Morning Mindfulness - Two Positive Minutes To Start Your Day

I've seen large boulders the water pushed out of the way. So, what may happen to the rock? I would answer, it depends on the shape and size of the rock. Also, are we talking about still water, slow river or fast stream? What is the shape and inclination of the river bed? There's a big chance that the powerful stream will push the rock out of the way. For how long? For as long as the force of the resistance is less than the strength of the water.

I used to think that I need a specific place and specific time to meditate. I used to get up as early as 4:30 in the morning for Yoga and meditation practice. I love practicing at the sunrise. There’s nothing like sitting in Lotus posture on the top of the hill at 5 AM, breathing fresh air and watching the sun going up. I still love it! I must admit those memories are still inside my head like a standard of training for me. I also love the ocean. All this is great! Gardens, mountains, waterfall, sunrise, sunset are amazing for practice, if you have them handy. What if you don’t?

The word meditation is used in the West to describe variety of techniques from different traditions and religions. And if we are not careful we may fall into stereotyping without any knowledge to support out conclusion.

Do you practice meditation? I am sure you do even if you don’t know that. Even if you are against meditation, you still do practice it under a different name.

My humble advice for today is, don’t jump into assumption. If you want to make an educated decision about anything, study it before you decide. Partial idea may be worse than total ignorance.

I’ve seen so many people who learned about martial arts, yoga, meditation and even secret agent stuff from movies. They think it is real. And they refuse to accept that TV is showing nicely choreographed moves designed to capture viewers’ attention.     I used to try to rebuttal before, but I stopped doing that over 20 years ago. Believe whatever you believe. Trying to change somebody’s believe is not a part of my philosophy. All I am trying to say today is that intelligent people make educated decisions. 

What people often miss here, is that in order for us to feel strong and burly, we do fight with ourselves. We clench our fists and teeth, we get tense. And just like with arm flexing, we put our own force against ourselves.      I understand, this is a natural reflex. It was built in us as a part of survival mechanism. We do need physical readiness when we feel danger. However, this mechanism was not designed to be used all day every day, like many people do. 

My short lesson for today is, be mindful of what you are doing to your body. Golden rule I try to follow, is any artificial restrictions to what is natural to our body, will eventually lead to breakdown. Period. I’ve learned it from other people and, unfortunately, from my own mistakes.  Good systems have no restrictions against what is natural, they are tailored to individual needs, and they don’t push people too far outside the comfort zone right away. Everything has to be done in small steps.

Pendulum will appear to be in balance if we hold it off-centered, but it will stay that way for as long as we hold it. And if we let it go, it will swing.      The key to the pendulum effect is that it will not just swing to come to the center again. It will swing to the other side, way past the middle point. As I call it, pendulum will over-correct. And it will swing back and forth for a while until it finally returns to the balance.

Stress is normal. It is a part of our life. This is how we live, move, function. This is how we exist. We cannot get rid of stress in life.     What people feel and refer to as “stress” is some kind of a unbalanced forces. When I teach my stress management course I don’t teach to get rid of stress. You cannot. 

When we are relaxing, on the bed, in the chair, on the beach, in the spa, on the massage table, wherever, and we feel sooooo relaxed, the air we are breathing is pushing on us with the pressure 14.7 psi. That is over 2000 lbs. per square foot. Now, calculate the square footage of your own body, and you will get the number of pounds pressing on our body 24/7 all your life. We all get that, and we all are OK with that.    Why are we not complaining?

As Goethe said, “A man sees in the World what he carries in his heart”.   This is what I wanted to talk about this morning. Are you mindful of your mindfulness? 

One of the principles I teach in my classes is the principle of the Mirror. Just imagine yourself standing inside a big round room, and all walls of this room are covered with mirrors. And you are standing in the center. What do you see in those mirrors? Yep, you see thousands of your own reflections. 

  When I started practicing Yoga in 1983, one of the advices I was given was to start and finish my day with a glass of water. Not juice, definitely not soda. A glass of clean pure drinking water. Since then I have been following this advice for over 30 years. Yes, drinking glass of water is the first thing I do after waking up and the last thing I do before going to bed.

There’s a phenomenon known as Compound effect. I read in the book called the Slight Edge that compound effect is a result of doing small, tiny things, every day, or is a result of not doing small things every day. 

Slow down, my friend. Look around. What you do today may or may not change the whole World. But the simple act of kindness can change the World for somebody.   Think about it for a few seconds.

What makes a day a good day or a bad day? That’s simple. We do.   As my teacher told me, “What’s wrong with the present moment if we don’t think about it?” 

When you wake up in the morning and look outside, do you see the same picture? Do you hear the same sounds? It is possible, if you window is just 3 feet away from a brick wall, and is completely sound proof.    It is also possible if you built an imaginary wall around yourself, and you simply don’t see the surrounding World. Because I don’t believe it is possible to have two identical days, or even two identical seconds. Clouds will be different. Birds will be different. Flies, butterflies, bugs, crickets will all be different. My friends, every moment is unique, unless you are staring at the imaginary wall around yourself.

Inner smile and a visit with your body are two very powerful exercises in Chinese Internal Alchemy, a legendary Taoist immortality system. Try it!

You are the Wizard of your own life, and Internal Smile is your Power Field you put on to create the Magic of mindfulness. So don’t underestimate its power!