mindful moments

My favorite definition of mindfulness is, "returning to the present." Mindfulness meditation is the repetitive practice of returning to the present moment, of noticing when we are distracted, or thinking about something other than our current focus, and returning our attention to our intentional focus - such as returning to our breath in vipassana. 

Mindfulness can take on many forms, other than just sitting meditation. Being present with the ocean or any body of water; watching the waves undulate across the sand, listening to the ebb and flow, or to the trickle or roar of the fluid cascading sparkle of the water before us.

A walk in nature, a jog, or a run. The flow of a good game of basketball, our minds focused on the present moment, our bodies in rhythm, our hearts in coherence. Creating visual art, focused on colors and textures running from our hands as medium meets medium. The flow of writing as our minds are focused on the turn of words and sounds of pens, pencils, or the keys' clackity clack.

Mindfulness can be practiced at any time, during any activity, in any situation. It gives us a chance to get to know our inner-worlds, to become familiar with our patterns of thought, to familiarize ourselves with our internal dynamics, our relationship with the external world, and to exercise our mental attention and focus on the present.

How much time do you spend rushing your teeth in the morning? Two or three minutes?

How long is your shower; ten, fifteen, maybe twenty minutes?

How much time does it take to shave, fix your hair, or put on makeup? 

I know I tell myself many times, through both my actions of avoidance and my inner-monologue, that I don't have time to meditate or to be mindful, that I lack time for a mindful moment. But I know I really do. What might I be avoiding? Maybe an unseen pain, or an attachment to a pattern or habit that I find comfort in?

We can make a shift to be more mindful, intentionally. Five minutes as we sit down before we eat our lunch. Five minutes after we park at work or after we get home, sitting in our car. Five minutes after a Zoom meeting, five minutes outside in our backyard, porch, or taking a short walk. Do we have five minutes for peace of mind and whole heartedness, for self-compassion and loving kindness? I can make the time. I can imagine myself open to daily mindful moments.

Bar Soap - Yep, a post about bar soap

 

Thanks to my brother Ricky I have started to use bar soap, specifically the Defense brand of bar soap with tea-tree and eucalyptus oils. I had to buy new bars a few weeks ago and I realized that I really didn't have any way (or where) to put the soap in between showers - it just sort of sat there on one of our two ledges getting smaller and smaller with every other shower (even when I wasn't using it). So I did some internet sleuthing to see what kind of soap dishes or containers I could to extend the life of the bar. I found a few that made sense, but the two that I was draw to the most both had problems (in my mind at least). I was about to buy a bamboo one, but all of the reviews talked about how it just mildewed within weeks of use. There was another one, a porcelain one, that looked good, but in my mind all I could image was me dropping it in the shower and having to clean up a mess of ceramic shards. 

The other day, as I was using a natural loofa, and I realized I can just put the soap bar on top of the loofa. So far it seems to have worked really well, the soap bar stays much drier in between showers than before (when I used to reach down between bottles and just find a goopy edged bar). I do have to say, if your loofa is a bit long, or curved in any way, you may have to find a little nook, as I have, to slightly lean the loofa with the soap on top, so that it will not fall over between showers. 

If you're into bar soap and would like to look into other ways to prolong the life of your soap bar, check out these two links below. I found them to be pretty interesting.

9 Ways to Store a Bar Soap in the Shower and Make it Last Longer - Loo University

How to store soap and shampoo bars – nul

Pressure to Produce

I was talking to a good friend of mine, another educator, just checking in the other day and in reflecting on our conversation I thought about how capitalism's pressure to produce over everything else ruins so much. In particular I was telling him about how so many aspects of my life involve reading and writing right now, from my day-job in education, to my PhD work as a student, and even teaching the one class that I facilitated last semester at USD, liberal studies 100. My friend said, then you must be getting really good at writing. To which I responded, maybe, but I don't feel like that right now. I feel burned out. Of course, now I'm sitting down to write about it, about how I feel burned out by how much writing I've had to do lately, and I'll process this burned out feeling, by writing about it, ha!

An idea struck me though. Within my PhD program it feels like I really want to work hard at becoming an elite athlete (an elite scholar), but instead of having room to practice our craft, instead feeling like we have space to really flourish, to move openly, and in ways that feel right for each of our bodies (minds and spirits), instead of being trusted to trust our own body (mind), intuition, and movements, it's like we're being asked to break up boulders with sledge hammers, over and over again. It's tiring. I was already tired (this pandemic has me exhausted). And so when I go to practice my own techniques, my own movements, I'm tired, burned out, feeling like the breaking down of the boulders hasn't really helped me progress in my path.

Granted, part of my burn-out, probably a large portion of it, is the COVID-blues. I am so sick of this panorama, er, I mean pomegranate, wait, wait, I meant to say pandemonium - uh, well, I think you know what I'm talking about, I hope. Or maybe I hope that you don't, because that would mean either you really don't understand what I've just written which is just fine, probably better to spare you the re-traumatization, or you're reading this from some distant place, or time - more likely time - after this has blown over and is in the annals of history.

Back to the topic, of capitalism ruining everything. My current PhD experience has some parallels with my (now) 15-year old son's high school experience, during his first semester of 9th grade. Without getting into too many intimate details, the basic gist of the connection between my experience and his is that we are struggling to help his school understand that some of their grading policies and procedures have been punitive and unrelated to our son's learning. That the compliance task-heavy nature of the industrial model of schooling is taxing, mind-numbing, soul-sucking, creativity crushing - and ultimately dehumanizing. I mean, we haven't said all of this to his teachers and school leaders, and while I think they would actually agree with some of (or even a lot of this) they, like so many educators, continue to perpetuate these cycles and systems of capitalist-driven punitive structures.

So why do we have grades? Is it to measure learning or effort? What is the definitive difference between an A and a B? Is it measurable, consistent? Is it like temperature, where a 10 degree difference in Celsius in one classroom is the same as in another? No, right? Can we be sure that the difference between two grades, the differences in assessment or evaluation of student work by a teacher, is the same between all instances of As and Bs throughout all Western forms of schooling? Of course not. An A in one class, from a particular teacher, with a particular student, is going to mean something completely different than an A in any other class, or even in the same class with a different student. So why do we keep using them as if they measure something tangible, real, or valuable - like effort and hard work? And is "effort" and "hard work" what we want to or should be measuring? 

Let me be clear, effort and hard work are keys to growth, but is that what we should be measuring in our school settings? How hard a student worked? Is it measurable? Is one student's 3 hours of focused time and effort the same as another student's 3-hours? If I can write 5 pages in less time than my brother (and I know I can), does that mean that I can get a better grade in less time with less effort? So we aren't really measuring effort then, right? Maybe these concepts of hard work and effort, that we attempt to measure, or pretend to measure, with our schooling systems' grades, are graded because they translate easiest into the capitalist working conditions that exist in our society? Maybe.