Hip Bridge Dumbbell Chest Press
Challenge: perform as many repetitions as possible maintaining good form. Do this exercise for at least five days of the week. Keep track of your repetitions on your calendar or journal. Which day did you perform the greatest number of repetitions? Celebrate your improving strength and share your outcome with a friend or training partner.
I cannot resist the urge to spread some love-life around this morning, so this post will include some of my favorite words on the most important topic in the world! Feel free to add to my list in the comments area. Enjoy and please share the love!
To say that I am made in the image of God is to say that Love is the reason for my existence…Love is my true identity…Love is my true character. Love is my name.
Thomas Merton
The soul is made of love and must ever strive to return to love…It must lose itself in love. By its very nature it must see God, who is love.
Mechthild of Magdenburg
Work without love is slavery.
Mother Teresa
Love comes out of heaven, unasked and unsought.
Pearl S. Buck
Love is not a mold that makes two people the same person. Love is the dream that enables both of us to be our own best person–together. Love knows that no one can fill up in us what we lack in ourselves.
Between the Dark and the Daylight by Joan Chittister
“There is nothing more truly artistic than to love people.”
Vincent Van Gogh
“f you ever have a doubt in life, do what’s best for the other person. Take yourself out of the equation and you will see magically, everything will work out.”
Audrey Hepburn
Waiting is a state of mind. Basically, it means that you want the future; you don’t want the present. You don’t want what you’ve got, and you want what you haven’t got. With every kind of waiting, you unconsciously create inner conflict between your here and now, where you don’t want to be, and the projected future, where you want to be. This greatly reduces the quality of your life by making you lose the present.
There is nothing wrong with striving to improve your life situation. You can improve your life situation, but you cannot improve your life. Life is primary. Life is your deepest inner Being. It is already whole, complete, perfect. Your life situation consists of your circumstances and your experiences. There is nothing wrong with setting goals and striving to achieve things. The mistake lies in using it as a substitute for the feeling of life, for Being. The only point of access for that is the Now.The Power of Now – Eckhart Tolle
But beware: The false, unhappy self, based on mind identification, lives on time. It knows that the present moment is its own death and so feels very threatened by it. It will do all it can to take you out of it. It will try to keep you trapped in time.
It is fitting to begin the first installment of the Linking-Thinking series with the above entitled statement: You Are Not Your Mind…Nor Your Thoughts. I cannot express adequately to you how intriguing and important this idea has become to me. Namely, that I-AM not the thoughts I think or feel about myself. How can this not be true? This way of perceiving self is all I’ve ever known. After all, even the famous French philosopher and mathematician René Descartes said, “I Think, Therefore I Am.” So learning or believing that I can relate to myself as a human Being and not a human Thinking or a human Doing, first requires an intellectual leap of disbelief. The possibility that I-AM existing as pure consciousness, separate from what I think, is hard to grasp. I have always attached my identity to the thoughts I have about myself; about the things I’ve experienced in my past and about the things I want to experience in the future. And yet, there is within me a knowing that this possibility, of peaceful Being, could be an absolute truth which ultimately connects me (and all of us human-beings) to our life Source and Force.
As I explore the topic of my tagline: Think…Feel…Be, in the weeks to come, I will be curating and showcasing the ideas of enlightened leaders of the mind-body space, from past and present. I will delve into my own questionings and understandings and lack of understandings as I discuss new ideas and topics each week. I would very much enjoy hearing from any of you, my readers, to discuss and discover what your impressions and experiences are in the realm of each week’s topic.
Ultimately, my goal and purpose in this space is to share my journey and interest in enlightened living, as I attempt to understand, grow, and integrate myself into a more perfect union of mind-body-spirit. I will include quotes from the masters in each week’s offerings together with questions for contemplation and consideration. I look forward to a shared journey with those who follow along as we push the doors and windows of our hearts and minds open to receive the fresh air of creative, intentional ways of living and being. So let’s go…shall we…onward to the high country! This week we learn from Eckhart Tolle how to un-link our thinking from our Being. Tell me, have you had any success or experience with the practice he describes below? I look forward to hearing from you.
Many people live with a tormentor in their head that continuously attacks and punishes them and drains them of vital energy. It is the cause of untold misery and unhappiness, as well as of disease. The good news is that you can free yourself from your mind. This is the only true liberation. You can take the first step right now. Start listening to the voice in your head as often as you can; be there as the witnessing presence. When you listen to that voice, listen to it impartially. That is to say, do not judge. Do not judge or condemn what you hear, for doing so would mean that the same voice has come in again through the back door. You’ll soon realize: there is the voice, and here I am listening to it, watching it. This I am realization, this sense of your own presence, is not a thought. It arises from beyond the mind.
So when you listen to a thought, you are aware not only of the thought but also of yourself as the witness of the thought. A new dimension of consciousness has come in. As you listen to the thought, you feel a conscious presence — your deeper self –behind or underneath the thought, as it were. The thought then loses its power over you and quickly subsides, because you are no longer energizing the mind through identification with it. This is the beginning of the end of involuntary and compulsive thinking.
When a thought subsides, you experience a discontinuity in the mental stream — a gap of “no-mind.” When these gaps occur, you feel a certain stillness and peace inside you. This is the beginning of your natural state of felt oneness with Being, which is usually obscured by the mind. With practice, the sense of stillness and peace will deepen. In fact, there is no end to its depth. You will also feel a subtle emanation of joy arising from deep within: the joy of Being.
The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle, pg. 27
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Good Morning; it’s Easter Monday! And yesterday I just finished my first ever intentional Lenten fast (40 days) of my adult life! Raised in a Christian/Protestant tradition, the Lenten Season was not something I ever felt encouraged nor desirous to practice. This year was different. I don’t know why, but I felt a strong impulse to ‘fast’ from some problematic dietary behaviors. Namely, I was looking to ditch my ‘need’ to not let a day go by in which I didn’t engage in consuming chocolate or nuts in one form or another. To say that I was anxious about being able to go cold turkey from these cherished substances may be an understatement. The first weeks were the most mentally taxing; regular, consistent thoughts swirled into my consciousness during my waking hours. I was convinced I needed these foods to sustain my energy and health as I trained for an upcoming marathon. How could I have been so careless as to delete these items from my diet during an uptick in physical training?
Strangely enough, I was about 30 days into the 40 day ‘fast’ before I realized that I was thriving and training well without consuming these foods. However, the next epiphany arrived when I realized the reason I was thriving was because I wasn’t denying myself nutrition from other sources. I basically replaced the calories I was fasting from with other ‘permitted’ food stuffs. Wow, what an eye opener! I felt like a fasting failure! And yet, what I had discovered as a byproduct of my fast was this: my thoughts about chocolate and nuts no longer bothered me throughout the day anymore. Thirty days into this experiment I realized that when I stood in the pantry and eyed my almond chocolate butter, a thought arose…I want some chocolate almond butter.
As soon as I thought that thought, I FELT that thought in my BODY and in my MIND. An anxious shiver ran through me, and I was almost certain that I was going to break my fast then and there, but I paused and that’s when I realized; the feeling of wanting was simply a THOUGHT! It was not a fact to be believed or acted upon. What a RELIEF! For reasons which I cannot explain, when I identified that thought for what it was, just a passing cloud in the atmosphere of my mind, I was released from its power to propel me into action. Yes, I was tempted to believe the thought; I wanted to believe that I needed that chocolate almond butter at that moment; I could imagine the tantalizing flavor and texture swirling around in my mouth, but when I recognized that this ‘idea’ was merely a thought I could let float by, I was home free! I was free to ignore the thought and let it pass. I truly believe that if I had not spent the thirty days of fasting from the forbidden food substances, I would not have been able to engage in linking- thinking. I would have been a servant, NO, a SLAVE to my thinking thoughts and I would have done performed accordingly, which was: EAT WHEN and WHAT I WANT.
So my Lenten fast (experiment) is not really complete without sharing it with the others in my life, as well as my blog post readers. Even though my first Lenten fast was not performed as practiced in the Christian tradition, it was, none-the-less a personal time of testing and learning. By intentionally denying myself certain opportunities for indulgence, I was provided with some beneficial insights into my own mind, body and spirit during that sacred season. I hope you might be encouraged to engage in a similar exercise for yourself should you feel so inclined. I’d love to hear from you and assist you in any way I can should you decide to take that plunge.
Lastly, if you’d like to follow my upcoming weekly series: LINKING-THINKING, make sure you use the box below to be notified when a new post is published.
Band Pull Aparts
Challenge: perform as many repetitions as possible maintaining good form. Do this exercise for at least five days of the week. Keep track of your repetitions on your calendar or journal. Which day did you perform the greatest number of repetitions? Celebrate your improving strength and share your outcome with a friend or training partner.
In honor of this season, I will be posting inspiring music for most of the next 40 days. I hope you’ll use this music as an opportunity to quiet and settle yourself; for contemplation, preparation, and thanksgiving. May you be encouraged and realize the felt presence of Peace and Love as you hear the music; may you hear the message meant for you in each of the musical offerings. Wishing you peace and every good!
In honor of this season, I will be posting inspiring music for most of the next 40 days. I hope you’ll use this music as an opportunity to quiet and settle yourself; for contemplation, preparation, and thanksgiving. May you be encouraged and realize the felt presence of Peace and Love as you hear the music; may you hear the message meant for you in each of the musical offerings. Wishing you peace and every good!
In honor of this season, I will be posting inspiring music for most of the next 40 days. I hope you’ll use this music as an opportunity to quiet and settle yourself; for contemplation, preparation, and thanksgiving. May you be encouraged and realize the felt presence of Peace and Love as you hear the music; may you hear the message meant for you in each of the musical offerings. Wishing you peace and every good!
Think...Feel...Be....BodyWise! 