Reflection on Change, 10/19/07

Reflecting on how I take for granted that I will wake up each morning and life will go on as it has in the past. As I see everything around me changing, I realize that I too am changing. My hair is turning gray. I tire more easily than when I was young. My motivation is sort of limp. But, I also realize the power and ability I have to be an agent for change in my own life. And I see how when I change, ripples of that new changed energy radiate out and touch others. As I was waking up this morning, the thought of exploring edges came up. My idea of edges is going outside my comfort zone, doing things I haven't done before, taking some calculated risks, and observing myself in these situations. A thought also came up of reading about others who have taken risks, explored their edges, stretched their comfort zones. I tend to withdraw when I feel uncomfortable, threatened, or at risk. I'll try to stretch myself out a bit and observe how that makes me feel.

Meditation on Change 10/15/07

Paying attention to times of spontaneous reflection, meditation, in my life. I probably spend more time doing this than I realize. Some people might call it daydreaming. So, while I seem not to be doing as much "formal" meditation, the time that I spend in "creative reverie" is increasing. I notice that this happens while I am driving the car, taking a bath, petting the cat, doing such mindless, automatic things. Water seems to me to be an element that supports this kind of non-thought. Water for me has properties of emotional flow, intuitive meandering thought, a non-solid, flowing structure. This morning in the bath tub, I was thinking about my ancestors, mentally visiting the drawer in my mother's bedroom where she keeps the old family photos. There is the photo of my paternal grandfather with his over sized, winglike ears; the photo of my father as a young man, wearing a tall white chef's hat. He was employed at the time as a cook during the construction of Larson Air Force Base (now defunct) at Moses Lake, WA. Memories surface of Sunday afternoon dinners at my maternal great-grandparents' house. After dinner, my great-grandfather and the other male relatives would sit and rock in the living room, blowing smoke rings from their pipes and talk. I remember the smoke stand that sat by the rocking chair and the brass spittoon in the corner. The women would be busy in the kitchen cleaning up after the meal, visiting, my great-grandmother humming a tune that sounded so much like Enya's song "How Can I Keep From Singing." I would be playing child games with my cousins: hide and seek, running around the yard among the row of bushes at the side of the property, exploring the woodshed. How times have changed. I remember my great-grandfather's name was John Calvin. My great-grandmother called him Callie, and he called her Lulee. Her name was Lulu. My reflections also happen spontaneously when I am doing what I think of as childlike things that spark my sense of wonder: gathering the natural treasure of brilliant autumn leaves and pressing and preserving them to use for making collages, cards, and other sort of useless, magical things. I did some shopping at a thrift store this weekend and picked up some useful items of clothing. My prize was a heavy wool winter coat, which I have been thinking about buying for a couple of winters. This particular coat is just what I was looking for, for $6.99, almost new. I reflected about who might have owned these items of clothing before me, what they did when they wore them, how they interacted with their families. I arrived at the sense of how all these things, people, circumstances and times change, how things pass through my hands, people pass through my life, times and events change and are changed by people, how it all changes and is impermanent. And I feel openhearted, able to change with everything. I am happy.

Change 10/10/07

Raining outside, overcast, thinking of buying bulbs to plant this weekend, bulbs, a symbol of hope, thinking ahead to spring. Bulbs, storage of energy in order to burst forth when the sun gets warmer in the spring, resting in the frozen earth all winter. Reading the paper -- news of changing times all over the world, war in Iraq, car wrecks, protest in Burma, discovery of new species, petty crimes, more serious crimes of arson, rape. My body is digesting the food I just ate, oriental chicken, transforming it into smaller particles and molecules that can be used for energy and growth and repair by my body. One thing becomes another. And, what do I do with the energy? I am working today, being productive, thinking, walking. I imagine I hear my phone ring, but it's just my imagination. Sitting, feeling the pressure of my weight on the chair, feeling the waistband of my pants around my waist, a little tight now that my stomach is full. I've also gained some weight in the last few weeks, more changes. Coughing, trying to expel something from my lungs, an itchy throat, catching cold? Thinking that I have to get gas on the way home from work, trying not to forget. My car will remind me.

Open-eyed Meditation - Change

6:30 a.m. October 9, 2007

Fingernail-thin sliver of crescent moon, wind tossing heads of trees, rosy-orange pre-dawn, silhouettes of trees along the landscape of hills like beard stubble. Blue spruce fingers pointing at the bluing sky. Rumbling train engine, birds waking, flitting one tree to another. Car headlights prowl next street over, refrigerator comes to life, cat sleeping. Wispy clouds catch pink dawn light in brightening sky. Branches of fir tree nod "yes" in wind. As light increases, seeing the yellow leaves of ash tree. Moon's sliver grows fainter, clouds brighter pink, sky tender blue. Reflection of dining room light in living room window. One small dark gray cloud hanging just over the hill, not yet transformed to pink, now dispersing like smoke, forming again, dispersing, growing thin now and totally gone, tentatively reappearing and gone. The clouds bright pink streaks through the now-blue sky, tall thin radio tower visible on peak of hill. Yellow and white peak of house gable across the street, gray roof. Light shining on glass of car window. Rumble of car starting, engine warming, field of green and reddish pasture grass and weeds across the way, charcoal gray asphalt road. As light increases, more colors become visible. Small dark gray cloud has reappeared and dispersed again below pink jet contrail. Another train rumbles through. Intensity of orange-pink above the horizon where the sun will soon rise, clouds turning fleecy white. Street sign, green with white lettering, becomes visible, the back end of a red pick-up truck, black plastic garbage can, 2 blue recycling bins. The sun pops up behind the hill, too bright to look at, illuminating the small cloud that forms, disperses and reforms

Morning, 10/7/07

I'm feeling cool this morning, and sleepy. But, I am able to rouse myself from the sleepy state when I realize I have gone there. Thoughts of a dream I had last night, an old friend, a messy house, living on the Oregon side of the Columbia River, many people in the house, trying to get to work on time and getting tied up in traffic when a policeman pulls over a young man in a car, a sore on my left leg. All sorts of odd elements in that dream. I bought myself a small moleskine notebook, and I intend to carry it with me and note changes I observe throughout my days.

Meditation on Change 10/06/07

I start by just settling in to basic meditation, observing my breath, watching thoughts as they come and go. Then I entertain thoughts about change, changes in the world. It's fall in this part of the world, and I observe this season of rapid change every time I step outside. Some of my flowers have caught the frost and have shriveled and died. Gradually the trees are changing colors and leaves are beginning to fall. The colors seem especially brilliant this year. The weather is unpredictable: warm and balmy one day, damp and cool another day. I think of big changes, the 1987 Supernova, the 1980 eruption of Mt. St. Helens, 9/11. I think of the gradual changes in governments and countries, of the arbitrariness of political boundaries. I think of pets that have died. I think of my near miss yesterday evening in homeward bound traffic, a car speeding in front of me through a red light. I clued into the possibility of being seconds away from death in every moment. I see an image of myself, sliding toward the edge of an abyss, my heels dug in, trying to avoid the inevitable. In doing so, in being rigid, in trying to avoid change, I miss out on life. Again, I settle into basic meditation in order to assimilate my insights, to tuck them away into whatever files they are to occupy in my mind and body.

Off the Cushion 10/05/07

After work, I drive east on the frontage road, Third Street, that runs alongside I-90 through Spokane. The road funnels exiting traffic off the freeway and also branches off into freeway entrances. I approach the intersection with Altamont which runs north and south under the freeway and through the east central neighborhood where serial killer Yates stalked his prostitute/victims. I've left work a few minutes early, all things done, feeling exhilarated to be starting the weekend. The light at the intersection is green going my way. The underpass where Altamont runs under the freeway is blinded by retaining walls. I can't see traffic coming from the north. A south-bound car speeds through the red light seconds in front of me. I confront the possibility of impermanence. So, this is the direction my meditation practice will take for now, as soon as I'm finished with this salmon Caesar salad I'm enjoying at Shari's and drive the rest of the way home.

Evening, 10/4/07

Sitting, hearing the heater's fan running. Sitting with thoughts and emotions -- anger, frustration. Thoughts arise and change into conversations. I seem to drop to a lower level of consciousness in which the heater is not heard.

I'm feeling frustrated with my practice at this time. It seems unimportant for me to remember what has happened during the half hour, and so I don't. I seem to be sort of tuning out. I feel bored with the practice of actually sitting meditation. Writing about the effect in my life is problematic partly because it touches on relationships with other people, which is something I don't want to discuss in a public blog. I sometimes write about those things in my personal journal. So, this is just the way things are for now. I will continue the practice because I feel its value for me. Maybe the blog will change; or I may focus more on my other blogs. Maybe I'll introduce some new elements into my practice. I don't know yet.

Morning, 10/2/07

Chanting before I sit to meditate, Radhe and Om Namaha Sivaya. Chanting seems to wake me up and cut that residue of sleepiness. I had a nice cup of Earl Gray tea and then sat for meditation.

Breathing, evenly and naturally. Thoughts arise. It seems like they arise almost to conscious awareness. But, if I don't grasp onto them, they soon drift away and I forget what they are. I don't know if this is good or not; it's just the way it is. I'm not sure if the thoughts just pass on through or are being dealt with on another level of mind, a less conscious, more intuitive level. Or, maybe I am just falling into a dull sleepy state. I find that I wasn't really so aware of what was going on with this session, going in and out of awareness, hearing the snaps and pops of the baseboard heaters switching on and off, the refrigerator coming to life.