Posts Tagged ‘mind’
Choose
.
.
freedom
to choose health
in the face of other options
takes effort
that is rewarded
incrementally
sometimes infinitesimally
over time
do the math
not the science
that it takes
making rockets fly
simple addition
day after day
for months at a time
healthy emerges
for goodness sakes
like green on the grass
running in a river
rounding the rocks
headed toward forever
where life is esteemed
and success of good health
the spectacular garnish
that feeds on itself
in magical ways
running and jumping
with joyous persuasion
returning investments
of health options chosen
turn off that tv
go do something else
break down that routine
be someone else
that unlikely person
you never felt could
emerge from your shell
stuck there for good
just a choice
to be made
inside the mind
there’s reward to be nabbed
free for the choosing
life filled with promise
of better than good
outside the lines
of everyday drab
just beyond reach
of those who don’t try
it’s easy to grasp
for the bold few who do
exercise free choice
to choose better health
not just for a day
but from now on
days-months-years at a time
.
.
New Insight
I awoke with a song in my head. It was a Roches song, but I didn’t know which one. I let the short snippet play round and round, over and over, enjoying it thoroughly, but that still left me wanting.
It took only a few tries to locate the right song, “The Scorpion Lament,” from their album, Keep On Doing. Ahhh. It’s like scratching an itch.
While processing all that, something else was revealed to me this morning. It is probably obvious that we would have a list of things demanding attention here on our new property. – I wonder how long I get to refer to this place as ‘new’ to us. I will probably use that term through the first year, since every day is still new to us, because we have not experienced spring or summer here before.
Anyway, regarding that list, …there are a couple of things that seem to me as though Cyndie should take the lead. When I don’t hear of any results on those, I toss out a few hints, occasional reminders and eventually realize I’m simply nagging.
“Yeah, I could do that.” she accommodates me.
With regard to one particular issue, last night I finally asked her if she needed something else to happen first, as if there was some step in a sequence that hadn’t yet occurred. That is a loaded question, in a way, because she is so classically random, …like the way she mows the lawn.
I was becoming confused with her choosing not to act in cases where it seemed to me it would be something that could be quickly knocked off our to-do list, or at least trigger action that can bring subsequent progress. What was holding her up from taking this step? If she was truly random, things should be able to happen at any time.
That’s it! This morning I realized that her not doing things isn’t the result of waiting on a sequence, it is the very manifestation of her randomness. That is why it doesn’t appear to bother her that a particular step gets done by a certain time. Meanwhile, I grow uncomfortable. I want it to happen in sequence, meaning, do this now, and then other things can follow.
It is why I am bugged by the fact that we suddenly find ourselves working on one thing, when I feel like we haven’t yet finished another. I also realized that after we accomplish some of the random tasks, I don’t get the same sense of satisfaction from having done so, as Cyndie does, because I’m still framing it as having been out of sequence.
Eventually, things work out for both of us, one way or another. We are invested in learning from our styles, and in achieving more together than would be possible, each on our own. I know that I have benefited greatly, over and over, as a result of her randomness through the years.
Our success is the reward that comes from the attraction of opposites, which is accomplished by overcoming the difficulties inherent in being so different from one another!
Contemplating Memory
A wonderful person I supervise at the day-job was addressing the roomful of us, describing an alarming incident that happened on his drive to work. The latch on the hood of his car released while driving full-speed on the interstate highway. He looked at me and made reference to the time my car had the same problem.
My blank stare gave me away.
“Don’t you remember?” he asked.
I didn’t want to completely deny his assertion of the occasion, so, admitted I wasn’t sure. In actuality, I would have comfortably stated that I had never had that experience before in my entire life. Any hint of a memory about such a thing had long ago gone missing.
Minutes later, while visiting the restroom –after he had described how he had gone out to my car with me to look into it (because he and I have the same model car)– I found myself with time to think about it. I exhumed a faint recognition of our both being out at my car, in front of our building, with the hood open. That’s it. That is all I can muster. And, only with the help of his series of descriptions of the event.
I will admit that my immediate reaction, standing at the sink, was to think of how my mother’s memory fractured and faded before our eyes in her later years. Was this my first hint of a pending similar fate for me?
More significant to me was the realization of how wrong I was in my confidence that I had never had that experience before in my life.
In my years of self-analysis since being diagnosed for depression, receiving treatment in the form of talk therapy, and subsequently contemplating my acquired dysfunctional perspectives, I discovered far too many instances where I staunchly defended something in which I held an unreasonable confidence.
I expect that my past depression has robbed me of a lot of memories. At the time, I wasn’t in a healthy enough mindset to record experiences like a mind otherwise would. Historically, I felt that if I had no memory whatsoever about something, then it never could have happened to me. It wasn’t so much a logical deduction, it didn’t feel possible to me that I would have no memory of something.
I no longer possess that same confidence. At the same time, I still need to practice the art of being conscious of the fragility of my perspective of the here and now. It’s something that a few horses will be more than happy to assist me with, I’m sure. Everything fits together rather nicely, don’t you think?
I wonder if I will retain a memory of having had this specific experience and following insight. I’d say that having written about it should be a help, except I tend to forget most of the things I’ve written in the past, so that doesn’t provide much of a confidence boost.
Fully Conscious
Yesterday afternoon, Cyndie took me along on a visit to the stables where she has been helping a friend look after horses. It was an absolutely beautiful autumn day that defied the month of October with temperatures in the 80s. The unseasonable heat seemed to put the horses in a bit of an ornery mood. The dryness of the fall minimizes the amount of green turf available for grazing, so they have plenty of excuse to feel ornery.
I quickly became reminded of my limited experience around horses, especially groups of them. Our visit served to be a very clear demonstration for me of the simple lesson that is the cornerstone of the process Cyndie is learning: being fully conscious of yourself when interacting with horses, and being fully aware of the present moment. Horses are not satisfied with anything less.
I was describing to Cyndie how awkward I felt, trying to temper my normal quirkiness. I tend to react spontaneously, often with quick movements. I even used the word, “unconscious” to describe my usual mode of behavior. I didn’t want to startle the horses, so I had to control my urge to make unintentional movements. It is a great exercise for me, both mentally and physically.
We tossed out some hay and filled water troughs. Then Cyndie moved two horses out of the hot sun and into the coolness of the stable. Twice I witnessed how the animals approach Cyndie and make themselves heard. She said one horse was angry there wasn’t anything to eat. Even I could read his message. His direct approach. The way he stomped his feet. He was definitely telling her how he felt.
The second time was just as we were getting back in the car to leave. A horse made a very obvious and deliberate effort to hustle up to the fence by the car. I asked Cyndie if he wanted to tell her something. She walked over to the fence. I saw Cyndie bend over and look at his legs. It was quite something to witness, because it really did look like a conversation. And then, as soon as it was clear she got the message, he headed off to whatever he was doing before, leaving her standing alone at the fence.
Cyndie said that he had a sore on his leg. I asked how she knew to look at his leg and she said, “Because he showed it to me. He pointed at it with his other foot.” I don’t know what I was looking at, but I missed that message altogether. It did look very much like a conversation, as a whole, however.
Her stint in Boston is going to feel like a very long time to me, I think.
Dream Lesson
I believe that our minds do productive work while our bodies sleep. Often, the dream we recall when we wake up is so bizarre that whatever meaning it might hold for us is disguised beyond recognition. Yesterday morning, I awoke to a very rare occasion of having had the same situation appear in two different dreams, one right after the other. I’ve not thoroughly deciphered all the possible messages for me in these dreams, but I’ve been given a pretty clear pair of situations from which to ponder a meaning.
In both dreams I was playing soccer. For some reason, I have better recall of the first dream, where I was out wide to the left of the goal, and my teammates repeatedly moved the ball out to me for a shot. The ball kept coming to my left foot. Three different times it happened. Each time I was hoping for it to arrive for a big shot with my dominant right foot. I found myself off balance to react well with my left, because I was looking for it to be on my right. I finally made a weak attempt with my left foot and the ball slowly rolled toward a crowd of players and then, to my surprise, somehow it squeaked into the very corner edge of the net for a goal.
I woke up just enough to realize my dream, then turned over and went back to sleep. Then it happened again. All I remember of this dream was that the ball came to my left foot when I wanted it on my right. I begrudgingly kicked a weak shot with my left anyway. It went IN!
When my alarm went off, the thought that was on my mind was the remarkable fact that I had two different dreams about the same thing.
I could easily interpret this lesson literally and practice being more prepared to use my left foot, and just take the shot whether it’s strong or not. It could also be symbolic of many other things for me.
I don’t usually put a lot of analytical effort into interpreting my dreams. I tend to let them influence me subconsciously. It seems the most congruent match for the oblique, bizarre image-stories that are broadcast in my noggin at night. That might explain some of the slow evolutionary progress I am able to demonstrate thus far in my life.
The message of these dreams appears much less complicated. I am inspired to take a LOT of shots with my left foot at my next morning futsal games on Friday. If I score a lot of unexpected goals, you can expect to hear more from me on this subject.
What is it…
What is it about me that leads me to interrupt the thought I am typing to go back to the first word of the sentence and correct the capitalization, instead of forging ahead with the thought and returning later to make such corrections? Probably the same thing that causes me to want to clean the driveway of snow with finishing caliber cleanliness on each pass as I go, instead of not bothering over the scattering of missed spots until after the bulk of the snow has been removed in a first pass.
What is it that prevents me from shutting down applications and rebooting my computer, even though my practice of leaving my 3 primary tabs open and the internet browser application running for days on end eventually leads to an increasingly inconvenient lag time with repeated pauses of the classic Mac spinning beach ball icon? Probably the same thing that leads me to continue to wander the upstairs hallway in complete darkness at night even after I have written about the practice and revealed the lack of any reason not to turn on a light.
What is it that would cause me to, out of the blue, after years of never missing, file a monthly bill without taking any action to actually pay it? Probably the same thing that led me to the practice of placing my daily vitamin on the counter in the morning and purposely taking notice of it once or twice before finally picking it up and swallowing it.
I don’t mind that my mind is wasting away in a terrible way, but it is something of a waste to have a terrible mind that undermines things my mind is trying to mind.
Tight Corners
There is something right around the corner and you can just sense that it will influence your otherwise uneventful experience of late. But there is no corner. Why do we say things like, “The corner of my mind?” Metaphoric corners are rolling around us all the time. The word “corner” looks just fine until you focus on the word “corn” and then you get that strange feeling that it doesn’t look like a correctly spelled word at all. How is it that our mind can suddenly see a group of characters of the alphabet in such a way that the word formed looks totally nonsensical? I have found myself pausing in disbelief at the word, “then” as if there were no way it could possibly be a word, even though logic led me to carry on as if it must be legitimate. This might explain why I have neglected to master a second language all these years. I can hardly maintain order in my head with the words of the language I grew up speaking.
Any credit for understanding the English language should go to my ears and the blessing of having parents who spoke properly. When rules of grammar were being taught in grade school, I quickly discovered that the correct answer was simply the one that sounded right to me. Unfortunately, that means I didn’t ever really memorize the actual rules of grammar. That will be visible in my writing style, where I often opt for choosing to lay out a sentence in a manner that reflects how it sounds to me when spoken, which sometimes turns out to be grammatically incorrect.
I still find myself occasionally choosing to follow a few grammar rules that result in written sentences sounding different than the way I would actually say things, but it is because there are times when doing so just reads better. I credit that to the reading I do and how I ‘hear’ the words written by professional journalists. I don’t know if everyone ‘listens’ to the words and sentences they read in their mind to the same extent that I do. (I think it makes me a slower reader.) I have a tendency to mimic what I see and hear, for better or worse. My writing will tend to reflect the writing of others that appeal to me.
When I edit, I don’t always know what is correct for a given sentence, but I usually sense when it just doesn’t sound right. I credit my parents for the way they spoke and also for their habit of having a radio or television on where I heard broadcasts of WCCO and dialects that most closely matched what I found to read in published works. I have no idea what led me to start thinking about things like corners of a mind or why I see things from a somewhat skewed vantage point at times. I guess it’s just a relative point of view. Relative to something.
For Friday
Fun for Friday. First, find four faces from forever for fresh friendship flavored familiarity. Freely flail five flexed fingers feigning frightful fits filled full from fluttering fanaticism. Fraternize freely foisted floundering fists fixed fruitfully following flowing flowers from fall festivals forever.
Forget it.
Have you ever noticed how letters and numbers can hold the impression of a specific color in your mind? For me, the letter F looks like this:
After spending many adult hours looking at blocks and magnetic boards of letters and numbers with my infant children as we exercised their amazing minds to learn, it struck me why it would be logical to picture these as associated with a certain color. I have taken a few informal polls to learn the variety of color associations friends have for letters and numbers. I’m of a mind that with enough research we could probably identify which kids played with the same devices in their formative years based on their color associations.
However, there are a few situations that complicate it. New things come along to disrupt our initial associations. One in particular that impacted me was a fascination I developed later in my childhood with color-by-number drawings. That re-oriented my color/number associations, for sure.
If you think about it, one of the most significant things to mess with our early impressions developed of colors of letters must be learning to read books. Every dang letter suddenly becomes black. Just plain black. Isn’t that just packed full of symbolism for a variety of situations related to moving from the colors of our innocence to the structure of life as an adult?
Rehab
I can’t count the number of times that I have seen stories of individuals who have made unbelievable recovery from physical trauma through their tenacious and dogged determination to endure endless hours of rehabilitation. I have much more respect for all their accomplishments now that I discover I can’t seem to tolerate even one session of focused exercise to recover a torn hamstring muscle.
I don’t understand what it is about me, but even though the tasks are incredibly simple and I know it is bound to help speed my return to the activity I crave, I can’t seem to muster the mental tenacity to pull off the suggested regimen of exercise in more than occasional, light intensity attempts. I am my own worst enemy.
I am free to exercise within the full range of pain-free motion, but need to avoid ballistic movement of quick bursts or starts and stops. The good news is that cycling would be just the type of exercise that I am able to do right now. Unfortunately, I am not a great fan of early springtime riding. I deserve to get over that mental hurdle, I know.
The simple exercises are painful to me in a mental way. The level of strain on muscle is so minimal that I get bored very quick. It is hard to feel that the muscle is even working, so multiple repetitions are what is required to tire the muscle. BOOOOORRRIIIIIIIINNGG!
Actually, my whining here is really just revealing that I am bummed out over the realization that I discovered I probably am not far enough along in healing to get back to my regular sports activity this week, like I had previously hoped. When my boredom over the lame exercise got to be too much yesterday, I tried running around in the house a little bit. Since that felt entirely pain-free, I got cocky and hopped a couple of stairs to quickly discover why it is prescribed to avoid ballistic moves. Ouch. Back to the wimpy, repetitive movements of the leg. Whooppee! I get to pull myself along forward on a rolling chair. I get to bend my knee and stretch the elastic band taut with my foot and slowly allow it to return. Thrilling, I tell you!
I am far from proud of my accomplishments in this area. Those who have spent years doing the smallest of exercises for days on end to regain their mobility, for maybe just a small portion of their former lives, are stronger than I ever imagined. Even though they are always impressive stories to learn about, such accomplishments now leave me awestruck over the implications of what significant achievements they truly are.
Relative Something 