No Place to Hide

It’s a stormy, Autumn day.  The wind is coming in the from the West, whipping sheets of rain past my window.  Unusually, I can’t see the Minquiers, a group of islands and rocks about 15 km south of Jersey, where I live.  I can barely make out the sea for the low cloud.  There are loads of whitecaps.  The BBC weather report talks about big seas and dangerous tides in the English Channel.  The waves are pummeling our beaches.  My cats are tucked up on their favorite chairs.  There is no desire to play outside today.

 

Stormy weather.  On a grander perspective I am curious as to when the storms of 2020 will end for us all?  The world is indeed on a steep trajectory of changes this year.

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Well Butter My Butt & Call Me a Biscuit!

Aging is an interesting thing.  In 2020, I deeply appreciate my years of experience.

 

I’ve enjoyed the freedom to do what I have pleased for most of my working life.  A great deal of doing what gave me pleasure when I was in my teen’s and twenties, was going to parties, dances, concerts and night clubs.  I enjoyed many a classroom where I was eager to learn and socialize with others.

 

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A Broader Perspective

This weekend, I’m off to Edinburgh, Scotland. Travel for me is a mainstay in life.  Besides the sheer adventure of it, travel is a way to step outside our day-to-day. Or as a client recently said, “I love to travel because I awake out of my sleep.”

 

This year, I have been writing a memoir. I’ve been recalling the moments of my journey.  I remember a day in Mexico that changed my life.  I was a wide-eyed 18-year-old at the time.

 

My girlfriend Kim called me up and said, “Let’s go to Hawaii.”  I didn’t have the money. She had been awarded money following a car accident and said it was her treat. We had been best friends off and on for a decade.  Wow, I jumped at the chance!

 

 

 

 

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S.U.C.C.E.S.S.

I was scheduled to speak at a local Yoga Festival a short while ago but things went sideways on the day so I did not.  Shame. Here’s a shortened version – a little Jnana yoga for the soul.

 

Many of you know that yoga isn’t just about exercise, postures or asanas.   The different disciplines of Hatha Yoga were designed to prepare one’s body to sit for long periods of time in meditation. Meditation and contemplation are what’s known as Raja yoga.

 

From my perspective, meditation is one way to train your brain.  The practice helps us release thoughts of the ego… wondering, worrying … to connect with ALL THAT IS.

 

Bhakti yoga is living a devotional life and surrendering to God. Mantra yoga is to awaken the self with deeper meditation.  Karma yoga is the path of unselfish action with personal consequences.

 

Jnana yoga was to be my topic because it is the wisdom of knowledge and I’m all about self-knowledge and growth.  I think it’s the most powerful thing we can for ourselves!

 

 

 

 

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Your Number One!

As I write this blog, I’m looking out my home office window. The sky is a lovely mixture of pale blue, white with predominant strokes of grey.  The clouds form a montage of pale hues. Below is the sea, a grey and very faint turquoise. The tide is halfway out.  There’s a calm about the weather today.  I heard on the news this morning we could be in for thunder and rain showers so I suppose this is the calm before the storm.

 

So different than yesterday’s sky.  I could see the coast of France clearly in the distance reminding me that I although live on a tiny island, Europe is at my doorstep and for that I am grateful.  J’adore my trips to France.

 

I remember an ex colleague of mine couldn’t understand why I liked living in Vancouver or San Francisco.  He said, “Everything is so far away from the West Coast!“ I thought it was such an odd statement because there was SO MUCH to the West Coast with easy reach to Hawaii, Mexico and the neighbouring Provinces or States depending upon what side of the 49th parallel I was sitting.

 

 

 

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Olfactory Trigger

Who Pulled the Trigger?

May has been a month of surplus emotion.  My mood has been going UP and DOWN like a seesaw.

 

‘UPs” or feel-good emotions are a result of positive triggers whereas ‘DOWNs’ are the opposite. Some ‘thing’ or some ‘one’ pulls a trigger in our mind’s eye.  As a consequence, we experience a feeling.

 

Positive triggers are sensory experiences that make us feel good.  They result in creating a positive STATE OF MIND.

 

 

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