Diem Shikoku Island Pilgrimage: Vulture Peak

Vulture Peak

view with reverence

standing strong against the sky

mighty Vulture Peak

~cie~

Sara Lazar PhD

Jon Kabat Zinn - PhD

The Ornery Old Lady's Reviews: Inspirience: Meditation Unbound

Please check out my exclusive Online Book Club review for Inspirience: Meditation Unbound by Richard L. Haight.

Rating: 
Four out of four stars for Online Book Club
Five out of five stars for Amazon and Audible

The above graphic leads to the Kindle version of the book. I reviewed the audiobook version, which I highly recommend as I find it helpful to listen to the author explaining the meditation techniques and leading the listener through the meditation process.

What I like best about this book:
This wonderful book offers meditation for everybody. One does not need to be an adherent of any particular religion or philosophy. There is no need to be an adept or have special knowledge. One does not need a special space for meditation. One does not need an altar or candles or any other trappings. One does not need to worry that he or she is doing meditation "wrong."

If you think you can't meditate, if you have become discouraged with meditation, let Richard Haight show you that you can meditate and it can be enjoyable and truly enlightening instead of frustrating.

This book has been one of my happiest discoveries this year.

The Real Cie

aka

The Ornery Old Lady

Fearless Thinking, Stress-Free Living Exercises: An Experiment

Disclosure: I received a free copy of this book for review purposes.

I am currently reading the above book as a member of the Online Book Club review team and have decided to take part in some of the exercises and see if I find them helpful. I already like the book well enough that I feel confident in recommending that you preview it and see if you might benefit from it as well.

I have decided to participate in the first recommended exercise, which involves recording one's thoughts for a minute four times a day. I can't promise that I'll do this four times a day, but I can commit to doing it daily. I will sometimes share these thoughts.

This is not a writing exercise. It is not meant to be edited. It is a means of determining where the mind is currently focused. Here is my first entry.

Unedited thoughts, one minute

08/29/2019 16:12

The bandage on my finger is making me feel crazy.

Will this stupid wart dissolve?

My ankle hurts, my right foot hurts. 

It feels like there is something sticky on my fingers.

Will things be all right after we move?

Will we actually start eating better?

Why the hell can't I just finish packing? What's stopping me?

I'm worried about the move.

I'm not going to try to analyze this very much. Lots of worry and trepidation is the theme of the moment, and I can't say I'm surprised.

~Cie~

Real Cie Reviews: Tarot Coloring Book

This is a beautifully designed little book with wonderfully intricate pictures to color. Meditate on the archetypal images while relaxing, relieving stress, and allowing your subconscious to strengthen and expand. Coloring is a wonderful and soothing activity for adults and can be helpful for those working through trauma. The designs are innovative and will please those who collect and enjoy Tarot cards.

Print the pages from the e-book or purchase the physical book with the pages ready to go!

~Cie~

Tan Renga Challenge 2019: Day 9: Snails

Snails in Moonlight

Artist Unknown

I bow to my master

Matsuo Basho told me the way

to watch a snail

Haiku taught me to embrace

the way of snail and turtle

Chèvrefeuille & Cie

Notes:

The Hokku (Haiku) stanza of this Tan Renga was written by Chèvrefeuille. The Akegu (closing) stanza was written by me.

I am not being hyperbolic in any way when I say this. Participating in this exercise has been life-changing for me. Haiku is no longer simply a poetry form for me. It is a way of meditation, a way to improve not only my life but possibly the lives of others as well.

Tan Renga Challenge 2019: Day 5: Wintry Gusts and Fresh Fish

Image Source

Wintry gusts:

on the sardine still lingers

the ocean's color.

How fresh and lovely they are

When not confined to a can

Gaki & Cie

Notes:

The Hokku (Haiku) stanza of this Tan Renga was written by Akutagawa Ryunosuke a.k.a. Gaki (1 March 1892 – 24 July 1927, death by overdose of Veronal.) The Ageku or closing stanza was written by me.

One of the things I treasure about this type of poetry is the way it makes a mundane item or creature such as a sardine beautiful and precious. Some people mock minimalist forms such as Haiku/Senryu or Tanka/Tan Renga, but I find that they have a meditative quality. 

My monkey mind is far too chatty and jumpy for me to meditate very well using traditional meditation methods. Either my mind wanders off track and I get bored and antsy, or if I do manage to relax, I fall asleep. 

This type of poetry allows me to meditate. I find that engaging in the Tan Renga challenge has made me calmer overall and given me an eye of the storm to escape to although my life is very chaotic. I am extremely grateful for this gift.

Alan Watts

"A prolific author and speaker, Alan Watts was one of the first to interpret Eastern wisdom for a Western audience. Born outside London in 1915, he discovered the nearby Buddhist Lodge at a young age. After moving to the United States in 1938, Alan became an Episcopal priest for a time and then relocated to Millbrook, New York, where he wrote his pivotal book "The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety." In 1951 he moved to San Francisco where he began teaching Buddhist studies, and in 1956 began his popular radio show, “Way Beyond the West”. By the early sixties, Alan’s radio talks aired nationally and the counterculture movement adopted him as a spiritual spokesperson. He wrote and travelled regularly until his passing in 1973."

 “Perhaps the foremost interpreter of Eastern disciplines for the contemporary West, Alan Watts had the rare gift of ‘writing beautifully the un-writable’. Watts begins with scholarship and intellect and proceeds with art and eloquence to the frontiers of the spirit. A fascinating entry into the deepest ways of knowing.”

       — LA Times - The above is from the official Alan Watts site.

Sit quietly and be with your breath, your mind, and all your feelings. 

It doesn't matter whether you are sitting cross-legged or on your knees with your legs folded under you. The point is to settle into a posture that is stable and comfortable. You can cross your legs in front of you, or if you are limber you may wish to try the half-lotus or full-lotus position.  You can sit on a cushion with your knees bent and legs on either side or you can sit in a chair..The idea is to be comfortable and find a position that you can maintain effortlessly.

As you settle in, remember that although stillness is emphasized in meditation, this does not mean that you that should hold still in a rigid way. Becoming still physically helps one find stillness of mind, but if you need to move, get comfortable so that you can settle even more deeply.  - From Alan Watts book "The Still Mind."

Real Cie Reviews: The Wayne Dyer Material

Dr. Wayne Dyer

10 May 1940 - 29 August 2015

My dear writing sister Blooming Psycho was up early this morning, and she sent me links to videos of lectures by the late Dr. Wayne Dyer, a psychologist and motivational speaker. Dr. Dyer's works encouraged positive focus and meditation to clear the mind of negative fixations.
Although Dr. Dyer's work addresses Buddhist concepts, it is not necessary to be a Buddhist to benefit from his teachings. His later work had a more spiritual focus than his earlier books. Even if one rejects the spiritual aspects of his books, one can still benefit from the ideas of positive focus.
I'm glad that Bloomy reminded me of Dr. Dyer's work. I invite you to listen to the videos she shared with me and decide for yourself if his approach resonates with you.

Best Wishes,

Cie

Participating In:
Show-Off Tuesday
Spread the Kindness

I Am Grateful

As someone with a rather chaotic life, everything is catch as catch can. I've tried meditating, but I have trouble doing so. This video is brief enough that it allows me to focus fully on it and to help myself with the brief, encouraging, but not sappy affirmations.

Meditation

I am going step by step into what is meditation. Please don’t wait till the end, hoping to have a complete description of how to meditate. What we are doing now is part of meditation.

Now, what one has to do is to be aware of the thinker, and not try to resolve the contradiction and bring about an integration between thought and the thinker. The thinker is the psychological entity who has accumulated experience as knowledge; he is the time-bound center that is the result of ever-changing environmental influence, and from this center he looks, he listens, he experiences. As long as one does not understand the structure and the anatomy of this center, there must always be conflict, and a mind in conflict cannot possibly understand the depth and the beauty of meditation.

In meditation there can be no thinker, which means that thought must come to an end—the thought which is urged forward by the desire to achieve a result. Meditation has nothing to do with achieving a result. It is not a matter of breathing in a particular way, or looking at your nose, or awakening the power to perform certain tricks, or any of the rest of that immature nonsense. ... Meditation is not something apart from life. When you are driving a car or sitting in a bus, when you are chatting aimlessly, when you are walking by yourself in a wood or watching a butterfly being carried along by the wind—to be choicelessly aware of all that is part of meditation.

What K is saying here is that when you meditate the 'you' need not think, not to have thoughts but rather to clear the mind, or allow the mind to be clear. To have a mind free of thought so that the mind is silent. K draws us to see that meditation and mindfulness are one and the same thing and by having a silent mind you are not only meditating but mindful, that is aware. You fulfil your oneness with 'God.' iNot the conceptual 'God' but the reality.

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The Art of Meditation - Matthieu Ricard

Matthieu Ricard received a Ph.D. degree in molecular genetics from the Pasteur Institute in 1972 He then decided to forsake his scientific career and turned instead to practice Tibetan Buddhism. Ricard is a board member of the Mind and Life Institute, an organisation dedicated to having meetings between scientists and Buddhist scholars who collaborate and share their research. He is engaged in research on the effect of mind training on the brain, at Madison-Wisconsin, Princeton and Berkeley. He makes the subject not only entertaining to listen to but brings back the practical origins of Buddhism aligning what some would call spiritualism with common sense. 

I Am: 365 Names of God

A meditative video for Christians.

Peace in Solitude

Still I seek to find

Peace in times of solitude

Peace within myself

~Polly~

Cross-Posted to:

One Love

Poetry of the Netherworld

Relaxing Fireplace Video

Set this on full screen. Meditate. If you're like me, you'll probably end up...

ZZZZZZZZZZ!

~Lily~

Milarepa's How To Gain Happiness and Avoid Suffering

Wonderful words and thoughts to consider in this one.
I am still struggling with my meditation. The Monkey Mind tends to take over. Also, if I relax too much, I fall asleep!

Beautiful Solitude Theme

Perfect for meditation.

Relaxing Music for Connecting with the Universal Energies