Nostalgia

I found a scan of this photo on my computer last night and couldn't resist working on it. This is my favorite-est horse ever, Chaps, long may he rest in peace. I had this photo framed but ended up having to put it away because I kept getting sad when I looked at it, but this time I didn't get that way. Oh, I LOVED this horse, we were muy simpatico. He was one of the horse herd that belongs to our neighbors and his group used to hang out down on our place, so I spent a lot of time those first few years after we bought the place with them. Poor guy, he colicked and couldn't be saved. In spite of the fact that this photo shows me at some level of my highest weight  and that hat isn't as spiffy as my current one, I am so glad my hubby got this shot.

Yet Another Riff on Gratitude

The other day, a quote appeared that caught my ear: "Gratitude is a magic wand."

As you may or may not know, I am fond of finding things to be grateful for. In my daily journal, I always have create a Gratitude of the Day.  There are days when I dearly would like to fall into total snark with it and other days when I just don't feel a lick of it. Sometimes the very things that are most pissing me off are the ones I know I need to throw some gratitude at somehow. This whole thing has worked for me now for a couple of years. Sometimes I worry that it looks all goody-goody and I'm just not all that fond of goody-goodies actually. I'll take the risk. In the past when I've written about gratitude, I mention the origin of my interest in it, which all relates to an article by Joanna Macy in Shambala Sun and her proposition that gratitude is subversive. Now, that's an attitude I can get behind.

And what I mean by that, other than admitting to still having some sort of teenage rebellion-y type of angst still lurking in this middle aged soul, is that once you start expressing gratitude for something - anything big or small - and do that on a regular basis, I have found that it's nearly impossible to get sucked into a depressed or hopeless or anxious state even in unpleasant circumstances. To some extent I am fighting that "suckage" by using gratitude to re-point my thoughts toward what is life sustaining and healthy. That directly subverts that nasty, critical and fear-provoking voice many of us end up listening to, you know the one that tells us we're no good, we need more stuff, we have to look a certain way, we're not loved, all that.

Getting back to the quote I started off with, if "magic wand" is defined as a tool that is used to direct and place energy toward a desired outcome, in that context, gratitude is a very potent one indeed.

All that said, of course I did a little additional research (using a well known search engine) on gratitude and unsurprisingly found a wealth of nifty quotations. This one brought me up short a bit: "Gratitude is merely the secret hope of further favors." - François Duc de La Rochefoucauld. Monsieur, thank you for that little bit of cynicism, although I'm not sure how, if I express gratitude for river rocks, which I think I have done in the past (and if not, am now), they would ever provide future favors other than to remain rocks. I doubt they care whether or not I am pleased by them. Instead, finding gratitude is a way of staying in the here and now, not wallowing in the past and not worrying about the future.

Gratitude of the Day: I am grateful for breathing in and breathing out.

Ridiculous Amounts of Fun

Last weekend, I joined a group of friends to celebrate a fortieth birthday.  The birthday girl had an interest in some maritime/water-themed fun and our supremely talented social director came up with our outing.  We started in San Francisco, Pier 39 and took the ferry to Tiburon, braving the wind and chop, heh heh.  Then we had a tasty dinner at Guaymas and just enjoyed each other's company.  Here is a peek at part of the ride over:



Video and Holy Cr** by Ms. Sandra Molnar, posted with her permission.

One of the Ten Thousand Plants

I finished a book recently: Zen Women by Mirian Levering. Hubby gave it to me for my birthday and it's a history of women in the Zen Buddhist school. I found the loveliest paragraph in there quoting a Buddhist nun, Maiodao, from the 12th century: "Moreover, each person is complete in every way, each thing is perfect and that which is totally complete and perfect covers the earth and reaches to heaven. Eyes are horizontal and noses are vertical. Spring courses among the ten thousand plants; the moon is reflected on a thousand waves. There is no lack and no excess."

That eyes and noses part fascinates me.

Emotions Weight Overeating

A comment on a previous blog post, about my thought that emotions are stored in fat, and reading that commenter's own great blog post about having a similar experience, led me to pondering another aspect of weight and the varying beliefs we hold about body image. In her post on Inside Space, she talks about using her fat as a method of sheltering herself from her emotions as well as hiding in it.

I've been pondering that, as I have heard many of my weight loss "buddies" say similar things. What is true for me is not that I ever felt that I was hiding behind my fat, as in fact when I was fat, I felt totally conspicuous and as if there were no place I could hide. Barring those medical conditions that can make a person gain weight, we all know where overweight comes from - overeating. There's no pretending there.


So what did I get then from the behavior? What I believe is true for me, and is something I still have to work with often enough, is that food was my drug of choice. I used it to numb myself and stop feeling those emotions. In addition, food hits that pleasure pathway of the brain in ways that are very similar to other forms of drug abuse. Food tastes good, it feels good to have a full belly - and so on. Here's a link to an interesting article about this.


Watching the pull I continue to experience toward Food - with eating still probably my favorite activity - just being honest here - is a daily gauge of my emotional and spiritual state. If I find myself drawn toward secret eating or what I know to be overeating that sends up the red flag to examine attitudes. Am I falling into an old thought pattern? Suppressing anger? Feeling anxious? Nowadays, my tendency is to move into physical activity instead when I want to work through emotions - that also hits the reward pathway but in a way that seems to promote healthy resolution to problems and a joyous acceptance of the ups and downs life brings.


I still believe that our emotions are stored in our fat, and as we lose weight and burn off that fat, those emotions can resurface as memories - we can even experience the same bodily sensations.


In fact, one of the blogs linked to on Inside Space, has a post that makes related comments.
That blog author quotes a 19th century article by Wiliam James that discusses the physical sensations of the emotion fear and asked the question of what fear would be without the physical changes and came to the conclusion that there would be none without the presence of the physiological aspects: the fast breathing, the fast heartbeat, and so on.

Lollipop. Old Memories

I was doing some grinding around on the treadmill this morning, just for grins, and up popped an old favorite tune from the depths of the iPod. This is one of those happy peppy little pop tunes that I admit to having a liking for sometimes.




It brought to mind some very pleasant memories as well. I first heard this tune while sitting (hiding from the world?) in the hallway of the school dormitory where we lived at the time - my father was an assistant headmaster and we lived at the school. I'd received a transistor radio for my eighth birthday and I was in love. It was a black one, maybe 3 x 5 and had a little earphone. Nope, not stereo or anything. The "My Boy Lollipop" song was one I really loved. Funny, I'd never seen actually seen Millie Small performing this until I looked up this video.

The View from Underneath

I had one of those great days yesterday - I just ended up enjoying everything although nothing out of the ordinary happened. Just that my brain didn't get in the way with stupid stuff - anxiety or fretfulness or whatever.

Got almost all of the housecleaning done except for the floor mopping. I like to do that when no hubbies are going to come back in when the floor is still wet, and he was busy either in or around the house all day so I'm waiting till today when I think he's going to go out thistle-whacking again.

But the best part of the day was when I decided it was time to go for a walk, ostensibly just down to the red gate to pick up the mail. I did put on my camera pack, just in case, although didn't start out feeling very inspired. But, oh my goodness, it was one of those great walks. I didn't get back until three hours later with some interesting shots in the camera and four-five miles under my belt. The highlight was watching a mama mallard with her five adorable ducklings swimming on the river.

I got my butt damp taking this picture from underneath the metal bridge that crosses the Chowchilla about a quarter mile past the red gate. Even though I was on solid ground, everything is just kind of wet there so just sitting setting up the camera was enough. Once I got started walking again though, my pants didn't stay uncomfortable for long.