It's not my lunch break today! It's the morning, right after my meditations, and right before I go for a jog (waiting on Suzannah to finish up some of her morning routine so we can go together :-).
It's also Wednesday. This happens when I'm not on a regular routine. Probably good to shake things up every now and then, but also makes it clear why I have routines.
Let's see... ah, #1:
For a Limited Time Only! While Supplies Last! Act Now!
I'm in Fairfield Iowa. If you know me well enough to have my email or phone number, and you'd like to say hello in person, we can try and make that happen. Drop me a line and we can go for a walk or have some tea outside or something. I'm leaving early Saturday morning, so Friday is the last day to catch me.
OK, on to other things. I've circled back around to the importance of intensity and focus. If you put everything you've got into one burning desire/goal, it gives you your best chance of achieving it. Spread yourself out, and you will do alright at a bunch of things. But the people who have achieved great things have done so mostly when they've focused their whole lives around those things. I'm of the philosophy that it's more important to be good than great (meaning moral rather than well-known) but even so, if you have something you believe to be most important, it makes sense to focus a lot of your energy on it and make sure you're identifying and taking the action steps towards its achievement. For me that is enlightenment, and that requires a certain kind of intensity. Love is the central factor, and so a cold, teeth-gritted kind of intensity won't do. It is an intensity of love, surrender, courage, focus, self-honesty, flexibility, dynamic action. Of intuition and faith.
That quote continues to echo in my head, almost hauntingly:
'why do so few people seem to achieve enlightenment, though many say it is their goal?'
'lack of intensity.'
Currently though, I feel like I am returning to the passionate intensity of my youth, in many ways. Only I am now adding the wisdom of persistence, of self-compassion, of growth mindset. When I was a kid, that intensity and passion was fragile. When I found I could not live up to the goals I set for myself, I thought that meant I was weak and unfit for the path, that I would never be able to achieve it because of that weakness, and I was sad. Now I know a better way to handle challenges, set-backs, and times when I don't live up to what I set out for myself: I grin, say, "bring it on!" and jump back into the fray, knowing that in this arena, I've got infinite lives, infinite tries, and eventually, the problem will have to yield to my unstoppable persistence.
And that would be enough, but I also know I can analyze my defeat and plan for the future next time, learning from my mistakes and failures and thus turning them into rocket fuel for my eventual success.
And that would be enough, but I've also learned that it's not just ok to have self compassion and self love, (not narcissism; more like the kindness and respect you'd show to a dear friend) but that those qualities will help, not hinder my progress, while making the path there so much fuller and more pleasant.
In other news: The giant blister is finally starting to heal, after much careful tending of it. Apparently, though it's better to leave the blister alone if it's less than a dime side, if it gets much bigger, it is a good idea to drain it, carefully. I didn't realize that and it got to the size of like a silver dollar/golf ball. I think it was like a black hole, where the bigger it got, the bigger it wanted to get. In any case, it's finally flattening out all the way and hopefully healing, as are the last of the weird bug bites, one of which was the progenitor of the blister.
So far it's been nice being in Fairfield, seeing a few of my closest friends and family, and taking it easy. The time is flying by though. Trying to remember all the people to try and contact so we can go for a walk and chat is what I've been doing. Though I don't have a lot of time or energy, so it's just a few people. Maybe I can have a general "I'll be at X place on Y day at Z time, say hi if if you want to" announcement, to catch anybody who's interested. But if I'm going to get that together, it's probably going to happen on Friday, because Thursday is too soon. Maybe look for that announcement tomorrow, and assume it will be around lunch time, at some park, under some shade, at a picnic table for an hour.
I feel like my brain is in a kind of vacation fog, caused by eating too much and waking up too late and generally being totally off any organized schedule.
Gotta wrap this up and move on to the next thing now. Take care and big love.
-I
P.S. "Undertale" is an amazing game that I loved, and you probably will too if you grew up on 8 or 16 bit RPG games.
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