Two legged chairs

Look around you at all the two legged chairs...

Not many?

How come?

Lots of four legged ones.
A few three legged stools, and approximately zero
two legged chairs.

What's that about?

Lots of twos in the world,
two eyes, two ears, two hands, two feet
two legs.

We can pull it off.
Why not the chair?

Are they picky or something, or
have the chair designers of the world been holding out on us?

You tell me.

Love is everywhere, just shut up

We walk by a tree
chattering in our head
about this worry
or that plan
or this future conversation
or that past yammer

and we miss the tree

and
if we saw the tree

really saw
without words,
just the light and the color and all the glimmer
and mystery

that would be love

and

all around us

and inside us

there is something, many things
we could be experiencing

in a direct experience
that would be love

so
if we quite the yammer
and just experience

we can be in love
with our toes
or our partner's nose

and the wall of our apartment
or the floor of
our office


and sometims
in this present
we might realize,
we'd like a "better" present

an office with a window that opened say
and friendly people all around

okay
that works

write the goal down
love the goal

look around you
love it until you've got the better place

follow your breath
love being alive


...

this is incomplete

listen to some Adyashanti talks if you want
the fuller picture

smile
smile

sense gravity

enjoy light

enjoy sound

attention on movement
that you invent

and discover

hang out in the "I don't know,"
which is another name for the
NOW

go learn something today

to meet five new people

have an adventure

cheers
Chris

Don't be too nice

Don't be too nice

And

If you can stay happy and present

Be

Nice enough

Care about the other person

And be amused

They are alive

Most of their problems are nonsense

And

So what?

So are ours.

In fact, sharing a smile and a laugh about

our so called problems

Might be one of the nicer ways of being nice?

What's another?

Smiling and saying what you like about

Them

The moment

Your life

All three

Okay,

Being lazy is good too

Just listen for awhile

Don't talk

That's a rest for you

And

Something like nice

for them

And it might indeed 

be quite a treat

and that 

is always nice

okay

okay

enough of that word!

How about this?

FRIENDLINESS IS NEXT TO GODLINESS.

ha.

That's pretty good.

Cheers

Chris

I wish this for you, I wish this for me, I wish this for us

Your partner comes up to you and says,
"Let me tell you what's wrong with you."

You're all ears, right?

( In some ways of living, actually, you might be,
that might be a chance to be happy with ALL feedback,
and
we'll wait on that one for a bit)


Your partner comes up and says:

"This is what I'd really like:
I'd like us to spend more quality time together
and
I'd like to take a walk after dinner
and
have a make out right now"

Now you might be listening, eh?


Even if we can't go along with a partner's request,
hearing what they want helps us understand who they are.

This is good news in a relationship,
because we can often drift into assuming we know who the other is,
and then it's two strangers
and then it's lonely really,
though we can keep busy enough to ignore it

So:

Here's today's game

Find someone and for 3-5 turns say this to each other:

I want this for you.......

I want this for me......


I want this for us......


See what happens.

It's a three way requesting. You don't get left out.

Your partner doesn't get left out.

The WE of the two of you doesn't get left out.

Find out what happens.
Cheers
Crhis

May You Be Happy, 2

When they measure various heavy duty meditators, yes yes
their brains are calmer, happier and more coherent

All that sitting in silence
and the present
and "letting" it be,
when the chatter comes through,
that's gotta pay off,
right?

And...
They discover that the "loving kindness" meditation,
Brings the biggest and deepest and happiest changes
to the  brain

w
hich is nice

The "heart brain"
we all know that somehow that's THE important thing in life

And this loving kindness mediation is saying:

May you be safe
May you be happy
May you be healthy
May you live with ease


About people you like, don't like,
hate, don't know, know,
Yourself

Just the good vibe of wishing well

It's kind of soothing when I do it

How about for you?


Tomorrow:
A couple's game:

I wish this for me
I wish this for you
I wish this for us

You may try it ahead of time
if you wish
Cheers
Chris

Life, Love & Learning

Just brain, body.

It's so easy this work:

One day a child doesn't crawl

The next she/ he does.

No new muscles, no new energy, no new "thinking"

except hugely new thinking of the organic sort,

the non verbal sort,

the inner relationship and connection and "knowing" sort:

a brain organized to be a whole new child.

It's so hard because everyone wants to fix, relax, stretch, release, repattern, adjust, blah blah blah

None of which help the brain / real person.

That's what my Anat Baniel Method work is about.

That's what my Feldenkrais® work is about.

My opinion is that Anat takes the Feldie method to a whole new level.
( 4 years training with her, after 5 in the Feldenkrais Method®)

Come find out if you'd like.

Cheers

Chris

360-317-4773

And today, day three of
waking up
and
awakened relationship,
what's a game you might want to play?

Let's take all the digits and the eyes and the breath as our game today.

Sensing ten toes and ten fingers.

Now

And light

Now

and Breathing

is it in, out

or

in

between

When can we play that game and it seems absurd:

talk to people

reading

on the computer

cell phone nonsense

ten finger

ten toes

breathing

light

( and if you want, this will bring joy:

it's no extra cost, and actually, lots of

extra

credit

to feel the joy

as

you

stay

present

ha

yes

wonderful

now)

The Full Life Now: Day 2

Today's a day to smile

It's good for us.
We know it.
People around us know it.

So: when to smile.
When you see another person.
When you see a cloud, or a leaves or the sky.

That's one game to play today:
See people, see reflected light: smile.

Another is this:
Sit quietly and sense your entire right leg, from toes,
all the toes
to the hip joint
Eyes closed
Then, keep the leg in awareness and start with your right fingers
and move up through your right arm to the right
shoulder socket.

Enjoy the whole right arm and the whole left leg

Breathe

Add on sounds.
Add on awareness of breathing , your breathing as you hear sounds.

Open your eyes.

Now the main game of the day:
Sense your right arm and right leg all day,
as much and
as fully as you can.

Talking
walking
reading this
sending emails
doing the text/ phone thing
driving
eating

right arm
right leg

they aren't going any where

where is your attention?

bring it on home, for the fun
and grounding
and freeing of it



This will be lopsided, yes,
and being mindless is
more lopsided, don't you think.


You can smile and eat light while you do
this,
if you wish.

Being "Now," vs yammering about now

Anat Baniel, working with a high performing harpist, 

whose tone improved dramatically 

with just 30 minutes of "work," which wasn't work, 

it was brain rewiring, 

to upgrade the whole nervous system.

 The harpist had no "issues." 

She just was curious about what "better" could be. 

She found out. 

See Become More Amazing dot com, if you are curious

what "better"

could be

If I had ten dollars for every person who waxed enthusiastic about The Power of Now,  while being lost from the Now, I'd be fairly close to rich.

It's so easy to yammer about.

And then:
How do we wake up to the Now?

Ah, yes.

Well, I'm going to try a game: which is to play for 108 days with this central dilemma of human life.

In a separate journal, there will be daily longer essays which will become a book.

But for my friends, and my own accountability, I'll put something up here each day.

A sort of ahead of time New Year's Resolution.

A September 8,, my sister's birthday, resolution. Why not have that be the beginning of a new adventure and a new book?

So today, let's play with this stark reality.

These words you see on the screen, are not "real," not "here and now," except as black squiggles of certain shapes you've been taught to decode.

Look at the screen: it's mainly background, white for most people.

Do we "see" the white?

Do we see the shapes between the letter shapes?

And how to stay present when we are in word land, reading, writing, or -- hardest of all-- talking?

Lot's of ways.

And today's game is this, if you want to play:  sense your right leg as a full time back up of attention.

All the right toes.

All the rest of the bones, the muscles, the tendons, the knee, the blood.
The thigh.

The sense of that leg and where it is in relation to the other leg, to your body, to gravity.

All the toes up to the hip socket.

Just sense it while you read these words, while you think and feel whatever you think and feel as this game is presented to you, as you mull:  "Really? One more thing to do?"

Well, it's your here and now.

Sensing the body was recommended by the Buddha as the most effective way to be present, and he's a pretty good recommender, if that's a word.

And even if it is a word, it's just squiggles on a background, and then you have your right leg, real as can be, with you all day and night, Buddha or no Buddha, Facebook or no Facebook. Internet, indoors, outdoors, at job or not at job, with people or alone.

You.
Are
The center of your experience.

Experiencing a big simple chunk of you,,, your right leg, is a fun was to experience / realize that reality.

Play that game, if you wish.

Tomorrow, another.