today i woke up to the glory of early mornings peace resonating within and without…
my first conscious moments today consisted of erratic thinking and general distraction. however, i quickly rectified the situation by focusing on my intentions for the day, namely: running, reading, meditating. also, i focused on my intention to be mindful all day and to stick to my spiritual journey. waking up early really is a blessing because it is such a peaceful time of day and there is a sort of vibrant energy flowing through the air in the pre-midday hours. this was the very same sentiment i expressed through my song posted above and titled “Morning Glory”. it represents the beautiful aspects of the morning aptly in a very uplifting and semi-euphoric way.
after my morning meditation i had settled into a peaceful zone and felt very happy. the meditation itself was very focused and brought me back to my center. however, as i noted earlier, today was a distracted day for me. so a couple of hours after the meditation, heavy storms of thought began to invade my mind again. but, i was in a generally buoyant mood today and so the distraction didn’t eliminate fully my presence. i approached it with an air of acceptance and even love. i embraced my frantic mind and simply allowed it to be while i, from a distance, observed. it was a very liberating approach to dealing with an explosive mind, which was how it felt on several occasions today.
even though my mind was quite disturbed, i was still able to sustain a fair level of mindfulness and presence throughout the day. one factor which helped was reading some spiritual books which included sutra statements intended to be approached in a similar manner to the holding of a koan. these kept me on the right track spiritually and helped me to maintain my inner peace for the whole day.
the main lessons of today have been: 1) to remember to start of the day on a peaceful note and to remind myself of my spiritual path and my commitment to it and my intentions to remain mindful, and 2) that the most beneficial approach to dealing with intensive thinking is to simply accept and embrace the thoughts while silently observing them; the key here is to not become frustrated or upset about the massive flux of thoughts and to just let them be.
“Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising up every time we fail.”
– Ralph Waldo Emerson