Reverb13 Day Eighteen: Finding Peace
In the midst of living, did you find moments to breathe? Were there moments that held you in the embrace of peace and quiet and pure contentment? Did these moments catch you by surprise or did you create the space for peace to find you?
I have been trying to meditate this year on a more regular basis. I have done so periodically throughout the years, and earlier this year I made an attempt to do so each day. Thus far I have not succeeded in making it a part of my daily routine. Hopefully I will find both the discipline and the right method by which to make meditation a daily part of my quest for peace.
It’s especially important, given my tendency towards anxiety that I find space and time and events that harness peace within me. Formal meditation does sometimes achieve this purpose, but not always.
Also, each night there is a bit of informal, unstructured meditation for me. I try to make the final half hour to an hour of my waking time as relaxed as possible. Computer off, a little reading, a little uncomplicated television. Relaxation and peace are not the same thing, but the former often leads the way to the latter, as it has for me much of the time this year. (It’s the first year I’ve tried to do only specific, relaxing things in the hour or two before bed.) It doesn’t always happen at the same time each night, but the nature of my final few activities remains fairly consistent most nights.
As for the less planned, less frequent places to find peace in my life, I’ll mention the empty stage. I am one of the managers of a small arts center, and as such I sometimes am the only one in the building. It is probably an actor thing for the most part, but there is something moving, something profound, something at times quite peaceful about standing on an empty stage, when there is nobody else around. Performing can be anything but peaceful per se, but being a performer on the stage when not performing in the conventional manner is a bit like standing before an alter for some people, I would guess. The peace of infinite possibility.
So I don’t have a regular “peace routine”, to coin a phrase. But I remain aware of how significant the concept of peace is to one’s health in all areas.
Reverb13 Day 17: What’s the Word?
What word did you select to be your travelling companion in 2013? What gifts did this word bring? What word will you choose to guide you through 2014? What do you hope it will bring into your life?
I chose no specific word as a traveling companion for 2013. Looking back, however, I could retroactively apply a few. The one that jumps out the most as I write this is, forward.
That might sound a little cliche’. Perhaps it is, though I don’t mean it simply in the, “look to the future…there’s always tomorrow” sense. I mean it in the sense of slogging on towards the destination/goal/mission through boredom, fatigue, wind, sleet and all that sort of thing. Hacking my way through the forest with an ax, one tree at a time.
Forward with writing the novels and all of those short stories. Forward with starting my own introverts social group. Forward with trying to find a better diet, and trying to exercise. Forward through disappointments and forward when I am just too weary to continue going forward. A marathon.
The gifts brought to be my 2013? In essence, productivity. Building blocks for foundations, and in some cases the foundations themselves on which to build the rest. Once in a while, it brought me satisfaction that though by worldly standards I have yet to attain great “success”, I still have not succumbed to the temptation of doing nothing for an extended period of time. I don’t just sit. Everyday I have a list of things I want or need to accomplish, and I look at it several times an hour. Forward.
What word do I choose for 2014? I could continue the army metaphors. “Forward” meaning to get into position and reach whatever hill by nightfall. Once there, I could and perhaps should take command of 2014, and the various goals I’ve begun this year by making the watch word, charge. Or, charge! By charging the various fields of battle that I slogged to get to in 2013, I will hopefully next year score key victories, building on previous successes and finishing the full structures on top of the foundations laid.
In other words, 2013 was a lot about working through circumstances, whereas 2014 should probably be about shaping the circumstances.
Reverb13 Day 16: Addicted to Habits?
Habits and addictions, some are silly, some serious; when we have issues without answers, they can hold us so tight that we stop moving forward with the life we intended.
Were you able to loosen those fetters this year, and if you were successful, how did you manage it? Did you accept outside help, or work alone?
If you still feel that grasp of addiction or hurtful habits, what will you do differently in the year to come?
I suffer no official addictions. A few bad habits, maybe. But the funny thing about bad habits sometimes, at least for me, is that they often start off as good habits. Or at least habits that I initiate with the hope of doing good.
I find that sometimes certain habits work for a while. I sleep better when I get into this habit, or get more exercise when I develop that habit. But in all too short a time it seems, the habit, the ritual, the regularity of the activity becomes the mission more than the success at which I was aiming in the first place. What starts off as a pointed self-discipline designed to prevent me from giving up on something before it has a chance to work turns into something that I won’t call OCD, but at least a manifestation of my own stubbornness after it stops working.
Would this perhaps be an addiction to habit itself? I don’t know. Perhaps there is something to that. Habit, ritual, structure are, after all some of my favorite things when it comes to achieving goals. Could my innate desire for more of those things actually cause a certain unhealthy dependency on same? I don’t have an answer to that.
As for the prompt, I think I am better now at not succumbing to habit for habit’s sake than I used to be. But that’s not intrinsic to this year. Nor will the tendency disappear next year. I think it’s a slow process of establishing an assessment metric by which I can decide what habits are worth keeping long run, and which should be dismissed in the near future.
I intend to see, (as I have mentioned on this blog numerous times) if I suffer from clinical anxiety starting next year. Perhaps these things are related to that. And if not, perhaps it can be a side issue I can explore on that journey.
Reverb13 Day Fifteen: Sensory Input
Give us a sensory tour of 2013. How would you describe the year that’s passing in terms of:
Sight?
Words. I saw many words in many different media. The words of authors from ages past printed across the yellowed pages of used and long forgotten books I purchased at used book stores by the bag. I saw words printed in brand new books, written by authors still living, in fonts unknown to the writers of the used books. I saw the words of fellow local authors in my writing salon, printed on common computer paper, along with the words in red ink I wrote upon them, offering my suggestions and concerns.
I also saw my own words as they blinked into existence across both my desktop screen and that of my lap top as I worked on novels and short stories and a stage play. Plus I saw my own hideous pencil scribblings, in print, scratched across the pages of a poetry journal I bought in an effort to reignite my poetry writing. Earlier in the year is was the chaotic ink loops and swirls of a journal I kept, in cursive, (a style I had not written in since childhood.)
Sound?
All of them from previous years, but more intently processed. The changed nature of common noises such as music I have owned for years, the voices of people I know and that of myself, and weather, but with an ear more attentive. I heard, (or at least attempted so to do) with a greater presence, a willingness to internalize, and not merely notice the sounds around me.
All of this made easier sometimes by my willingness as always to embrace the sounds of silence.
Smell?
The aroma of hopefully somewhat healthier food choices over the last year, as I attempt to improve my diet. Smells of fruits, wheats, grains, and the odorless purity of water as beverage. The olfactory profile of solid nourishment.
Taste?
In perhaps direct contrast to my previous answer, this year my have the slight taste of baked goods, as I tried to make a few such items myself this year. Not on a regular basis, but given my propensity to fail at cooking entrees and side dishes I have this year, (particularly last month during Thanksgiving) attempted to be a bit more fanciful in the dessert field. I think perhaps that by so doing, and becoming a competent baker, I can ignore what a bad cook I am. As will other people, I am sure, if I am known to bring dessert. A long way to go in this regard, but I sense improvement on the horizon for 2014.
Touch?
I could say the touch of a family hug, or cleansing purity of a rainstorm on my skin. All of those are acceptable, and probably the more poetic answer for the “touch” of 2013. Ad of course, truth be told, they are probably the more important touches. But I allow myself to move outside the realm of the profound and obvious (or the profoundly obvious?) and answer with…my computer keyboard.
This keyboard in particular, which I have been using for close to 15 years, is on its way out at last. My computer is ancient, and I will be replacing it in the New Year. Unlike the last time I got a new computer, (and threw away its own lousy keyboard), I probably won’t be keeping this current one after the transition.
So as much as anything else, the “touch” of 2013 is a tribute to the feel of a keyboard long past its prime, but on which I have written 85% or so of my words since college. Nearly all of my fiction has been crafted with this Smithsonian piece made by Compaq. (Remember them? I never even owned a Compaq computer, just the keyboard.)
I am used to the worn smoothness of each key. The scratched up and dented “N” key. The exact spacing of the rows and letters and buttons on it. The course plastic of the casing. The angle at which it slants when the tiny “legs” are deployed. (I can’t type without them up.) The futility of running a card between the keys in an effort to remove the dust and dirt.
All of that will almost certainly be gone with the new computer. I may hold on to this old keyboard, if it works with the new computer, setting aside the new keyboard until such time as this one finally breaks down. But even if I do so, 2013 may be the year of this keyboard. Doesn’t sound like much, but to a writer, his tools are significant beyond their mere utility.
Reverb13 Day 14: Decisions, Decisions
What was the best decision you made in 2013? What were the results? How will you continue the good work in 2014?
I’ve struggled for a while now to find deeper, more meaningful connections with more people. So it would seem at first odd for me to answer this question with the decision to give up on more people, more often. But that’s what I have done. Though the results are still in the infant stages, and it will take a while to fully implement, I feel nonetheless it is one of my best decisions from this year, and it can be broken down into little component decisions:
-I’ve decided to make my trust more difficult to obtain, so those that do are more likely to be choice individuals.
-I’ve decided to give fewer chances to people that are sapping my energies and testing my patience, so as to make, at least in theory, more room for those who will not do so. More room for people who may in fact enhance who I am as I enhance who they are.
-I’ve decided to be more frank and less tactful in certain situations. For years people told me I was too blunt, and blamed that for my lack of greater connection. After trying for years to be less blunt and meeting with the same results, I’m opting to be more open with what I am thinking and feeling again.
-I’ve decided my time should be spent mostly in service to people and causes that contribute to the vision of the world and society I want.
-I’ve decided that if someone doesn’t want to get to know me after a few tries, they are not worth trying to understand.
-I’ve decided that it’s okay to take notes before giving second chances.
-I’ve decided to expect less from other people so as to avoid attachment and disappointment.
-I’ve decided that eggshells don’t hurt, but they are a mess to step on, and I won’t be stepping on as many for as many people in the future.
-I’ve decided that being around someone a while doesn’t entitle them to anything, since my being around a while with others doesn’t entitle me to anything either.
The results of these decisions, and others, as I said, are still just coming in. But so far I have a greater sense of freedom and purpose. I sense that I will be more able to navigate the world to get the things I want without hurting innocent people, as well as not being hurt by the wolves in sheep’s clothing I have been trusting too often.
In a way, it may make me somewhat less warm in 2014, but only to an extent. My interactions, hopefully, will be thinner but deeper, like a well, instead of broad but more shallow like a pond.
Ty Unglebower 