Not Posting Here Anymore

As I'm sure is obvious.

Go to http://www.prayinghorse.com, my photography web site

OR

 http://www.dryadranch.com  for bloggery

Thanks!

Box of Beauty

Over the last year, I have been participating in a women’s circle, a “group of women who are emerging”, as part of our mission statement states.  In fact, at our last gathering, we celebrated our one year anniversary.  I have been greatly inspired by our circle and by my circle sisters.   One of our activities was to draw a card from Susan Seddon Boulet’s Goddess deck, a beautiful set of cards made from her paintings.  The card I drew was Psyche (see the painting).  As I read the back of the card, which contained a short retelling of the myth of Psyche, I found myself tearing up.  I’m not a gal that tears up much (which drove one of my therapists to distraction practically). 

You can read much more about the Psyche myth here, but the essence of it is that Psyche was the beloved of Eros, and in order to placate Eros’s jealous mother Aphrodite, was set four seemingly impossible tasks.  Psyche accomplishes the tasks, even though she is in despair about her ability to do so, by allowing others to help her and listening to the wisdom of those coming to her aid.  Her final task is to visit Persephone in Hades and bring back a box of beauty.

Here is where I stopped and felt stunned by the phrase “Box of Beauty”.  It seemed to be an answer of sorts – this year, I have been questioning: what is my vision, what are the next steps I need to take, what ways can I grow?  As I sat reading the card, I thought about Psyche’s first three trials and saw parallels between those and how my own life has unfurled; yes, I could identify three phases of my life that at the time I was not at all certain I would get through.  And now, the task is to bring back a presumably full Box of Beauty.  What does that mean exactly?  What could be in the box? 

As I am questioning now, at my getting-riper age of 55, what I need to do now with my life, especially on a spiritual level, and what I have to offer, this idea of returning a Box of Beauty explodes with meaning. 

In the myth, Psyche gets the beauty from Persephone.  So it must be, I think, even though all of us contain universes of beauty within us, none of us can take credit for it.  It certainly isn’t necessarily related to our physical beings, although some of us could be gorgeous in a beauty queen sort of way.  I see it more as imparting beauty in word or action by choosing what is most forgiving or compassionate or loving. 

I also see that the Box will contain offerings of art and creativity and have been greatly excited this last week by the visions inspired by this myth.  This digital painting/photo is my version of the goddess Psyche.  I borrowed from the traditional association of the butterfly with the soul, which is another definition of the word psyche.  The butterfly in this image is from a photo I took this spring of a California Sister (Adelpha californica) resting by a pool in our Lion Creek.  And so, this image is the first from the Box of Beauty.

For poetry lovers, a verse from John Keats, “Ode to Psyche”, 1819:

O brightest! though too late for antique vows,
Too, too late for the fond believing lyre,
When holy were the haunted forest boughs,
Holy the air, the water, and the fire;
Yet even in these days so far retired
From happy pieties, thy lucent fans,
Fluttering among the faint Olympians,
I see, and sing, by my own eyes inspired.
So let me be thy choir, and make a moan
Upon the midnight hours;
Thy voice, thy lute, thy pipe, thy incense sweet
From swinged censer teeming;
Thy shrine, thy grove, thy oracle, thy heat
Of pale-mouthed prophet dreaming.

New Book

As some of you may know, I seem to have developed a fondness for observing fungi.  Over the last couple of years, I have made it a mini-mission to photograph as many fungi as possible - at least those that we spy at our beloved Dryad Ranch.  I created a little book of my treasured finds:

Fungi of Dryad Ranch by Megan M Ralph | Make Your Own Book

The Ordinary

One of the books I'm reading at the moment - the one I have here in my office for lunch time* - is a thoughtful work on creativity:  The Widening Stream by David Ulrich. 

I love this quote:  "The world is interesting and becomes far more so as we closely observe things, people (including ourselves), and events, and contemplate their significance.  Once again, heightened awareness becomes a transforming agent for ourselves and our work.  through the action of directing our attention, we revel in the commonplace; the ordinary becomes extraordinary."

Here's another, that I highlighted with a question mark.  "The creative act, regardless of how it takes shape, is one of service and devotion to the world."  What do you think of that idea?  Is that so for you?

* Yes, I know maybe just reading or just eating could be a better choice.  Sometimes I do both.

I'm taking a rest day today - oh maybe I'll go for a walk later on, but after being a veritable whirlwind yesterday, what with scrubbing and cleaning and cooking and working out and walking and some more cooking and a gripy knee, it seems like a good idea to Not Do So Much today.

It seems I have to force myself to slow down.  It seems there's a part of my brain nowadays that says:  go go go, burn calories, don't let yourself get fat again.  Seems I still can't trust that it's the overall trend that matters, not what happens on any given day and that a rest day is needed on a regular basis.

My plan is to re-organize one of my dresser drawers (fun,eh?) and spend a lot of time working on photos:  editing, tagging, filing and backing up.

Metabolic Pathways Graphic

I was lurking on one of my favorite web sites / forums this morning (Calorie Count).  The complexity of the metabolic system was under discussion.  Someone posted a link to an amazing graphic.  I don't understand it really but remain in awe.  Both at our bodies and at the greatness of the artwork, such that it is.  I got it here.

Yipes, How Did I Miss This?

Somehow, this amazing singer had never hit my radar until yesterday (thank you Pandora).  Eva Cassidy doing Autumn Leaves.  Her version of Fields of Gold brings me to my knees, but I couldn't find a live video for that one.

Hot Diggety! A New Personal Best

A few weeks back, convinced I wanted more data about my activity levels,  I ordered this fancy gadget that purportedly measures the total amount of calories burned during the day.  It's a Fit armband from BodyMedia - you wear it all day around your upper arm to provide various measurements to calculate energy output.  Well.  It's interesting and all but to date, I haven't decided whether I've wasted my money.

One of the more amusing aspects of this experience is that the armband assigns personal bests to various of its measurements:  eg. highest number of minutes engaging in vigorous activity, highest number of steps taken during a day and so forth.  It also measures sleep (how many hours of sleep one gets in a night), sleep efficiency (hours of actual sleep vs. lying down time) and then there's lying down time itself.

I rang in the New Year by achieving my best ever performance in both lying down time AND sleep efficiency.  And here I thought Sloth was a sin.

(What do you suppose the lying down efficiency is of the aging witches butter fungus pictured above?)

On Fear

I read this wonderful article in Yoga Journal yesterday, titled Befriending Your Fears.  We all struggle with our fears - it sure seems that on any given day I'll somehow find something to feel fear about.  Nowadays, I'm mostly able to let it be and tell myself, "Oh, there's that fear again"  when I feel my stomach start to churn and that unpleasant adrenaline-y buzziness comes up again.  When the mind starts to visualize The Very Worst Outcome.  The author calls this a Trance of Fear; what a great phrase.

Recently, it seems that with nothing else to feel especially fearful about, I've chosen to worry about driving home.  And look!  The weather wants to cooperate by raining and being cold and creating horrible muddy spots in which neighbors get stuck (yes, we had to pull someone out the other day) and concocting thick tule fogs which are the worst of all.  I'm such a city mouse driver even though we've migrated to the country.  I already know that it's way worse elsewhere and there's the discomfort anyway. 

I especially loved this paragraph from the article: "As long as you are alive, you will feel fear.  It is an intrinsic part of your world, as natural as a bitter cold winter day or the winds that rip branches off trees.  If you resist it or push it aside, you miss a powerful opportunity for healing and freedom.  When you face your fears with mindfulness and compassion, you begin to realize the loving and luminous awareness that, like the ocean, can hold the moving waves.  This boundless presence is your true refuge - you are coming home to the vastness of your own awakened heart."

Same Topic

Synchronicity is grand.  It seems that over the last couple of weeks so much of what has attracted my attention has been vision-related.  I go to the bookstore:  a new book by Oliver Sachs called The Mind's Eye, all about people who have had varying degrees of blindness and their experiences with navigating the world.  What richness of adaptation!  Another find:  a CD by Clarissa Pinkola Estes, called "Seeing in the Dark" where she relates the journey into the intuitive, creative nature.  Of course, the key question to pose is "What would You have me do now?"

For some great podcasts on spiritual practices:  Sounds True Insights at the Edge

On the Topic of Vision

 
There are two aspects of Vision that I have been working with over the last couple of weeks. One is on the purely physical level. I have had an ongoing retinal problem (Presumed Ocular Histoplasmosis Syndrome) that has caused me to lose the central vision in my right eye and can become active in the left eye at any time. It has been some years since I have experienced those types of issues in the left eye, but a week ago, I noticed quite a lot of floaters in my left eye – it was definitely unusual, although I did not notice the distortion or shadowing that I would have had with a flare up of the inflammation. So I hauled myself into the Bay Area to see the retina specialist.
My visual field in that left eye at the moment includes about 20 little black dots that move as my eye moves. It’s almost like a constellation of stars – in reverse. Instead of shining, they’re dark.

The five days before I saw the doctor were anxious ones. I didn’t know if this was a harbinger of the “bad times” again and I reviewed all of the plans I’d made years ago the last time I was dealing with the problem. What I wanted to do if all the treatments failed? How would I live my life? Etc etc etc. My job depends on me being able to see, so how would I cope with that? (low vision aides for the computer) Driving! Oh boy, there’s a big one. I’ll work from home, give up the office and rope off my work space. And reading. My photography, what would I do about that? I’ve heard of blind photographers, but have no idea how that works exactly. Anyway, I realized that no matter what, I would be able to concoct a high quality of life, with room for things I love doing, some form of practical work/means of income and a creative life.

The examination gave my left eye a clean bill of health. He saw no inflammation at all. I just have some annoying floaters. Gratitude and relief don’t even begin to cover describing what I felt with that news.

Meanwhile, on a spiritual level, I asked myself what is it that I am supposed to see that I am not seeing? Is there something I’m closing my eyes to? Some sign I’ve blocked from sight? It seems that right now, I am prompted to really look inside. What IS the vision for how I want to lead the rest of my life? Those are the questions I’m grappling with now. I don’t have answers yet, but think those answers include service and connection. I don’t exactly know what that means yet.

A Complete Digression

Praying Horse must laugh sometimes.  I love these comics:  this one (and I hope I'm allowed to show you this without violating copyright), the original web site is at Dinosaur Comics and this particular one is dated July 22, 2009, but it never fails to make me laugh.  It so much reminds me of some of the silly weight loss ideas I've heard and of course the end result?  Bleh. 

Leptin Resistance

As I mentioned in the last post, I've been reading up on appetite hormones, specifically leptin. 

Leptin is a protein hormone that acts to regulate appetite, metabolism and energy levels.  If leptin is doing its job properly, it signals the brain how much energy your body has and how much is required - in other words, whether you need to eat because you are low on energy or whether you have enough energy and do not need to eat any more.  In the latter case, it should signal satiety.  Because it is manufactured primarily in the fat cells, the amount of leptin in your body is directly related to the amount of body fat you have. 

You would think that would mean that the appetite would decrease, but that is not the case. Unfortunately, for some of us, our bodies have become deaf to the leptin's message that we are full and should stop eating - our cells are unable to accept leptin's satiety messages and we keep eating.  In fact, most obese people have high levels of leptin and have become leptin resistant, in a similar way that some diabetics have become resistant to insulin. 

A WebMD article on appetite hormones levels quotes Louis Aronne, directory of the Comprehensive Weight Control Program at New York-Presbyterian Hospital:  "With leptin resistance, you don't feel full and the more you eat, the hungrier you may get."  Further, the article quotes Scott Kahan, co-director of the George Washington University Weight Management Program:  "The general public tends to think of 'fat' people as lazy and as having no willpower [but] it couldn't be further from the truth...There is no question that certain people are preconditioned to gain weight more easily and more quickly regain weight after dieting."

So, what to do?  It will come as absolutely no surprise that a proper diet and exercise were mentioned again and again as the key.  Almost all of the articles I read also recommended that snacking be limited and that one should eat three well-balanced and nutritiously healthy meals, making sure to get plenty of protein.  I don't know about this part of the recommendation - it is certainly not what I do, even though I am pretty sure that if I am not now still leptin resistant then I certainly was in the past.  I actually eat 6 - 7 times a day consisting of three medium-sized meals and three or four small snacks.  I'm not sure what the rationale is behind the three meals only recommendation, just passing on what I found in my reading.

Some Links:
Alternative Health for Today:  Insulin and Leptin Resistance - Information Worth Knowing
Sharecare: What is Leptin Resistance
Suite101: Overcome Leptin Resistance with Exercise
WebMD: Some Dieters Are Set Up to Regain Weight
Harvard Gazette: Shining Light on Leptin's Role in the Brain
eHow: How to Check Leptin Levels

While I'm working on a post about appetite hormones (trying to sort everything out is interesting to say the least), I'd like to "show off" this super-sweet blog award I received from my sister in spirit and fellow blogger at When The Spirit Moves Me, and also offer this lovely yoga invocation.

My hubby and I have been taking a Yoga Basics class on Monday nights since early spring, and we just adore the class.  Anyone in the Oakhurst area, it's at the Old Mill Studio/Pure Heart Wellness Center.

For My Sisters

Sisters, we weep with grief
Shout with anger
Tremble in fear
Stand tall in joy.

We grow strong as the biggest tree
Deep as the deepest well
Wise as the elders.

We echo and call
and call
and call.

We dream our circle to life.
Within, we cradle the newest
being – the babe we feed
with the nectar
of the goddesses and gods
the whatever is.
All of that.

We are spread about with sunshine
We are covered in rain
We soar with the wind
push up the green shoots.
Our legs are roots
Our bodies living wood
Our arms move in worship
We dance between the stars.

I’ve heard we are made of stars.
We are old as the oldest
We are the blackest night
And the newest light.

Formed from the dust of the galaxies
Conjured from lust and need
the moans of pleasure
slick seed
and yes.

We birth the mountains from our wombs,
Bring forth the seas.
From between our thighs,
the scent of ancient sands.
The old queens whose hands
hold the scepters
bestow the mysteries.

All that is.
All that is.

Recent Thoughts

I got to thinking the other day that so often many of us talk about our emotions as something that are primarily difficult or negative. Just want to throw out there that many emotions are positive. How about the times you have experienced these?

affection love fondness liking attraction caring tenderness compassion sentimentality arousal desire passion curiosity joy cheerfulness amusement bliss gaiety glee jolliness joviality delight enjoyment gladness happiness jubilation elation satisfaction ecstasy euphoria zest enthusiasm zeal excitement thrill exhilaration contentment pleasure triumph optimism eagerness hope optimism rapture relief surprise amazement

The thing with emotions is that any given one doesn't necessarily last very long; they come and go. It does take some practice to avoid holding onto a feeling, whether it be a positive or a negative one. We say we don't want to feel the "bad" ones, but sometimes our minds will latch onto something and won't let us stop experiencing that feeling, as when we are angry about what another person did and we can't stop thinking about it and rehearsing and rehashing it in our brain. I read a book some time ago by Jill Bolte Taylor called My Stroke of Insight. She's was a neurophysiologist (or equivalent) and had a stroke and part of her recovery process was in being able to watch her own emotional process. She noticed a pattern in herself that she called the 90 second rule, where an emotion causes a chemical process in the body that lasts for 90 seconds. After that time, any remaining response is the individual choosing to continue experiencing that feeling, whether that choice is conscious or not. I don't know whether this is "true", but it is something interesting to think about.

I mentioned this to some friends who responded one of two ways:  either they defended why they needed to feel the "negative" emotions or they explained how they work very hard at only experiencing the "positive" ones.  That's not the point, the point is that ultimately, we are going to experience all or most of the whole gamut of feelings - if we hold on to a particular one, whether it be one we think of a good or one we think of as bad, then we can get stuck in it and make ourselves suffer.  If we strive to hold onto happiness, oh my, aren't our hopes dashed.  If we don't let anger flow through and out of us, that burns us inside. 

More Studies. Sorry, I Find This Interesting

I read the most interesting article in the magazine New Scientist about the addictive quality (for some people) of what the article terms "junkie" food, i.e. food high in sugars, salt and fats. It's a long article, but worth reading in its entirety.

A number of studies have found interesting clues to ways some individuals respond to food in a manner very similar to drug addiction where the reward circuitry of the brain is highjacked. Also, certain foods (see above) are more "addictive".

I know a lot of folks scoff at studies like these, and claim that by publishing results like this, the scientists end up (somehow) letting people off the hook of personal responsibility.  I don't see it that way - a person who wants to deny their own complicity in engaging in addictive behavior doesn't need a study to do it.  I find that learning about these correlations make it easier for me to understand some of my own past behavior. It helps to hear that there is some evidence for those of us who feel we have a food addiction, that we probably do. What it means then, is if we want to change our behavior,  we can't just go on a diet and hope that our willpower is enough; the problem has to be addressed in a way that also works with the addictive quality of our eating habits and the kinds of food we eat.  I fully believe that at the beginning of my weight loss, I made a very clear cut decision to save my own life.  I guess that sounds dramatic, maybe I should phrase it, "decision to choose health above remaining mired in unhealthy overeating".

Studies

I'm a participant in the National Weight Control Registry, which is a large, long-term study of people who have lost a significant amount of weight and maintained the loss for over a year. I'm going into my third year of participating; basically it consists of answering questionnaires each year. From time to time, I get letters from them that briefly describe some of the research findings that come out of the studies they conduct, using the responses to the questionnaires.

This year, one of the studies looked at "Psychological Characteristics of Successful Weight Losers". I'll just quote from the long paragraph in the letter, and apologies in advance for the wall of text, but I find all of this interesting.

"Some obesity researchers have argued that long-term maintenance of weight loss requires such extreme effort that few people are able to accomplish it, and that those rare individuals who do maintain their weight losses do so at tremendous psychological cost. We examined registry members' scores on a number of psychological questionnaires, and compared their scores to the scores of groups known to be experiencing high levels of emotional distress (patients with eating disorders, psychiatric patients) and to scores of groups with relatively low levels of distress (community samples, patients enrolled in university-based weight loss programs). These comparisons show very clearly that, for our group of "successful losers", long-term maintenance of weight loss is not typically accompanied by the high levels of distress observed in certain populations, e.g., eating disordered patients. On average, the scores of registry members on measures of depressive symptoms, general distress, and susceptibility to losing control of eating resemble the low scores seen in community samples and obesity patients, and are much lower (indicating lower levels of distress) than the scores observed in eating disordered and psychiatric patients. Thus, weight loss and maintenance do not appear to have created a "psychological hardship" for our participants."

Speaking from my own experience, if anything, my mental health has drastically improved as a result of the weight loss effort, if only because that process caused me to question so many of my own hurtful self-concepts as well as force me to change the unhealthy eating behaviors that brought me to being so overweight. Also, the more time has passed in maintenance, the fewer instances where I really feel the urge to pig out, which isn't to say I don't enjoy a big treat meal with full dessert from time to time.