Day 4 #trust30 - Where in the world?!!!

If we live truly, we shall see truly. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Not everyone wants to travel the world, but most people can identify at least one place in the world they’d like to visit before they die. Where is that place for you, and what will you do to make sure you get there?

(Author: Chris Guillebeau)

I'm lucky enough to have traveled most of the world from an early age. That's what being a TCK is all about. However, there are many places I haven't been that I would still like to visit. 

The one place I want to visit before I die is actually a place I've been before - my favorite place in the world, Bali.

I love the atmosphere, people, culture and mix of Hinduism and Buddhism found on this tiny island that you can travel the length of in one day. 

The main thing I want to do there is stand in the temple on the edge of the ocean and watch the sun set.

If I could do this before I die my life would be complete. I don't know if it will happen, or when (if it does), but I'm hopeful. If it doesn't, then at least I can say I've seen one of the most beautiful places on earth and that no matter where I go that experience will stay with me.

UPDATE: Day 3 #trust30 - The Question/ My Biggest Obstacle

UPDATE 6.5.11

"The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing." - Socrates

Having spent the last 48 hours pondering the question I asked myself two days ago, the only answer I can come up with that is honest and that answers my question with integrity is that I don't know how I can solve this problem for myself.

I know that I should keep going down the current path I am on for this has taken me much father than I ever thought I would or could go.

I also understand that I'm asking this question right now because I obviously still have some answers that I need to figure out. I'm not all knowing. I have learned a lot in this l last year that I didn't know before, and I know that I will learn a lot next year that I don't know right now. Therefore, the wisest thing I can do right now is admit that I don't have all the answers, but remain happy to sit in knowledge that as I move forward the answers will no doubt find me when I'm ready to embrace them.

The bravest thing I can do right now is surrender to the mantra "I don't know" and that is what I shall do.

Namaste

6.3.11

That which each can do best, none but his Maker can teach him. Where is the master who could have taught Shakespeare? Where is the master who could have instructed Franklin, or Washington, or Bacon, or Newton? . . . Shakespeare will never be made by the study of Shakespeare. Do that which is assigned you, and you cannot hope too much or dare too much. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Identify one of your biggest challenges at the moment (ie I don’t feel passionate about my work) and turn it into a question (ie How can I do work I’m passionate about?) Write it on a post-it and put it up on your bathroom mirror or the back of your front door. After 48-hours, journal what answers came up for you and be sure to evaluate them.

Bonus: tweet or blog a photo of your post-it.

(Author: Jenny Blake)

See ya in 48 hours! Hopefully with some answers!

Day 3 #trust30 - One Strong Belief

It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude. - Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance

The world is powered by passionate people, powerful ideas, and fearless action. What’s one strong belief you possess that isn’t shared by your closest friends or family? What inspires this belief, and what have you done to actively live it?

(Author: Buster Benson)

We all have the power to end our own suffering by understanding our minds and realizing that we don't have to be driven by their every whim. This is the one strong belief I possess that isn't shared by my closest friends and family. Of course, they believe that to some extent because they are not total delinquents, but they don't believe it to the extent I do and it shows in their often unhappy lives.

I have chosen to follow the teachings of the Buddha and to live a Buddhist lifestyle. This doesn't mean that I am a happy sorted person. No way! It simply means that I'm more in control of my mind than I've ever been before. It means I take responsibility for my thoughts and actions that arise from those thoughts. It means I'm aware of what I'm thinking and how my thinking causes me to suffer, and it means I have a place to work from, to start from, when trying to liberate myself from suffering. 

I've started a year long blogathon in which I write everyday about the lessons I'm learning and my struggles with my practice. This will be research for a novel I want to write around the topic of liberation from suffering. However, it also keeps me in check with my thoughts and actions, and allows me to see where I'm going wrong. My blog has also connected me with others on a similar path who are also writing about their experience. We learn from each other, laugh with each other and commiserate when the going gets tough.

There are so many resources out there on the web that I never knew existed that have helped me with my path. I'm learning something new everyday. This also keeps my practice fresh and allows me to come at it with new eyes so that I don't become entrenched and stuck in my path without a teacher.

I'm also actively figuring out how to continue my practice when I move back stateside at the end of September. I am actively pursuing a Sangha that I can join because the Sangha is the heart of the practice. 

Ultimately it was #reverb10 and 750words that started me on the firm path I'm on now after several unsuccessful attempts to dabble in Buddhism. For this I am eternally grateful. 

Namaste

Day 2 #trust30 - Once Sentence to Describe the Day

Day 2 and I'm on track for the 30 day challenge :)

Your genuine action will explain itself, and will explain your other genuine actions. Your conformity explains nothing. The force of character is cumulative. – Ralph Waldo Emerson, Self-Reliance

If ‘the voyage of the best ship is a zigzag line of a hundred tacks,’ then it is more genuine to be present today than to recount yesterdays. How would you describe today using only one sentence? Tell today’s sentence to one other person. Repeat each day.

(Author: Liz Danzico)

One sentence:

When in doubt stop and remember that those who have not been touched by the Dharma cannot be expected to live by the Dharma and therefore compassion should prevail no matter how difficult that makes your life and practice for that in itself is the practice.

Day 1 #trust30 15 Minutes to Live

I just found out about #trust30 today so my 30 days starts a couple days late. So be it. I'm letting go today.

We are afraid of truth, afraid of fortune, afraid of death, and afraid of each other. Our age yields no great and perfect persons. – Ralph Waldo Emerson

You just discovered you have fifteen minutes to live.

1. Set a timer for fifteen minutes.
2. Write the story that has to be written.

(Author: Gwen Bell)

Sit. Feel the heart racing, pumping the blood around and round the heart and body in desperation. It refuses to stop even though you will in 15 minutes. Take a deep breath. It's hard to calm it. It's living you out before you live out it. 

Feel the ground, the earth, pulsing below you. It mimics your heart just to let you know that you truly are still alive.

Dig your fingernails into the dirt. Rake them around until they are filled with stones and dust as your skin and bones will become in what may seem like a few minutes but yet also eternity, waiting, watching, wondering.

Watch your chest rise and fall with each inhale and exhale cause goodness knows that's easier than watching the tip of your nose. You've only got 15 minutes left baby girl, why watch the nose that's tormented you with it's size this whole time.

WAIT. I'm still breathing, I can still feel the blood pumping, the heart racing, the energy soaring.

You would have called your mother, sister, father, brother, girlfriend, boyfriend, cousin, friend, lover, teacher. You would have called them all if it wasn't for the fact that the 15 minutes you had left to live would be taken up simply by them asking:

"Hello, how are you? I've been meaning to call you for so long now and I just didn't get round to it. You know what there's some crazy shit been going on in my life. Do you mind if I tell you about it before even letting you say hello? No? You don't. I knew you wouldn't and it's not as if you don't have time."

No. It's better to breathe. Although they'll all be sad and wonder why you didn't try to communicate with them that you were dying. But you were always dying so why would this come as a shock to them? Has it come as a shock to you? Feel that heart jumping out of your chest - you can't deny it. Well I guess you could go ahead and try but don't say we didn't warn you.

You wonder how they're going to find you, right? Arms and legs contorted? Face in a grimace as if you died in pain? Tongue hanging out? Eyelids and lips as blue as the summer sky you gaze up into now? Will you have peed yourself? Shit yourself? Let's not go that far. Does it really matter? Well to them it does, but you'll be gone by there so it shouldn't matter to you one bit.

We can only control how we live. We can't control how we die. Well, I guess we could try...

But this is 15 minutes to live my girl and you're preoccupied with death? That's not much living is it? It's mostly thinking? LIVE as if you are dying. Don't DIE as if you are dying. 

You feel frozen, don't you? What can you possible do in 15 minutes that's living, is what you're thinking, right? Watch some TV? Watch some other people live the fantasy life that you'll never achieve? NO WAY. That's not living although you certainly spent a lot of time doing so when you were alive.

But I am alive now.

That's what you think! Prove it!

Where's the cushion? Pull it to the floor. Adjust your posture. Remember that practitioners experience is noted in how long they take to adjust. Adjust your heart away. You've got at least 10 minutes now.

Wiggle those toes, itch those armpits, scratch away those insects that live under the skin. Make sure your legs don't fall asleep by sitting up high and allowing the knees to fall down to the ground. 

That's it. Now take 3 breaths in slowly and surely. YES! I KNOW! Only 8 minutes left, but RELAX.

Place your hands in the mudra of your choice. There's no dictator here. That's it. Slowly. Move them around a bit till their comfy. Take another 3 breaths. Yes, I know, we got the order wrong. You'll just have to breathe again. Get over it. That's life isn't it?

Settle down into your spine but don't slouch. You're only as young as your spine and just because you're dying doesn't mean you're old. That spine is younger that you think it is. Drink in it's energy, maybe you'll get a couple extra seconds out of it.

Well, now just keep breathing. We're nearly there. Not much we can do about it now.

Shit - what about that recipe I promised to send mom???.

-----

You've always had 15 minutes to live, you just didn't know it.