Category Archives: Grouchiness

Sending Good Vibes

I’ve been feeling kinda crabby for the past few days. Maybe it’s the cold, or the wind, but something is deranging my dosha.

Then, to make matters worse, I just happened to read an account of some mean-spirited interchanges between some people I know, and I was like, “Whoah. This simply will not do.”

Everyone, even if they are behaving badly, is just trying to get their needs met as best they can, right?

Sometimes as I lead my class out of savasana I’ll guide them in this little “metta meditation” where they send good mojo to themselves, to someone they love, then to someone they are having difficulty with.

It’s hard to wish happiness and a good life to people you are having difficulty with, but it changes you.

I remembered a version of this exercise I did during a 10-day training. We were asked to look around the circle of our fellow trainees and pick someone. They should not be told we had picked them. It was a secret. Then, for the next 10 days, whenever we would see them or even think of them we were to send them metta, (which just means “good vibes.”)

I remember picking out a woman, and then everytime I saw her in the cafeteria or just in class, I would say in my mind,”My you be happy. May all good things come your way.”

I must have sent that vibe to her a hundred times during that training. At the same time, I wondered if anybody had picked me, and was sending ME messages. If they were, I really wanted to feel them, but as hard as I tried, I couldn’t.

So while it was a very lovely exercise, I don’t think it made any difference in the life of “my woman.”

Today in my crabbiness, I thought for the millionth time that I needed to re-read and re-study and start practicing NVC again, or at least read that book on my list about how “What we say matters.” Because, holy shit, it totally does.

And if what we say matters, what we think probably matters, too. That’s why I thought of the exercise where I sent those good vibes to that woman all week. I remember thinking that even though my telepathic communiques probably had no effect on her, they were making a big difference in MY life. They were sweetening me. It was like being a secret Santa or something.

She wasn’t just a random person to me anymore. She was “my person.”  And everytime I saw her in the food line, or taking her shoes off before coming in to class, or I passed her in the hall or held the door for her going into the Ladies room, or I ran into her in the shop, I switched to this really sweet mode in my brain. It was sort of Little Prince-like: she was  ”my flower” and precious to me in all the world. I was changed even if she wasn’t, and that was probably the point the teachers wanted us to see.

So I am going to pick somebody this week and secretly send them “metta.” I think it might cure what ails me, purge the crabbiness, make me sweeter.

De-Cluttering

If I could find my camera I would take a picture of my room.

This room.

Where I am sitting now, and where I sit and write every morning.

But I can’t find my camera because it is buried under a tsuanmi of papers and other crappola on my dainty little Lady’s Desk, which is tucked under a dormer window where I never, ever sit and work. (Because said desk is always piled with rubbish.)

Back in November, the downspouts were filled with leaves. In order to dislodge them, G had to have access to this window, which meant that I had to clear the desk. So, I found a laundry basket and summarily dumped all the papers, magazines, receipts, media cards, junk mail, etc. into it in one fell scoop.  There. Done! (She swipes hands here.)

She then splayed herself across the desk, and gradually inched her body out over the roof holding onto a 10 foot roof rake. I held her ankles so she wouldn’t fall to a bloody and tragic death, because I am the kind of person who is totally into “Safety First.”

And it worked! The leaves dislodged, the gutters cleared and all was right with the world.

But yesterday (3 months later) that laundry basket with desk crap?

Still there.

And, quel suprise, a whole new pile of stuff has now grown to replace the original pile which is still in the laundry basket.

For the past two days I have been setting a timer for 1 hour and trying to deal with it. But it’s getting worse, not better.

I did find the labeler, though. That’s progress, right?

 

Just a Little End-of-the-Week Rant

The day itself was cold, but sunny, which was a real treat after yesterday’s dreariness.

So as I was washing up and contemplating going into my room and doing my practice, it occurred to me that, “Shit! Today is Friday. Friday is Yoga Workout Day at the studio!

And even though I was close to positive that no one else was going to show up to practice, I told them that I would be there every Friday at 10 AM to do the Workout. So I got dressed and went.

And no one came. I could have done this same practice in my cozy little yoga room here at home, but here I was, in this vast room, just me and Yoganand (on the Ipod).

Which was fine. It really was.

I am waiting for the day when this practice doesn’t kill me. Today was NOT that day. It killed me. I was particularly aware of how weak my legs are. The standing one-legged balances? “Flying Airplane” posture? Are you kidding me?  My standing leg quakes. I want to come down so very much. It is so very, very hard.  He says , “Now, you can extend into Warrior 3” and in my mind I want to, but my body is so very, very WEAK.  And my arms are weak. And my hips are tight and weak. All I become aware of in that practice is how weak and restricted I am in every place in my body.

At the end of the practice I am exhausted. I thought for one nano-second of going to the gym and running on the treadmill afterwards, but no.  Done.  Needed to go home. Needed food. And that’s what I did. I also considered doing some cleaning, but no. This weekend I will clean. Now, I needed food.

When I walked in the house, the dog was all frisky, so I ate a handful of nuts, changed into jeans and walked her. Last night I went down to the basement and found a winter coat. My light winter coat, but my winter coat nonetheless.

Sucks.

And today I wore it again, but no hat. I kind of needed a hat, but the weather was on the bubble between “hat” and “no hat”, and there wasn’t much wind so I decided “no hat.”

Dog walked, then home to lunch: Brown rice and broccoli and a little leftover tuna. And a small bag of Pirate Booty and later, a Chobani greek yogurt (blueberry).

The stupid paper came and I read that as I ate.  This was the last paper in my year’s subscription and I talked to G last night about renewing.  I hate everything about this paper. I hate the editorial policy, I hate the letters to the editor, I hate its pro-gas drilling bias, I hate the right wing Christians who write the most insane letters to the editor.

I hate the church reports and how the only thing that people seem to get all enthused about are veterans.  Support our troops! Send cookies! Make banners and display the pictures of all the service men on Main St.

Really? There will be nothing to get enthused about if Obama sends all the troops home. Booor-ing!

I call this paper “The Aggravator” or “The Agitator.”  Because that’s all it does to me when I read it: aggravates and agitates.  So why in hell do I subscribe to it?  That’s the question I asked G.

Because I need to know where I live? Because I need to know what the enemy is hatching and scheming and thinking and doing, so I don’t walk into an ambush?

Probably.  So I just caved and renewed for another year.

(Good god.)

When Plinky Eats My Post

I have just spent the better part of the evening replying to a Plinky.com prompt and setting the whole thing up to post automatically to this site, only to have it NOT WORK.

grrrrrrrrr…..

I did not wake up at my best today. It rained all night. And I was awakened in the middle of it by thunder. In October? Thunder?  Srsly?

And then when I finally DID manage to drag my sorry ass out of bed, I was in no mood.

I did not want to do yoga. And the gym? Ew.

I could not even conceive of how I was going to grind out my 750 words. (But I did.)

Coffee helped, of course.  And as I was washing up, I knew, even through the dense green fog that was my brain, that this was THE MOMENT.  Yep.

This was the kind of day that I either had to “Warrior-Up,” or spend the day in my jammies.

So I got my yoga pants on, went into my room and snorted out about 16 million rounds of kapalabhati.  Yes I did.  Then proceeded to do postures and capped the whole thing off with 20 minutes of meditation

And after that I was fine. I had slain the Murk.  Vanquished its ass.  Go me.  And that was my day.

(So take that, Plinky.  Plinky is a stupid name anyway.)