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Category Archives: meditation

MOBY-DICK: Thoughts on chapter one

15 Thursday Dec 2016

Posted by essaybee2012 in call to the sea, container ships, cruise ships, Ishmael, labor, meditation, Moby-Dick, modern world, mystical vibration, shared pain, universal thump, water, work

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adventure, barbarous coasts, bills, call to the sea, Caribbean, container ships, cruise ships, Customer Service Representative, emails, forbidden seas, Herman Melville, Ishmael, labor, managers, meditation, Moby-Dick, modern world, mystical vibration, passengers, phone calls, romance, sea-captains, shared pain, simple sailors, slaves, universal thump, water, work

Chapter One seems to me especially rich.  It serves to pull the reader in with common ideals to Ishmael.  Even in today’s modern world of high-tech cruise ships, the call to the sea as a simple sailor plays to one’s heart.

When I’ve cruised in the Caribbean, a most thrilling part to me has been the loss of sight of land.  No bills.  No phone calls.  No emails.  It’s as if I might as well be on another planet.  On three-masted Windjammer ships, especially, where passengers are able to leave being a passenger behind and participate in the raising and lowering of sails, the call to the sea is complete.

Ishmael calls it “a mystical vibration, when first told that you and your ship [are] now out of sight of land.”  He adds, “meditation and water are wedded forever.”  I have felt this!

When I labored for a major container ship corporation, in which containers are shipped worldwide by truck, rail and ship, I served as a customer service representative.  With emails coming in continuously, phone calls ringing continuously and managers thumping me on the shoulder with urgent requests, no sun set with all the day’s work complete.

Ishmael wisely advises:  “Who ain’t a slave?  Tell me that . . . however the old sea-captains may order me about—however they may thump and punch me about, I have the satisfaction of knowing that it is all right; that everybody else is one way or other served in much the same way—either in a physical or metaphysical point of view, that is; and so the universal thump is passed round, and all hands should rub each other’s shoulder-blades, and be content.”

When I’ve yearned for a more adventurous and romantic life, I can take to heart Ishmael’s shared pain:  “I am tormented with an everlasting itch for things remote.  I love to sail forbidden seas, and land on barbarous coasts.”

After reading the first chapter of Moby-Dick, I am in for the full journey!

photo from:  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0049513/mediaviewer/rm657111552

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Test the “age” of your brain

06 Thursday Nov 2014

Posted by essaybee2012 in aging, alcohol, Alzheimer's disease, antioxidants, aspirin, blood flow, blood pressure, brain age, Centre for Cognitive Ageing and Cognitive Epidemiology, cholesteral, chronological age, cigarettes, cortisone, dementia, diabetes, diet, exercise, flaxseed, folic acid, genetics, hippocampus, insulin resistance syndrome, lifestyle, longevity genes, Lucy Elkins, Mail Online, meditation, Mediterranean diet, memory loss, metabolic syndrome, Michael Swash, obesity, omega-3 fatty acids, physical fitness, problem solving, Public Health England, Queen Mary University of London, Real Brain Age, red wine, sleep, sleep disorders, socializing, stress, Stuart Ritchie, support groups, trans fat, University of Edinburgh, University of Southern California, Vincent Fortanasce, weight, yoga

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MailOnline

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2821157/Try-test-reveals-brain-age-read-knock-years-it.html

What’s YOUR brain age?  Take this test to find out and discover how simple lifestyle changes can knock years off it

  • New brain test is being developed by Public Health England
  • It takes into account weight, exercise levels, cholesterol and alcohol intake
  • Lifestyle factors including how you socialise and how much you sleep you get each night affects a person’s risk of developing dementia in later life 

By Lucy Elkins For Daily Mail

Published: 19:41 EST, 4 November 2014 | Updated: 07:22 EST, 5 November 2014

Every new wrinkle reveals how our skin is aging, while our creaky joints and thickening waists tell the same story about the rate at which our bodies are growing old.

But what about our brains?  What is happening within our heads as we age is far less obvious.

While many of us are familiar with the feeling of being less sharp as the years pass, or slower to process information, doctors have traditionally found it difficult to assess the rate at which our brains are aging.

But that could be about to change, as a new tool to calculate people’s ‘brain age’ is being developed by Public Health England.

 

A new tool to calculate people’s ‘brain age’ is being developed by Public Health England. It will look at information including weight, exercise levels, cholesterol and alcohol intake

A new tool to calculate people’s ‘brain age’ is being developed by Public Health England.  It will look at information including weight, exercise levels, cholesterol and alcohol intake

It will look at information such as weight, exercise levels, cholesterol and alcohol intake, as experts are increasingly aware that lifestyle factors — from how much you socialise to how many hours you sleep each night — can affect how our brains decline, as well as our risk of developing certain forms of dementia.

These factors can determine how many brain cells we lose and how fast, for as we age our brain literally starts to shrink as we lose more and more brain cells. 

‘The older we get, the faster these brain cells are lost,’ said Dr Stuart Ritchie, a research fellow at the Centre for Cognitive Ageing and Cognitive Epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh.

‘This leads to shrinkage in the size of the brain, and we now know that this shrinkage is linked to a loss of cognitive ability.’

The hundreds of connections between each of these cells, which help relay information, also start to fall apart.

‘The brain is just like any other part of your body — it can wear out with age,’ said Professor Michael Swash, emeritus professor of neurology at Queen Mary University of London.

‘After 60 we will all have some age-related changes to our brain.

Among the factors determining brain age is whether or not a person gets between seven and eight hours (or more) sleep each night

Among the factors determining brain age is whether or not a person gets between seven and eight hours (or more) sleep each night

‘For some these changes will come earlier, and for some they will come later.

‘Some people even have genetics that protect them from having virtually any changes at all.’

Yet the new lifestyle-based test under development shows it is not just genetics that play a part; so too does the way you live your life.

So just how is your aging brain faring, and what future does it face?

Complete the test below, which has been developed by Dr Vincent Fortanasce, clinical professor of neurology at the University of Southern California, to find out your brain’s ‘real’ age — and see how your lifestyle could be hastening your cognitive decline…

ANSWER EITHER ‘TRUE’ OR ‘FALSE’ TO THE FOLLOWING STATEMENTS:

1. I get between seven and eight hours (or more) sleep each night.

2. I eat at least five or more servings of fruits and vegetables high in antioxidants daily.

3. I eat at least one serving of blueberries, raspberries or blackberries daily.

4. I eat baked or grilled fish high in omega-3 fatty acids at least three times a week.

5. I take fish oil supplements high in omega-3 fatty acids or flaxseed supplements at least five times per week.

6. I take folic acid supplementation and a daily multivitamin.

7. I take a low-dose aspirin daily.

8. I drink red wine or grape juice at least five times a week.

9. I exercise most days of the week for at least 30 minutes each time (total of three hours or more of strenuous exercise weekly).

10. I read challenging books, do crossword puzzles or Sudoku, or engage in activities that require active learning, memorising, computation, analysis and problem solving at least five times a week.

11. I have ‘longevity genes’ in my family, with members who have lived to 80 and older without memory loss.

The quiz asks whether a person eats at least five or more servings of fruits and vegetables each day

The quiz asks whether a person eats at least five or more servings of fruits and vegetables each day

12. My total cholesterol is below 5.2 mmol/l.

13. My LDL (‘bad’) cholesterol is below 3.3 mmol/l.

14. I am not obese (less than 1.4 stone overweight for a woman; less than 2.1 stone overweight for a man).

15. I eat a Mediterranean style diet — one high in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, beans, nuts and seeds, with olive oil as the source of fat and little red meat.

16. Instead of butter and margarine, I use olive oil and no trans-fat spreads.

17. I have never smoked cigarettes.

18. I have normal blood pressure.

19. I do not have diabetes.

20. I do not have metabolic syndrome (high triglycerides, central obesity, and hypertension), also called insulin resistance syndrome.

21. I do not have a sleep disorder such as snoring or obstructive sleep apnea or untreated insomnia.

22. Daily uncontrolled stress is not a problem for me.

23. I have a strong support group and enjoy many activities with friends, colleagues, and family members.

24. I have no problems with short or long-term memory.

25. I’m ready to prevent Alzheimer’s and am willing to do whatever it takes.

And those taking part in the quiz are asked if they drink red wine or grape juice five times a week

And those taking part in the quiz are asked if they drink red wine or grape juice five times a week

NOW ADD UP HOW MANY QUESTIONS YOU ANSWERED ‘TRUE’ TO… AND SEE WHAT YOUR SCORES MEAN: 

0-11:  You have a high risk of Alzheimer’s.  Add 10 years to your chronological age for your Real Brain Age.  Right now, call your doctor and talk openly about health problems you have.  Ask if you’re doing all you can to manage these problems.

12-14:  You have a moderate risk of Alzheimer’s disease.  Add five years to your chronological age for your Real Brain Age.  While there’s not a lot of disparity between your Real Brain Age and your chronological age, you need to understand the risks you have that increase the chances of Alzheimer’s.

15-19:  OK.  Your Real Brain Age is the same as your chronological age.  That said, you have a mild risk of Alzheimer’s disease, so pay attention.  Carefully review the quiz to see what changes you need to make to your diet, exercise, mental stimulation or rest and relaxation.

20-22:  Not bad!  Subtract ten years from your chronological age for your Real Brain Age.  You are doing a lot to take care of your physical and mental health.  Check the specific questions that you marked ‘False’ and be sure to pay attention to changes you need to make.

23-25:  Congratulations, you are aging well!  Subtract 15 years from your chronological age for your Real Brain Age.  You are presently healthy, with a youthful and productive mind.  Unless things change in your life, your risk of Alzheimer’s disease is extremely low.

It’s important that you review the quiz and circle any of the statements that indicate some work is needed.  Talk to your GP about your risk factors to see if treatment is indicated.

Having older relatives that have reached 80 years old without suffering memory loss can boost a person's brain age, the test suggests

Having older relatives that have reached 80 years old without suffering memory loss can boost a person’s brain age, the test suggests

NOW… DISCOVER THE TRICKS TO KEEP YOUR BRAIN YOUNG

WORK OUT YOUR BODY

It used to be said that ‘Use It Or Lose It’ was the only way to keep your brain young.

And there does seem to be an element of truth in that.  People who challenge their brain with crossword puzzles or Sudoku or by learning a new skill, such as a language, may help reduce the rate at which their brain ages, albeit only to a small degree.

What seems to work even better is having a fit body.  Research shows that being physically fit will help keep your brain in good shape, too.  Even just moderate walking for 30-35 minutes a day has been shown to help reduce the rate at which the aging brain shrinks.

And the idea that you are what you eat applies to your brain as well as your body.

Eating a Mediterranean-style diet, high in fruit and vegetables and low in meat and saturated fat, may have a protective effect.  That is because the antioxidants in the fruit and vegetables may help prevent normal damage to the brain cells.  Some experts believe that eating oily fish, rich in omega 3 oils, can also help reduce inflammation in the brain that may encourage damage to brain cells — although studies have not been conclusive on that.

And refraining from smoking has a positive effect on a person's brain age

And refraining from smoking has a positive effect on a person’s brain age

GET LOTS OF SLEEP

A lack of sleep is also brain-aging.  A recent study found that people who work night shifts over a ten-year period age their brain by the equivalent of six-and-half years.  It is thought that the lack of sleep can hasten the death of brain cells.

Poor diet can also have an aging effect.  Studies have found that just a week of eating junk food can lead to problems with memory.

KICK BAD BRAIN HABITS

What is bad for your body is generally bad for your brain.  Smoking, being overweight or having high blood pressure or raised cholesterol are all likely to increase the speed at which your brain ages.  This is because all of these affect the health of the blood vessels in your body — and of blood vessels in your brain.  The brain needs a good flow of blood, and even a tiny micro-bleed can lead to the death of cells.

HAVE A GOOD SOCIAL LIFE

An easy way to keep mentally young is to mix with others.  People who stay ‘socially engaged’ seem to reduce the rate at which their brain ages.

‘This makes a difference — not a big one, but a difference nonetheless,’ says Dr Stuart Ritchie.

Studies demonstrate that those with a good social life fare better on cognitive tests as they age.  Research has even shown that being part of a strong network can reduce the impact of Alzheimer’s disease.

Socially active adults have healthier brain scans, too, perhaps because interacting with others stimulates the parts of the brain involved in planning and decision-making.

The test aims to predict a person's risk of developing Alzheimer's disease, pictured above in MRI scans

The test aims to predict a person’s risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease, pictured above in MRI scans

Is brain food real? A guide to fueling and protecting your brain

RELAX, DON’T OVERDO IT

While stimulation is good for the brain, too much challenge or too big a workload can be detrimental, as stress has a direct effect on brain function.

Research has found that stress is bad for brain cells and can disturb cognitive processes such as learning.

The area of the brain called the hippocampus, where memories are formed, can be debilitated by chronic stress, while high levels of the stress hormone cortisone has a corrosive effect.  It can speed up short-term memory loss in older adults and wear down parts of the brain crucial for memory storage and processing.  Some research even suggests stress can accelerate the onset of Alzheimer’s disease.

Yoga, exercise and meditation can help reduce stress and thereby reduce its negative effect on our brains.

Read more:  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2821157/Try-test-reveals-brain-age-read-knock-years-it.html#ixzz3IJHTIhoY
Follow us:  @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

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Like a balanced stone

01 Saturday Nov 2014

Posted by essaybee2012 in Blaze.com, design artistry, gravity-defying artwork, meditation, meditative presence, mental well-being, Michael Grab, Oliver Darcy, patience, rock balance, Thanksgiving, therapeutic ritual

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BLAZE.COM
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/10/31/when-you-see-his-gravity-defying-completed-artwork-youll-likely-just-stare-in-astonishment/
US

When You See His Gravity-Defying Completed Artwork, You’ll Likely Just Stare in Astonishment

Oct. 31, 2014 10:31pm Oliver Darcy

It’s hard to imagine the art Michael Grab creates is real.

Drawing on what must be an incredible measure of patience, Grab stacks rocks in various ways, forming art pieces that appear to defy the laws of physics.

According to the statement posted to his Facebook page, he stacks the rocks not only to create impressive pieces of art, but also as  a way to meditate.

“Over the past few years of practicing rock balance, simple curiosity has evolved into therapeutic ritual, ultimately nurturing meditative presence, mental well-being, and artistry of design,” he wrote.  “Alongside the art, setting rocks into balance has also become a way of showing appreciation, offering thanksgiving, and inducing meditation.”

View the Art:

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

Image source: Gravity Glue/Facebook

(H/T: Bored Panda)

—

Follow Oliver Darcy (@oliverdarcy) on Twitter

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some things learned

02 Wednesday Jan 2013

Posted by essaybee2012 in alchemy, Annie Dillard, Are You Running With Me Jesus (1965), aura, awareness, blogging, breath, cottage of the mind, For the Time Being (1999), geographies of the mind, God, home, khi, Malcolm Boyd (1923 ), meditation, mindfulness, now, peace that passeth all understanding, Philippians 4-7, prayer, reading, shantih, T. S. Eliot, The Waste Land, Upanishad, waves, writing

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I’m reposting some excerpts of mine as an introduction to a condensation of a book that I read recently which has provided great inspiration to me.  I learned a handful of things in 2012 that have helped me tremendously in moving forward.  The following excerpts represent for me, as a prelude to the book condensation, the core of my path from last year into this year.

The following is from:  Geographies of the Mind

grand niece, January 20, 2012

Lately, through a friend, I’ve been practicing “mindfulness,” which is a form of meditation. Mindfulness helps to keep one planted in the now of existence, with bare feet on wet sand instead of allowing oneself to be pulled forward by the tide, into the deep, or backward into the dead tangles of old seaweed. Annie Dillard, in her book For The Time Being (1999), described existence as at the crest of an ocean wave. The dead fall behind life, and newborns rise into it. My grand-niece was once a part of the ocean and is now a part of the wave. Someday, I’ll no longer be a part of the wave, but I’ll still be within the ocean. We’re all a part of that ocean.

Too often, the past and future seem to have roots creeping up and around my legs, pulling me in both directions, tearing me apart instead of leaving me alone to participate in the now. I described to my friend that mindfulness brings a realization of having been born with a nice little cottage of the mind, but in growing up, I learned to spend more-and-more time outside, always here, always there, but never home. Mindfulness brings me back into the cottage, into the now.

This blogsite of mine is an extension of that cottage. I can have all the parties I want here, because I’m always invited.

The following is from:  alchemist

buffet at New Riders of the Purple Sage show, July 18, 2012

A fresh Sun cooks through me.

Khi — air and energy balance the plus and minus within,

Aura – each breath blushes, surrounds,

Shantih shantih shantih –

“peace which passeth all understanding.”

Laughter brightens, ripens my Face,

its form imposed upon me.

Note: Shantih (shahn.tee) repeated three times is the formal ending to an Upanishad as well as the final line of T. S. Eliot’s poem, The Waste Land. Eliot, in his notes for the poem, understood the word to mean: “the peace which passeth all understanding.” This phrase can be found earlier in the Greek-penned letter of Philippians 4:7 (KJV) as “the peace of God, which passeth all understanding.”

Khi (kee) is the Greek form of the oriental chi.

The following is from:  Talkin’ near-bedtime, beer-drinking, alchemy blues

August 3, 2012

. . . take a deep breath, feel the air and energy balancing the crap in your life down into the good in your life, feel the energy expand outward as if becoming an aura radiating out from your flesh, let the breath out and then feel the peace. It’s just a breath for God’s sake. We all do it. We have to in order to breathe. It’s not that you do it. It’s how you do it.

So, I breathe, write and try to live in the “now.”  Add to that, I read.  May sound simple, but it helps to focus my mind, to be mindful and aware, in a positive way.  Here’s where the recent book I read comes in.  It’s from 1965, with a fortieth-anniversary edition published in 2005, entitled:  “Are You Running With Me, Jesus:  Prayers By Malcolm Boyd.”  It is, as far as I’m concerned, beyond all books on techniques of prayer.  It’s real-life, and it has helped me, if for nothing else, to have someone important to talk to, when there’s no one to talk to, 24/7.  When things get bad, which they do a lot, I slow it down to a breath, and I talk through prayer.

Beginning tomorrow, I’ll post excerpts in the form of a condensation of the short, paperback book–the passages that have meant the most to me and that I think will make my point as to how worthwhile it is to those for whom prayer is meaningful.  It’s worth owning.  http://www.malcolmboyd.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_Boyd

*Please note, with this new year, that this remains a not-for-profit blogsite.  I do not receive compensation/money of any kind for any reason regarding this site.  I just try to write my pains and joys and bring awareness to things that I feel are important to understand in this future-shock “now” of a wave that we all share.

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Talkin’ near-bedtime, beer-drinking, alchemy blues

03 Friday Aug 2012

Posted by essaybee2012 in alchemy, aura, balance, beer, blues, books, breathing, cooking, cousins, death, Eastern tradition, Englewood Colorado, entropy, evil, family, flesh, Flight For Life helicopters, form, Frank Messina, friends, goodness, grandchildren, grandparents, great-grandparents, habit, hospitals, khi, knowledge, laughing, life, media, meditation, moon, parents, peace, Philippians 4:7, poetry, poets, prayers, recipes, school, shantih, T. S. Eliot, Texas, The Moody Blues, The Waste Land, understanding, Western tradition

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It’s 9:45 pm, and I’m at my studio in Englewood, Colorado.  I’m having a can of beer.  A good one.  A Colorado-brewed Scotch Ale.  It’s not past my bedtime anymore because I’m past the age of having to be parented.  In fact, my parents are deceased.  I’m also past the age of caring.  Well, I do care some.  Only about certain things and about certain people.  Right now, there may be a full moon that’s beautifully set in the evening sky above me.  Set like a jewel of some celestial, unworldly kind.  (Did I mention I’m a poet?  Maybe not one of the fine caliber of Frank Messina, but as I stand and breath, I say to this night sky that I am poet.)  If it’s not a full moon, then it’s very close.  Close enough.  I care about the moon.  If the moon disappeared suddenly, I would worry.  It’s always moving, but it always comes back.  People don’t always come back, but I can depend on the moon.

I’m sitting in a folding chair now with the flag of Texas for the cloth part.  I hope it’s not a sin of some kind for having my ass set upon a replica of the state of Texas.  Would this be like mooning Texas?  Doh!  I grew up in Texas, so maybe that makes it okay for me.  My parents, paternal grandparents and paternal great-grandparents are all buried outside of a small town in the Texas Panhandle, so I say that gives me the privilege to have my ass thus set.  It’s nice to have privilege of some kind.  I was schooled in Texas through my twenty-fourth year.  I consider that a fine privilege.  I can depend on that education I received, even if my abilities at humor still sometimes are called into question.

I’m rambling, probably because of the good beer that I’m drinking.  A lot of rambling goes on in Texas, but that’s another story.  I’m in Colorado now where there’s a whole lot of good beer.  It’s late, and the moon is very nice to look at as I type this in my folding chair outside of my studio.  There’s very little wind.  It’s kind of balanced between warm and cool and feels just fine.

The real reason I’m writing this is because of the poem I wrote and posted recently titled, alchemist, which I think is pretty good, thank you.  In fact, I can’t stop feeling it.  My hope is that those who read it won’t stop feeling it either.  It was written to be felt until one’s last breath is taken.  I, for one, have decided that I will.

My aunt’s last breath was taken just last month, less than twenty-four hours after I laughed with her in her hospital room, then pretended to reach out to shake her warm, frail hand when I had to go.  She looked down at my hand kind of funny, then smiled when she understood my stupid joke of shaking her hand instead of hugging her.  I leaned over, hugged her and kissed her on her right cheek.  That was that last time I saw her, and I’m intensely glad that we got to laugh together those last moments.

My cousins and her grandchildren were in the room with her when her breath stopped, and they described it for me later.  A long time ago, I was in a hospital room when my paternal grandfather took his last breath.  I know of the experience and feel strongly that I can speak of it:  that final “peace which passeth all understanding.”  We will all experience that final breath, that final peace that has nothing at all to do with books or words, even Biblical words, or knowledge or understanding of any kind.  And we will all take that peace to the great beyond.  Better to be laughing sweetly than living bitter.

I’d like to try to explain my poem, alchemist, only a little, because poems, like some things, are not supposed to be explained but instead felt, taken deep inside.  I truly do want you to take this poem inside, which I myself will take to the grave with me.

This poem can be taken as a recipe or a prayer or both.  I see it as both.  It can be taken in an Eastern traditional way or a Western traditional way.  I see it as both.

A “Flight For Life” just flew over because a hospital is only a block away.  Critically injured people are taken to and from there all the time, so I always make a sign of the cross when the helicopter flies over.  I can usually see bright lights on in the copters and paramedics’ heads along with their red vests because they’re so close in the air above me.  They’re very loud and always capture my attention whatever I’m doing at the moment.  But, back to the poem.

alchemist is at its heart simply about the act of meditation.  One takes in a deep breath of air.  It mixes with one’s inner energy, one’s “khi.”  The “pluses and minuses,” or the goods and bads, or sacreds and evils or positives and negatives within are balanced.  When one holds a breath in, it’s like an expanding  inner strength, a balanced rainbow of bright light, radiating outwards beyond the flesh, an “aura.”  (Hang in here with me.  Don’t “New Age” out on me.)  When one empties the balanced breath outward, the experience of “peace which passeth all understanding,” from either the final line of T.S. Eliot’s poem, The Waste Land, or earlier, from Philippians 4:7, takes its place.  This is the recipe, or prayer:  khi + aura =  peace which passeth all understanding.

Try it right now.  “Breathe deep the gathering gloom, watch lights fade from every room…”  Doh!  Sorry, I accidentally channeled The Moody Blues just then.  Seriously, though, take a deep breath, feel the air and energy balancing the crap in your life down into the good in your life, feel the energy expand outward as if becoming an aura radiating out from your flesh,  let the breath out and then feel the peace.  It’s just a breath for God’s sake!  We all do it.  We have to in order to breathe.  It’s not that you do it.  It’s how you do it.

This is a recipe or prayer which cooks one from within in order that one may be ready to be served to others.  How can an unprepared or uncooked meal be served to others?  It would be an insult, in the least.  Being properly cooked brings one to be brightened.  Properly serving oneself to others is cause for laughter (and of course it’s a nice privilege to be served as well).  You can always tell when one is underprepared or undercooked by what a bummer they are to be around.  Yep.  Too much minus and not enough plus:

“Hay, how ya doin’ there partner?”

“Just peachy, thanks.  Doin’ just peachy.”

“Yeah, well you might just tell that to your face.”

You know the kind.

One’s outer form is imposed on them whether liked or not.  A turkey is a turkey.  A pig is a pig.  A big nose is a big nose.  Plastic surgeons aren’t really hiding anything.  What matters is that the “peace which passeth all understanding “ is prepared within so that it can then be served beyond.  Beyond the flesh.  Beyond the form.

There are other feelings in the poem which are personal to me.  I won’t share those. They’re for my contentment alone.  But the recipe/prayer is for all.  It’s so simple.  Take the air into your energy.  Balance out the shit that media satellites constantly feed you with the good that’s there to be found by just turning the channel in another direction–like towards that very bright moon shining above, or to the Flight For Life helicopters that are so good for reasons that don’t have to be explained to anyone with family or friends.

In a way, the whole thing is like a refrigerator.  Unless it’s consistently plugged in, the cold will very soon become warm, and the food will stink.  The closest scientific term is entropy.  Unless you regularly follow the recipe/prayer, the minus will always overtake the plus just like the warm will always overtake the cold.  Regarding alchemist, one needs to stay plugged in for as often as possible to overpower the minus enough to balance the two.

Here’s the most important point.  One can never eliminate the minuses in life. They’re there as sure as a big nose is there, or a pig or a turkey. The minus has to be cooked through with the plus to reach a balance.  Anything more would be overcooking, or charring.  Life has minuses whether one likes it or not.  The very best you can do is to obtain balance–regularly, until it becomes a habit.

Many people consider meat to be bad, but I can tell you from having grown up in Texas that finely prepared chicken-fried steaks or barbeque ribs or T-bone cuts of steak are as well-balanced a meal as one can ever find.  Although, the “peace which passeth understanding” is many times followed afterwards by an early bedtime with much snoring.

It’s now 11 pm, and the burritos I ate earlier, along with the good beer, are having a similar effect.  A natural effect.  The pluses and minuses in life are plentiful and natural.  Today, and in the days to come, the minuses will, I believe, become even more plentiful.  It makes it even more vital to do whatever one can to balance the two, to stay plugged in.

Khi + Aura = Peace which passeth all understanding.  That ultimate peace will only be found in death and then taken beyond, but in life, it can and should be encouraged within–to the max–at all times, and then also taken beyond oneself, into your family, friends and the world at large.

Before being served to others, one must be properly cooked.  That is the alchemy from the alchemist that turns something base into something of value.  That is the Khi, the Aura and the Shantih, Shantih, Shantih.  And, this is where I wish to end my prayer before bedtime overtakes me at last and leads me to warm dreams of a cooked Steve that brightly laughs and dances with the alchemist in the companionable moonlight with good beers.  Doh!

[the photo and all above text is by Stephen Bort, copyright 2012.]

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Geographies of the Mind

19 Thursday Jan 2012

Posted by essaybee2012 in afterworld, America, Annie Dillard, Bare Trees, being, blog, cemeteries, civilisation, climate, Colorado, cottages of the mind, death, Denver, depression, England, environment, existence, exploration, Fleetwood Mac, For the Time Being (1999), future, Geographies of the Mind: Essays in Historical Geosophy (1976), geography, geopiety, geosophy, Great American Desert, habitat, history, home, imagination, land, libraries, machine, meditation, mind, mindfulness, myth, nature, newborns, now, ocean, party, past, Pink Floyd, place, power, present, sanctuary, soul, Spring, The Geography Behind History (1965, 1967), The Mindful Way Through Depression: Freeing Yourself From Chronic Unhappiness (2007), unhappiness, utopia, water, wave, Welcome To The Machine

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Yesterday, I met a new grand-niece for the first time.  I held the little peanut (5lbs 4ozs), who was born five days ago in Denver, and not much in life holds a candle to those moments with her in my arm.

All of us keep homes in geographic places.  Since I’ve opened this blog, I’ve met bloggers (online) in other places, one near the English seaside whose blog site I like visiting.  My home is presently in the mountains of Colorado at about 8700 ft. altitude (It’s 42 degrees outside now, the sun is out, but there’s a bitter wind blowing through the pines and aspens which has turned the snow-covered ground into a sort of hard white frosting, reminding me of the early Fleetwood Mac album, Bare Trees).  But our minds are geographic places also.

Lately, through a friend, I’ve been practicing “mindfulness,” which is a form of meditation.  Mindfulness helps to keep one planted in the now of existence, with bare feet on wet sand instead of allowing oneself to be pulled forward by the tide, into the deep, or backward into the dead tangles of old seaweed.  Annie Dillard, in her book For The Time Being (1999), described existence as at the crest of an ocean wave.  The dead fall behind life, and newborns rise into it.  My grand-niece was once a part of the ocean and is now a part of the wave.  Someday, I’ll no longer be a part of the wave, but I’ll still be within the ocean.  We’re all a part of that ocean.

Too often, the past and future seem to have roots creeping up and around my legs, pulling me in both directions, tearing me apart instead of leaving me alone to participate in the now.  I described to my friend that mindfulness brings a realization of having been born with a nice little cottage of the mind, but in growing up, I learned to spend more-and-more time outside, always here, always there, but never home.  Mindfulness brings me back into the cottage, into the now.

This blogsite of mine is an extension of that cottage.  I can have all the parties I want here, because I’m always invited.  [ When is a party not a party?  When you’re not invited ].  I hope to someday make my niece’s new daughter aware of her own little cottage, where she’ll always find a sanctuary, an ever-replenishing spring of personal power away from “the machine” that this world will welcome her to soon enough.

A very good book on the practice of mindfulness, is:  [Williams, Mark, John Teasdale, Zindel Segal and Jon Kabat-Zinn.  The Mindful Way through Depression:  Freeing Yourself From Chronic Unhappiness.  The Guilford Press, 2007.]  The best copy comes with a CD that contains assistance with the practice of mindfulness.

There are two other books that are on my mind regarding this post (my little cottage, as you might have guessed, has stacks and stacks of printed paper, with lots of my fingerprints and dusty sneeze-germs on the pages).

The first book is [Lowenthal, David and Martyn J. Bowden, ed.  Geographies of the Mind:  Essays in Historical Geosophy.  Oxford University Press, 1976]:

1.  Yi-Fu Tuan.  Geopiety:  A Theme in Man’s Attachment to Nature and to Place.

2.  John L. Allen.  Lands of Myth, Waters of Wonder:  The Place of the Imagination in the History of Geographical Exploration.

3.  William A Koelsch.  Terrae Incognitae and Arcana Siwash:  Toward a Richer History of Academic Geography.

4.  David Lowenthal.  The Place of the Past in the American Landscape.

5.  Martyn J. Bowden.  The Great American Desert in the American Mind:  The Historiography of a Geographical Notion.

6.  Marvin W. Mikesell.  The Rise and Decline of “Sequent Occupance”:  A Chapter in the History of American Geography.

7.  Wilbur Zelinsky.  Unearthly Delights:  Cemetery Names and the Map of the Changing American Afterworld.

8.  Philip W. Porter and Fred E. Lukermann.  The Geography of Utopia.

The second book is:  [East, W. Gordon.  The Geography Behind History:  How physical environment affects historical events, with illustrative examples from early times to the present.  W. W. Norton, 1965, 1967.]:

I   Geography as an Historical Document

II   Old Maps as Historical Documents

III   Geographical Position

IV  Climate and History

V  Routes

VI  Towns

VII  Frontiers and Boundaries

VIII  Habitat and Economy

IX  The Dawn of Civilisation

X  The Dawn of Civilisation in the Americas

XI  Europe and China

XII  International Politics

–SB

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