Capricorn Tales

Today's mantra: I forgive those who have harmed me in my past and peacefully detach from them.   This one speaks for itself.  I have spoken about letting go of things that do not positively serve, you in the past blogs, forgiveness of a person or a situation, can help you do this.  We all have a lot of things that we can forgive to help us move on and I was reminded of that tonight.   I have had to do a lot of forgiving on this journey, from people that hurt me, to myself for not believing more in me, and situations changed my life.  That is right, a situation can be forgiven, because forgiveness isn't just about making someone else feel better, it is about making you feel better.  If someone else is given a reprieve, because you chose to forgive, even better.   Tonight I was reminded of an anger I have carried inside for a long time.  Almost seven years ago, on December 8, 2008, one of my best friends, that was a soul siste...

Well, I am sure Bob Dylan meant something completely different when he sang those lyrics, but from day one until yesterday, I really found that my times, well they were a changin'.  That is what I am going to focus mainly on during this blog, as well as giving my opinion on the meditation challenge.  I went back through the thirty days and I picked my favorites.  Including the staying in the moment meditation. It was short, but for me, it is a way to re-find my balance and center myself.  For instance, if you are having one of those days when you just need step away and breathe, do it literally.  For those moments when you are feeling "less than", do the love meditation, or the self-confidence meditation.  There are so many and I am grateful for the J Bittersweet meditation challenge.  In some cases I edited, for lack of a better word, the way the meditations were done, as I found so many variations of the same thing.  So, if there is somet...

The other day we learned the Zazen meditation, which primarily focuses on keeping ones concentration.  Today's meditation is more of the same, but with a twist.  In the monasteries and temples I spoke about the other day, meditations tend to go on for longer than the 5-30 minutes people dedicate to this daily practice.  In order to maintain focus and to keep the good QI (chi) going and remain in concentration, the Kinhin (kin-yin) meditation is also practiced.  Kinhin is the practice of mediation while walking in a clockwise circle, be it slowed paced or at nearly a jog.  Kinhin is loosely translated into, 'walking back and forth'.  When practicing Kinhin, create a fist with one hand, then cover it with another and keeping it in front of your energy center, roughly two inches above your navel.  This area is also where you Solar Plexus chakra is located.  If you are having trouble picturing this, think of the stance a martial artist takes ...

Twenty-nine days down and one more to go.  I am enjoying meditating everyday and find that sometimes I just do it for a few minutes when I need that energy pick me up, or to release those tense moments. When I first saw the meditation for today, naturally I became excited.  Will this help me find Mr. Right? Will this lead me to find the one?  Well, I completely misinterpreted this meditation and was pleasantly surprised when it began.  This meditation isn't about finding anyone other than yourself.   "To love oneself is the beginning of a life long romance."  -Oscar Wilde.  How true are those words?  When you love yourself, you open yourself to love others, whether it be family, friend's or a significant other and this is partly because you are creating a positive energy, or vibe.   This meditation is also about forgiveness of those who have hurt you, and releasing that pain, as well as an exercise in ...

  Zazen is commonly practiced in Zen temples and monasteries, as a form of meditation that focuses on concentration.  Breathing for this meditation is done from the hara, or your navel area, the center of balance, and helps beginners focus by using a counting method.  One, inhale to the count of ten; two, exhale to the count of ten; three, inhale to the count of ten; four, exhale to the count of ten and so on until your reach ten, then repeat, beginning at one.  This process can continue upwards of twenty to thirty minutes.  Your position for Zazen should be in a lotus, or half lotus position, with your spine straight, but relaxed. It seems impossible right?  You can do. Trust me, if I can, you can.  You got this.    The concentration factor of Zazen is to allow your thoughts, judgments, words, idea's or anything passing through your head to do just that, pass through, while you keep your mind clear and focused on your breath...

  *Proceed with meditation with caution if you choose to use a candle, in other words, don't burn your house down. Also, these opinions are my own and are meant in no way to persuade one to think or believe in the things I do.  We're all individuals, so you can choose what tickles your brain and what doesn't.  :D   As we near the end of the thirty day meditation, I have found that the majority of the meditations were to my liking, and less than a handful, not so much, but I feel that this is a good thing, if you want it to be.  What better way to continue meditation, than to look back and continue to practice the ones that did resonate with you and to already know which ones did not.  This meditation was one of my favorites.   Gazing meditation is meant to help you focus and concentrate.  It is also thought to improve eyesight and is used to enhance psychic abilities, almost like scrying, the art of staring into a candle, or reflective ...

Disclaimer:   If you have heart disease,  high blood pressure or a hernia, please do not attempt this exercise without consulting a physician or a professional yoga instructor. Disclaimer 2:   If you begin to feel dizzy or faint, STOP! No one needs an injury from this exercise.  Crunches work just as well. :D That being said, I mentioned previously that I have a repaired heart, but I did make it through this exercise with flying colors and enjoyed it, though it did make me giggle at first.  This meditation breathing exercise called, Kapalbhati Pranayama,  is a yoga breathing technique aimed at weight loss (yay me!), strengthening tummy muscles and improving circulation.  One of the older yoga breathing techniques, this form of breathing is not designed to relax you, but instead bring energy to your body, so I would suggest doing it in the morning.  The meditation will consist of three breathing reps.  Now, before we beg...

  I am going to preface this blog with, if you have a medical illness please seek professional medical treatment.    Many people believe that a healing meditation is going to miraculously cure you. I am not saying it won't, but I also can't say that it will. I know this seems sketchy as an opening line, but the majority of the alternative medicine practitioners out there, will tell you to use this form of healing in conjunction with conventional medical treatment, not as a replacement.   As the meditation days progress,  they seem to be more detailed and not as easy for me to translate into words, so again, I will post the link later in the post, so you can meditate peacefully, listening to the guide and the soothing music.    What I liked about this meditation is that I felt energized afterwards, as if I had a spurt of energy, after a long day of running in nine directions.  Funny enough it shows the person lying down in the evenin...

For twenty days I have been blogging my interpretation of each daily meditation, as well as how it affects me or pertains to my life, but today I am going to paste in the link for the meditation, because I think it is important that you follow this word for word.   Self-confidence comes easier to some than others.  It does not come easily to me, but as I have mentioned in the past, sometimes life events might condition how we think about ourselves, even when we have family or good friends that do their best to give you confidence.  Mean words hurt, mean words from peers that you want to like you, can hurt even more. So how does one move past this?  Hear only the positive words, feel only the positive vibes. Mean words hurt yes, but people spewing nastiness, are people that do not positively serve your life and so you must let them go.   I am beginning to believe that everything happens in divine right time.   That being said, I can honestl...

Well, it looks as though I am sliding in right under the midnight radar and getting this in today, or at least starting it before it is a new day.  Speaking of new days, I kind of like to think of the crown  chakra as seeing each coming day as new, once the chakra is balanced and open. Purple in color and located just above the Crown of your head, this chakra is the seventh and final of them all.  This chakra allows you to connect to your higher self and intuition and allows you to receive guidance and enlightenment.  I also believe it is essential to maintain full trust in whatever you believe in to allow this chakra to remain balanced and open. Some believe that many do not achieve the full experience of the crown chakra, but perhaps that is because we have programmed ourselves to not trust everything.  In this day and age we might think "trust" is hard to come by, or have, in many situations, but is it really?  I put the word trust in quotes in ...

  I will preface this blog with this thought, I am not yet into the chanting meditations, but I tried this meditation and ended up stopping it part way through. I thought perhaps it was because I have an issue with chanting, but I still wanted to keep up on this blog, so I did some research.  According to one article from the Spiritual Research Foundation (Google is an amazing tool!), "chanting only Om, can have adverse effects if the person is of a lower spiritual level (ie. spiritual novice) as [they] may not have the capacity to tolerate the spiritual energy generated from the chant."   It is also believed that women should not just chant Om by itself as this energy creates a wave of heat that can have adverse reproductive effects.  They should only use the word 'Om' when coupled with other words.  I know this might sound crazy, but if chanting 'Om', creates a high amount of energy due to the vibrations created b...

Today's meditation is about beating insomnia and is meant for bedtime, so I thought I might take the opportunity to recap the first fifteen days of this challenge.  I'm not going to take us through day by day, instead let's focus on how we feel.  Do you feel like you're making progress? Do you feel different? Has the way you approached each day changed? I can honestly answer yes to all three of those questions.  Though I had a happy childhood and can't complain, there are events during that time that took place that I can't change, but that had molded me into someone I did not want to be anymore, negative and self-loathing.   There have been times that I felt like a feral animal, scared and feeling trapped and then verbally came out lashing.  It has been quite some time since I have been this way, though "ugly" me slips out for an appearance from time to time, but it is fewer and far between.  I had been attempting meditation for some tim...

Right before I awoke, I had a dream that I was walking around a stadium. Next thing I know, I am in an empty locker room, a white tub is filling up with a thick red liquid (guess what that was!), then something that looked like a cross between an Orc from Tolkien's mind, and a vampire began to emerge.  It's eyes were a milky gray and it looked like it had dreads, but I can't tell if that was skin, or hair.  It had a dark gray skin, a pointy chin and nose, jagged teeth and claw like fingers.  Yes, I am a vivid dreamer and while some nights I don't mind, this morning, right before my eyes opened, I did mind. So what does my dream have to do with a meditation?  Well, stress and fears.  That icky thing crawling out of the tub could have been a manifestation of my fears and stress.  I am a fairly easy going person, but every so often we hit a rough patch and yesterday was one of them.  While I feel I handled the majority of the day we...

Hello!  Here I am...Today's lesson is a good one, learning how to meditate* so you can balance and center yourself.  The other day I mentioned that the meditation for staying in the moment helped me find a way to center myself, but this meditation teaches you how to focus and ground yourself.  It is the perfect meditation for me. Even when I am sitting still my mind is going so fast, I think my body is following it. ha! Since I am lazy when I first wake up, unless it is time to take myself out for a walk, I lie down during these meditations, but today's lesson was specific, since you are literally imagining yourself being grounded.  Sit down in a chair, feet "planted" firmly on the ground and relax.  Remember your breathing techniques, breathe in to the count of five, breathe out to the count of eight, relaxing in the process of each breath.  Repeat three times.  Once you feel relaxed, imagine your feet growing roots into the ground.  That's ...

Anyone who knows me, knows that I can be wound a little tight sometimes.  Although I love the little things in life, it is the daily annoyances (ie. Traffic, rude people, etc.) that can toss me over the edge on some days.  I am not sure what makes each day different from the next, in my mind anyway, but I do know that some days are rougher than others to get through.  As of late, my cousin has inspired me to reach deep within and start weeding out the negativity that has been left behind from all sorts of things in my life, including past relationships, and the deaths of my mom and one of my best friends, who was like a soul sister to me. I am a Capricorn, so I tend to hold on to things.  What can I say, I give a good glare. *Shrugs shoulders*.  However, a good glare, or a left over vibe from some moment gone wrong, is not conducive to my heart health. Yes, the little ticker is running mighty fine, like a well tuned car, but reality i...