Apparently, habits die hard. Truth be told, I've been consistent with only one of the three goals of the month. I have been able to sit and meditate for at least 15 minutes a day, but I have gotten a little slack on the working out and no processed foods. I'm probably stretching/exercising about 4-5 nights a week...one night turned into mandolin night, so not a total loss. I have been pretty good with no preservatives, but twice I caved and went with the burrito over the bowl at Chipotle. And we also HAD to go to Dairy Queen for a celebratory treat after we bought a new (to us) car. Other than that Nicki has been making some really good meals, and we have started back on juicing here and there. The juicing continues to surprise me with its deliciousness, although tonight's was pretty awful.
I have decided to focus a little more on the meditating this month, but will continue to do my best to avoid preservatives and exercise everyday. I am still trying to make getting up early a habit, unfortunately my bed is really cozy in the morning. Most of my sitting has been happening at night, but I would rather sit first thing in the morning. Its not only a nice way to start my day, but I find myself more mindful throughout the rest of the day. Before the new year I was sporadic with sitting, in both consistency and length of time. Now I sit for 15 minutes, which used to seem like forever, and find myself thinking about the time much less. There have actually been a few times in the past week when I sat the full 15 minutes without thinking about checking on the timer.
In the past, I have played around with different types of meditation, but have currently settled on zazen, specifically susokukan (counting meditation). In a nutshell, I count from 1 to 10 with each in and out breath. Originally I thought the purpose was to just sit and not think, but the more I tried to not think, the opposite happened. (I had read this many times before, but guess needed to find out for myself). Now I just sit, breath and count. When something comes up that I don't need to think about, I try to go back to the breath and start counting again. I will tell you when I get in the groove, the counting works really well at keeping myself from getting distracted...but the moments in the groove are few and far between.
Now that I have decided to focus more on sitting this month, I am going to start increasing the time I sit each day, and branch out and try a few other kinds of meditation. For the rest of this week I plan on dabbling in some guided meditation. I have tried this once or twice before, but I thought it was a little corny...maybe this time will be different.
For anyone interested in Zazen...google that spiat, you might find it a good read.
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