1-23-2015 Sometimes when you play games, its useful not to play to win, but instead play to observe. When you play to observe you do so to better understand how someone else plays. You also play to observes so that you can observe your own responses. What this teaches you is how to be aware of your own responses and ask what's moving me in this situation. You can apply this same idea to any situation in life. If you find yourself in a place of reaction, still yourself and observe your reactions. Observe what other people are doing. Relax and let go of your attachment to the situation. You'll discover strategy in your stillness, by allowing yourself to observe and freeing yourself from the expectations involved in the situation.
1-31-15 As I've been working with stillness this week, I've been stepping back and observing my responses to various situations and seeing how I can be still in those situations instead. I'm finding it instructive to be still in those moments and compare how I might respond otherwise. Would the response really be the right one to make? It's not a second guess kind of thing, so much as its an appreciation for how being still can provide me some perspective about my choices and help me make more informed responses.
2-4-15 I've been feeling anxious the last couple days. I know why. I'm getting ready to do a lot of traveling starting next week...basically three trips in one month's time, and being around a lot of people. I know once it happens I'll be fine. I'm sitting with that anxiety and really watching how it shows up in my behavior and actions. For example, I didn't go to a networking meeting today and the reason is because I don't want to be around other people. I want to just be at home and I know that's a response to the travel, knowing I won't be at home. It surprises me how strong this feeling is and how much it motivates me to not do things in my regular routine, even though those things are important. I really need to be still with this feeling and work with it so that I can acknowledge it, but not let it stop me from doing what I need to do for my businesses.
2-6-15 Stillness, when embraced, leads to openness of presence. Openness of presence leads to awareness of possibility, and to the discovery that it was really there all along. You just didn't realize it because you were caught up in the cacophony of your life and forgot how to let yourself relax, let go, and discover everything within you that had been drowned out by whatever grabbed your attention. Bring yourself back to center. Still yourself, and be present with whatever comes up. Sit with whatever you feel, think, etc., with no judgement. It just is and you just are, but if you can accept it, it changes and so do you. What will you change into? No one knows the answer until the answer happens to you.
2-11-15 Sometimes the hardest part of working with stillness is what comes up when you are trying to be still. Your inner demons can rear their heads and come out in force. Of course, you can switch to a different meditation to work through those demons, such as using water breathing to dissolve the demons, but it can also be instructive to just be still with your inner demons and attentive to what you are getting from them. there is always an underlying message waiting to be found and learning to be still with yourself, when you actually don't want to be still can be a useful experience as well. I've been sitting with some of my demons this week and while its hard going, it's also rewarding in terms of the insights I'm getting from being as still as I can be with them.
2-13-15 In Awakening the Sacred Body, the author explains that when you are still and open to presence you can feel emotions come up such as anger. The reason this occurs is because we aren't distancing ourselves from the emotions, but instead are opening to them through the stillness. The key at that point is to just experience the emotion, without trying to analyze it or think about it or contextualize it. Then you just breathe it out, and release it. I struggle with this some because I'm so used to holding on to anger and I see how even analyzing it and thinking about it is still holding onto it.
A related challenge, which I've written about before is that sometimes I find myself trying to force the stillness...I did that today and I just stopped because I knew I couldn't force it. Then later my inner contact told me that I couldn't force a connection...I had to open to it. So I just accepted that and let myself acknowledge that my forcing it is really born out of desire and is not allowing me to authentically connect. I'm conceptualizing but not opening up to the stillness.
2-16-15 The last few days have been interesting experiences. Pantheacon is always a crucible of sorts. This year, moreso than any other year, I felt accepted and managed to connect with lots of wonderful people, some new acquaintances and some dear friends I always enjoy seeing. Each day I did my stillness work and instead of focusing on anything I just allowed myself to be still when the moments were perfect. This morning in teaching the elemental balancing ritual, I also felt myself connect with the next element I may work with. It gives me a lot to consider, but as always I know this work will be rewarding.
2-17-15 Last night Kat and I had a hard conversation about some communication problems I bring to our relationship. I've always had a tendency to go off and make my own plans without consulting my significant other. This has occurred because I've typically identified my S. O. as an authority figure in my life and therefore someone to work around instead of work with. I know where that originates from, but I also see how it has hurt my relationships in the past and present. I need to bring my partner in with me when I make plans, instead of making plans and then informing her after the fact. I know she'll back me up and help me and I need to trust that instead of creating a power dynamic that really isn't there.
2-18-15 As I can reading the Nature of Personal Reality by Jane Roberts, I am struck simultaneously by how there is at times a fair amount of law of attraction language, which I typically don't agree with and a lot of content focused on working with the consciousness or working through emotions, which shows me how this work has inspired my magical practice despite how long its been since I read it. A lot of what's written does apply to my stillness work as well, especially as it relates to opening to being.
2-19-15 I was reading more of The Nature of Personal Reality by Jane Roberts and there was something very insightful offered about aging that really made me pay attention. Seth, the spirit Roberts channeled, noted that people who are desperate to stay young, do so in order to negate their beliefs feelings about aging, and consequently reject part of themselves. This really resonated with me. I've noticed, this year, more so than the past my own aging and it has made me feel uneasy. I don't like that I have a slower metabolism, that some of my joints ache and need some warming up and that my forehead has less hair than it used to. I see these signs of aging and part of me wants to resist it. Reading what Seth shared helped me recognize this and I'm just sitting with it. I am aging and it is part of the process of living life.
2-22-15 the wrap up of a convention is always an interesting process. The people leave and the convention reaches a place of stillness, but its only temporary. It will all start up again at some point. Not everyone will be there for the next iteration. New people will come, others will go...but the spirit of it lasts.
On a different note, I've been thinking about my own lessons to learn and realizing that sometimes I put myself through a lot because I don't always learn what I need to learn right away. Hard lessons...but once I learn them, my life gets better.