Thursday

Sunday

Lake Marion Boat Ramp Florida

"In a controversy the instant we feel anger we have already ceased striving for the truth, and have begun striving for ourselves." - Buddha

Saturday

I've been pretty good at remembering to step back behind the immediate thinking my brain throws at me lately. Actions and reactions play out in my brain and I remember to step back and just witness them. Sometimes though things get intense and I don't remember. Or, I remember, but this remembering does not have the needed effect. There is still the sting or the stink of something infecting me. Then, extra effort is required. I have to bring it back to the breathing. The feel of the hands on the steering wheel. The full immersion in the words I happen to be reading. Attention to every sound that can possibly be heard around me. Count the sounds. Auditory inventory. A bird pretty far away. Traffic noise. A leaf blower somewhere. A compressor on a refrigerator or an air conditioner. Sometimes I just deal with the fact that things are going to bug me. I am going to be bugged for a while. I have to even step out of my 'efforts' to 'deal with'...'troubles.' It feels like it takes effort to be effortless enough to not be affected. It takes effort to throttle the instinct to get snagged by the hooks that hang down in the path. Immerse myself in the task at hand. Multitask by being super focused on each item one after another in rapid succession. Task. Next task. Next task. Tasks complete for the day? Okay. Now peace. Gracefully glide around home or the environment, the store, the gas station, the where ever. Writing seems like a good idea lately. I'm keeping a pen and paper journal lately and it has lots of self helpy tips that I remember from all my reading and video watchin. I feel like I'm doing more than just reciting the words of the self helpy steps. I'm applying them a lot. I want to say more though. I want to discuss more than just how to avoid the negative. There are stories, and while some say the stories are futile and false and foolish and they trap you and they keep you stuck...when you keep the stories, you stay in the stories. Stories are just invented. Stories are substitutes for the present moment. Not good. But the stories are stories. Stories exist. I just don't have to be stuck in them. I can tell them without being them -- without being in them. Stories can be gems. Stories can bring glory.