Week 5-6

One of my practices I committed to this semester is giving myself reward once a week. When I planned this practice, I was very excited because I thought I would NOT miss this. I was also thinking it should be more than once!  :P However, after following all my plans in the past weeks, I noticed that giving myself reward was not practiced as many as it should be. I was falling into my past habit- pushing myself- since exams from other classes were coming. Once I realized, the disappointment had followed. And then I started to blame myself, which was not good at all for my body system as well as mind. Although I practiced loving myself during the 5 days in class, making these as habit was difficult. I think I should have quiet time with myself and ask forgiveness like we did in class with a partner.

 

long week--lovingkindness

This week I am benefiting greatly from doing lovingkindness meditation. It is something that I have been in need of.  I have been having some serious roommate problems that have escalated so badly I am at the point that I feel I have lost my best friend and loathe going home.  I have been labeled as "selfish", "a poor excuse for a friend" and "a total moron" by him for reasons that are deep rooted in possessiveness and jealousy.  These words come out in anger and are intended to hurt me, and they do, more than I can even begin to explain in words on a blog... I have been so worn down and exhausted by this conflict that I had even come to believe his words may be right.  I cannot seem to make the situation any better the ways that I have attempted and so I have decided to take a step back.  I will take good care of myself, I will be strong, and most of all I will show lovingkindness to both myself and my roommate.  I do not want to be selfish and I strive to be the best friend that I can be, so I will reevaluate my reality and focus on doing my best.  I am hoping that I will be able to set aside all the pain and view this aspect of my life as a learning experience as opposed to a debilitating predicament.

Catch-up!

I've been so busy and distracted lately with post-grad planning I kept forgetting to blog!  Luckily I'm taking another class with Mark, so he nicely reminded me to get back on it :)

Again, the last few weeks have been extremely stressful and so face-paced, but I've been able to relieve some of the drama in my life with the few exercises I chose to keep up with for this class!  Working out (mostly running) has also been my go-to for stress relief, so even though I've found it hard to find time to fit running in, its worked.  I make sure to run at least 4 times a week, outside or on the treadmill, and I can tell that after each run I'm so much more relaxed and focused to get the rest of my work done.  I have also been going to the 12:15-1:15 yoga class offered every Thursday.  Not only is it getting a little more intense and turning into a good workout, I find it really comforting to know that I have that time set away especially for yoga, relaxation and reflection.  You guys should come if you;re not busy Thursday afternoons!

The exercise “Stop, Drop and Breath” that we did through the module as a class last week has been something that has come in extremely handy for me this past week!  I have a tendency to become overwhelmed and had some experiences that made just that happen.  My roommate Daniel and I are at a strange point, and the fact that I am interested in and seeing another guy has made my living situation almost unbearable… Almost every day this week I benefited from taking a break to lie on the floor and clear my mind.  It was a healing process and I believe strongly that it gave me the ability to handle the situation in a healthier manner and also a chance to really reflect on my own feelings.  Taking these breaks is helping me to understand both the problem and both of our understandings of it on a deeper level and I think they will help me to properly guide myself strategically forward and hopefully minimize this conflict.

Power Nap - Meditation

Who knew there was such thing as a "Power Nap Meditation." I sure didn't... but I do now.  I used this guided meditation yesterday, Feb 20th around 6 PM, before my staff meeting, as a personal reward to myself for getting work done earlier in the day.  I was a little apprehensive about this 45 minute guided meditation, thinking it wouldn't work or concerned I wouldn't wake up in time, but it seemed to work.  It was almost like hypnosis.  The guide gets you to relax and follow her voice.  There is background noise of crashing waves and in and out music.  There is also a buzzing that I observed that occurs after her voice trails off for the first time.  I wasn't sure I ever fell asleep fully or was just laying there listening, but I couldn't recall the middle part of the meditation, so I suppose I was "out" somewhat.  I ended up coming back into waking consciousness right before she ended the guided meditation and prompted that reaction.  I did feel energized and ready to go, which was nice.  I was surprised by the results and interested to use it again in the future to see what results might come. 

I did attempt this meditation again at 1:30 in the morning, with the intention of feeling energized and getting back to work to possibly pull an all-nighter. I completed the meditation, got up and put my laptop away and decided to go back to sleep, instead... so maybe it doesn't always work like that?  It might be my mindset that stopped it from operating in the same manner or perhaps it was the time of day.  Maybe a guided meditation can help with late afternoon sleepiness or lack of motivation but can't really make up for a lack of sleep in the middle of the night? I will be exploring this one again soon; I really enjoyed it.

Dream Work

Two weeks ago, I was feeling rather unmotivated.  I decided to find a guided meditation that would help to foster a more motivated me or at least perhaps point me in the direction of how to get back on that track.  The meditation was one I'd never done before, it was something I'd searched and found on Spotify. 

It was very interesting though because the meditation prompted me to place myself in a poorly lit room, in an old, abandoned home.  I pictured a kind of sepia toned environment with a single window and a single chair.  I can't remember now if the chair was part of it or my own creation - but nonetheless.  It prompted me to picture my goals and my dreams outside the door of the room, however to reach them I would need to leave the room but every time I would approach there would be an obstacle known as "fear."  The guided meditation prompted me to picture this fear as a monster, a person, etc.  At some point however I would be able to push past the fear and reach my goals and regain my motivation.  At the time this meditation seemed slightly silly.  Though I do tend to enjoy guided meditation that prompts imagery and scenario based activities, the concept was kind of strange to sit with.  I felt better after meditating - so I did get something out of it. 

The interesting part about all of this was not that I did this meditation in the morning, but later in that same day when I was sleeping for the night I revisited that room, that place I had visited during my meditation.  It was nightmarish but familiar.  It was almost like I was reliving the guided meditation now without any kind of direction from an outside source.  It was really trippy and super exciting at the same time.  I plan on doing this meditation again, I feel like there's some great potential for insight and some conscious/subconscious overlap.

Free Hugs

One of the preferred practices from class that I plan on implementing to the fullest this semester is hugging it out & saying thank you.  After my off-putting diagnosis from the doctor, knowing now also that I wasn't contagious, I decided to give free hugs on Thursday, the 14th.  I know people might think it was for them - but really it was a win-win.  What a stress reliever and booster to get hugs from hundreds of strangers with some repeats :)

I got a lot of really wonderful, positive feedback from that activity and just centered around that day in itself.  Some people are suspicious of anything free - even a hug I guess, but the overwhelming response that I got was "thank you" "do this more often," "you all are awesome," etc.  I love making people's day - getting a hug/knowing that someone, even a stranger is willing to reach out to you and give you that much needed physical contact is really something magical. 

There's been a lot of chatter about this new facebook page called "GMU Confessions." Most of them have no relevance to me and some are somewhat disturbing - the confessions, however there was one posted that day that really warmed my heart and exemplified why I give Free Hugs and why it's so important (image posted).  How fantastic!

It's great to hear, especially because I plan on doing this a lot more often - this semester on campus and off and will be even completing my Transformation and Consciousness in Action project around this campaign.  Thursday the 14th was a great day.  A coworker of mine who stopped by for a Free Hug and asked about the movement that is Free Hugs later texted me and said, "I don't know if I've ever said this, but you're one of the few good people I know." I felt very privileged to have such a wonderful day and be shown the goodness in people - young and old. A stranger who gave me a hug told me I restored her faith in humanity - that might be a stretch but it was appreciated on both ends, nonetheless.