Meditating

This rainbow ended at Don and Marianne's house the other day.

I have been trying to meditate daily but it is so hard some days. Does taking a nap do the same as mediating???? It does seem to calm things down and I am now trying to focus on asking my body what it wants and not just pay attention to my breathing.

Last Sunday I spent all day doing a meditation retreat at my neighbor Tory's. Tory has been a practicing Buddhist for 35 years and is trained as a minister. I came to realize that day, my response to "religion" and "spiritual" has been a big issue that I should deal with. I had a very serious problem with my religion when I was in my early thirties and have been carrying it around ever since. It has been a real button pusher. I now know I need to make peace with it and learn what spiritual really is to me. I need to make peace with my past.

All day is a long time to meditate and be quiet. We did some in her "barn" and some in the pasture behind our homes. It struck me as funny that we were sitting arounds the tree where Marie had buried her cow and calf, that got struck down by lightening many years ago. Marie would have gone nuts seeing these strange people sitting and wandering around the pasture meditating. She was a very conservative woman.

At the end of the day we spent 10 minutes sharing our experience with a partner and I was very teary as I told her my health issues. As I walked home stuffing back my tears, I acknowledged that there is an awful lot of sorrow in me. I can usually have my melt downs with Mick and he is very comforting but that day I couldn't do it. I think I was afraid I wouldn't stop once I started so I stuffed them back, deep inside and got a headache instead. Smart. Hopefully I will be able to give into it the next time it surfaces so I can move beyond.

It was a really good day otherwise and I will keep doing my meditation thing.