Bless Yourself

“Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself”- Rumi

Hello all,

What blessings do you bring to the world? Do you say “Hello-good morning-good afternoon-good evening- good night?”

Jim Carrey in The Truman Show

Do you keep to yourself? What do you think when a stranger says hello or greets you? How does it feel? Is it strange? If it’s nice to be on the receiving end, why don’t you start to do that more often? Wish anyone and everyone good times if you can, you’ll already be making the world a little better. Do you smile freely? That’s a blessing, to you and all else besides.

If you are forced to wait, be it fifteen minutes or three months for something, do you become tense about waiting? Frustrated? Anxious? Why would you let that happen? Don’t you know this could be a lot more pleasant for you and others involved if you come to peace with the waiting? If you get ready to bloom?

Yoga and Meditation, is not just something that “hippies” do, it’s something ancient, it’s something instrumental in you becoming happier, healthier and more balanced all round. You will become much more free. You will come to peace. You will blossom. It’s something anyone can do. Do you like happiness, health, and freedom? I know I do.

Even though some of my saddest moments have come about in the last 18 months, I could not and would not regret them. I have learned so much about myself, life and others. About what really matters to me. How to find peace within myself. To stop waiting for salvation, and find how to do what’s needed to create this within myself.

Some things I did to get happier:

Yoga – daily is best, but otherwise at least 2-3 times a week is still good
Meditation – daily is best, again regularity is key
Read – read about wellness, psychology, yogic traditions, meditation etc anything beneficial or enrichening to you spiritually
Persist, repeat, keep trying to fly and do it all again

Yoga – this brings peace and calm to all parts of your body, this relaxes the intertwined systems of the body, muscle groups, improves spinal health, among countless other benefits, and this all generates a lot of good biochemistry for you brain and body – this is where the peace and ease comes in – you don’t make or force it, you just let it in and let it out and let it go, all that letting is ultimately to let it BE.

Meditation – if you only sat for fifteen minutes a day, cross legged with your back straight (if not cross legged on a supportive and comfortable chair) and just focused as much as you can on your breathing and nothing else – try to inhale freshness and energy, try to exhale thoughts, you may also smile during meditation – you will find after three months of daily practice a lot of improvement. I would call it a miracle but that is entirely up to you and if you put the work in. This supports and enhances the yoga and does the same likewise for the meditation.

Read – this may be less important than the other parts, but in this studying I found greater self-acceptance, wisdom and awareness; in developing mindfulness that came with trying to better understand myself, and whatever magical or spiritual possibilities exist for myself or anyone. This I strive for and this I share with anyone willing to hear me. I read about all kinds of psychological ailments, a bit of yoga and meditation science (there’s actual findings which are published as well as opinion pieces) and anything and everything to do with being human, being alive and what this might mean for us all.

Ultimately to me, and this may not be the case for you, how different opinions, philosophies, and perspectives on life, even if they are not complementary to each other, they all bring something to light, and all bring something to life.

All writings are a kind of “dialogue” amongst humans, in our efforts to better understand ourselves and life itself, or to extrapolate on “this is my position”. So why not read as much as possible, as long as it seemed the writer put in the necessary amount of effort into their work.

You must take into consideration – science as analysis, technology and method to explore the thinking, observation, calculation, categorization of life as we know; and is of a certain school of philosophy – but science is not god.

It is our way of using philosophy and technology to get closer to “god” “cosmos” “flying spaghetti monster” whatever is that magic about the scope of science that it curiously attempts to grapple with and assign meaning and definition and classification and so on – do not deny, science is a way of describing in human terms, all of that which without science and a certain kind of rationale would be as magic to us.

Who would not be astounded by the sights observable at the bottom of the ocean, at the height of the stratosphere, or in outer space? Don’t tell me it isn’t magical to say the least. How is science, not describing and categorizing this magical, fantastical, divine life and world?

You can bless this life with a more studied approach, with a balanced approach, with care and self-care. Try out some of these useful self-care practices, on a regular basis, with simple discipline, faith and patience and you’ll go far.