Dear Wisdom:

So good to have you post again, and on your main post with so much of our correspondence!

Glad you went back to the kindergarten class and loved it again and that you are quite confident about your future occupational area (kindergarten teacher).

As to how I am doing: this is my 8th day of being sick, not too bad, but not good either, a cold, congestion, chills at times.

As to our thoughts: these are little physical events happening in our brains. Your thought take place in your brain and there only, in between your ears. They have no power. Only your action has power. People think so many thoughts all the time, most not remembered because they are ongoing. If you watch a worm on a tree, you watching the worm will not keep it safe. Thinking has no power to travel outside your brain. No one can read your mind, know what you are thinking unless you say what you are thinking.

If you think: “the worm will fall”- your thought cannot cause the worm to fall. Nothing you think causes anything to happen.

And nobody can send you his thoughts. All those thoughts never leave your head. Only vocalizations, sounds and words spoken leave you and reach someone’s ears. Only your fingers typing, pass on your thought to another.

Did I answer your question, part of it? Please let me know and clarify your question/s. I will try again.

anita

Dear Wisdom:

I am glad you think walking is good for my cold. I did walk today and most of the days I’ve been sick, but half as much distance per day.

About balance, I am not clear about what kind of balance you mean. If you mean being calm, outside of meditation, then I would say Mindfulness is Living Meditation, where whatever you do, you focus on what you are doing. If you are washing dishes, you listen to the sounds the dishes make, the water running, you feel the soap on your hands, the feel of the dishes, the warmth of the water on your hands, etc. When you walk, you focus on the feel of your foot on the ground, left, right, the sounds walking make. Ongoing, you pay attention to the sights around you, the look, the sound, the smell, the taste (if you eat/ drink), the feel/ touch.

And then there is calming music and hot baths and …walking, aerobic exercise, yoga stretches !- anything to take down the elevator from your head (thinking, thinking…) to your body (stretches is an excellent way, you feel/ focus on a stretch), and otherwise. Got to get out of the thinking mode- that is for sure.

Did I answer the balance part?

anita

Thank you Wisdom for your encouragement! Peace of mind. I do wish you peace of mind. Those things you think about, that cause you distress, no good comes from thinking again and again, as you know. So how do we stop thinking? By doing and focusing on doing. Doing, but not in an automatic, mindless way but purposefully, mindfully, paying attention to what we are doing with our senses: sight, sound, touch, smell and (not as often): taste.

Mindfulness: Try it, try it and you may like it, I say (a Dr. Seuss way of putting it. Let me know how it works for you.

anita