Emotional Balance

Managing emotions - Identifying feelings (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I am often quite unbalanced, as a person goes emotionally. Which is how I have come to find meditation.
Its often quite hard to sit through uncomfortable emotions, but when life starts to get crazy, there is no other kind of rest like sitting within ones self. Finding that balance has been a lifelong journey, so far. First I tried drugs, that didn't work. Then I moved on to other worldly things such as eating, buying things, and other people. None of these things worked as they stirred up more emotions which I had no idea how to deal with.

It's still quite odd that the best way to deal with a feeling is to relax into it. This is by far the most counter-intuitive thing that I have ever experienced,  but because everything is impermanent it isn't long until whatever I am encountering seems to fall away. It may be hard at first, especially when inner thoughts and feelings insist that something must happen, but by focusing on an object these will easily fall away.
The beauty of mindfulness practice is that it is a way of spirituality that asks you to find out for yourself. There are no "musts" or "should"s. Whatever works is what works. This principle is what gives mindfulness its worth.
Emotions are a tricky thing, and we all have them. Another tricky aspect is that there is no instruction book to them. Often being mindful within difficult emotions can be taxing, painful, and scary. As you watch the mind things begin to slow down. Thoughts begin to separate from their meanings and peace comes.

Through diligent practice of watching the breath the senses begin to open and emotions begin to balance. Peace can be found within much more easily than it can outside the self. The path of meditation is not always easy though. Meditation can bring up emotions from the past, but only through accepting these echos can we move on from experiences that formed them initially.

Mindful Blogging

"Gathering the Light" from the Taoist book The Secret of the Golden Flower, translated by C. G. Jung and Richard Wilhelm - I have no idea how this relates. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Finding time to meditate is just as hard as finding time to blog.
I feel like I have to have a large chunk of free time with which to meditate in.
The way that mindful meditation is set up actually allows meditation to be brought into every day life. It's not something to be set aside from everyday life, mindfulness is brought in to the hustle and bustle of life.

It is still hard for me to practice consistently, but it is as simple as paying attention to what you are doing. The usual practice of meditation, in the eastern sense, is to pay attention to the breath. This is pretty simple, in essence, but extending this to other aspects of life is the difficult part. Simply paying attention to whatever we are doing at a particular time is by far not easy. In the hustle and bustle world we live in, being able to do one thing at a time and pay attention to it is even more difficult.

I have decided, as I have time to write this post, that I will develop a new type of blogging- Mindful blogging.
As the spearhead of this practice, the instructions are simple.. just pay attention to the keystrokes, the pressure of the sofa on the back, the sounds going on around, and simply be in the moment.
Try it out! Its really not that hard, and after you've been going for a while it becomes increasingly easy to be distracted by thoughts and other outside stimulus.

That's all for now- if you have any feedback it would be greatly appreciated. Just remember to do what you are doing and pay attention....