May 2019 – Artistic Apathy

Fast Forward ⏩

Recently I’ve been noticing just how fast time seems to be going. It’s already almost the sixth month of the year. Halfway through the year. Weeks seem to blend into themselves and time is starting to seem more and more like something that’s just happening and that I have no control over.

Or do I?

I’ve been noticing more and more with meditation, as I sit with my eyes closed for thirty minutes that time seems to dissolve.

That “sense” of time that we all have… You know when you estimate how much time has gone by since you put those biscuits in the oven? Or how much time it’s been since you texted that person back?

Yeah, that. Well as I sit with my eyes closed all of that goes away. There’s no “it’s been 10 minutes” and counting the time until the session is over. It’s just me. Me being with me and being present in this moment.

See a lot of people live in terms of what will happen in the future. And sure, the future is sure to happen but it’s not a sure thing. No one can predict the future. You can only have an idea of what the future will be like based on the past.

As for as the past, the past only exists in our minds. Matter of fact, this whole post is in the past as I’m typing it. We can’t go back and our version of what happened is often skewed anyway.

Well what does that leave us with? The present. The here and now. You only really have now. That excitement you have for that future vacation or the anticipation that you’ll get a call back for that job is just speculation. We really don’t know where we’ll be five, ten months from now.

As I meditate more and more, I’m moving into this awareness. The awareness that I am just this moment.

The other day I had thoughts about my own mortality and felt as if I had to do something because time was going by too fast. I just got home from vacation and a month has gone at the snap of a finger. Soon I’ll be in the grave! Okay, hold on, hold on. Let’s relax.

If I fully embody the belief that I am just this moment then all the worries about the future and the flow of time will cease. There won’t be a flow of time, it’ll just be now.

It’s a hard concept to grasp but it’s more than a concept. It’s the truth.

Thank you for reading.

End of a Chapter, Start of a New One

Recently I’ve been feeling like a chapter of my life has come to a close and I’m starting a new one.

To better illustrate, I’ll explain it to you.

Recently I faced an old fear I had head on and came out on top, which partly inspired the last post. That and the bird. But anyway, I had an old story of limitation in my head. It’s basically those voices that tell you you can’t do something because it’s never been done or you won’t amount to nothing.

As I faced this fear, my whole body was freaking out and I nearly threw up. The whole time though I was just staying with my nervous self and not freaking out over being nervous which in turn would only make things worse. I also gave myself permission to throw up if I needed to. That may sound insane but I basically gave myself the space to be nervous and by doing that I was there for myself when I couldn’t really count on anyone.

Long story short I challenged the old story and proved it wrong. Now something I had huge anxiety and worry over isn’t even a problem anymore. I still get nervous sure but I can rest more knowing I am safe. I still have many fears that need to be faced.

That was the closing out of that chapter. The old story. The new chapter began when I began to look at all the possibilities now that I faced this fear. It was like stepping into a new world, you couldn’t believe how impactful it was when I did this one thing and didn’t run away.

I’m trying this new thing where I’m just honest about my feelings. I now understand the phrase “the truth will set you free.” You really liberate yourself from your mental prison when you just talk about what’s weighing you down.

I’ve stepped into a world where I only could have dreamed of months ago. And it’s all because I decided to face my biggest fear head on where others would run and hide. And that’s not to shame those people because I was scared too. But it’s more of giving myself a congratulatory pat on the back. We all deserve a little credit every now and then.

This has been the writer at Artistic Apathy.

Leap of Faith

I’m here at the park and I’m listening to Yumeji’s Theme by Shigeru Umebayashi and I see a bird.

This bird is perched up on top of a swing set and I notice how gracefully it dives with its wings tucked and lands on its two feet.

I thought “wow where do they get the confidence to do that?” It seems scary, even for a human. I thought “duh, it’s a bird of course it knows how to fly.” Then I had another thought.

Before that bird had to learn how to dive like that. Before it learned it had no idea what it was doing. It was probably a series of trial and errors. I don’t know, I’m no bird expert. All I know is that bird had faith and knew that it had to learn to fly to survive.

And so it did. Now it does it so gracefully and effortlessly it’s astonishing to watch.

Here it is, now I’m going to equate this to real life.

As I watched the bird I thought about how us humans are scared to leap or dive sometimes. But if you never take the plunge you won’t know what’s on the other side. You’ll never gain the confidence that that bird had when it dove to the ground.

Many of us are scared to leap whether it be quitting a job that doesn’t serve us or embarking on a business venture. But the truth of the matter is, we don’t know how good and expanded we’ll feel once we finally do take that plunge.

Great confidence and freedom comes from things such as these.

Think about the bird. How free it is. It can soar and fly. Wouldn’t you like to fly? It goes wherever it wants and isn’t tied down to any one place or thing like many of us humans are. We’re tied to our emotions, our financial situations, our jobs, friendships and relationships that don’t serve us anymore.

Wouldn’t you like to be more like the bird? Lose that jealous friend, quit that job you hate, conquer your fears and see what’s waiting for you on the other side. Be more like the bird.

10 Days of Meditation – Results

Now the title may be misleading. I didn’t meditate for ten days straight. I just made it a habit to take some time out of my day to devote to myself. Particularly in the morning.

While I don’t want to make this journey all about the results, I think it’s important to put into focus what I’ve learned and hopefully you all can get something out of it as well.

Now if you read my previous blog post about meditation you would know I’m no stranger to it. I started my own practice what seems like forever ago but is only a few years. A lot has changed since then.

Mainly what got me back into doing it is my desire to be more engaged in the present moment. I found myself often times retreating into my mind and fighting inner demons all day long. I wanted to dispel those demons and feel more in the here and now and not in the future or past.

So far it’s been helping me to do that. You could call me a intermediate meditator so I quickly fell back into the practice. I thought nothing would come up during the meditation but to my surprise many thoughts and stories and feelings came up.

My job was to not tamper with them but to simply leave them be. They would come in and do their thing for a while then they would leave. I had an old thought pattern that was eating me away. When I began “allowing,” it quickly became almost a non-issue. Today I can say it’s one less thing to worry about.

I’ve learned a lot of things about myself. The days have been mostly fair to me but the other day I was struggling with an inner pain. Depends on your definition of struggling though as I was learning how to be with it. I came up with an interesting metaphor. Old pains are like a wounded animal you find by chance. You take it in, nurse it back to health and love it and when it’s time you set it free.

That’s exactly what I practiced. I spent the day feeling the pain in full. No denying it or trying to stuff it down. I didn’t eat it away, I didn’t engage in some kind of awful addiction to numb it. Although I’m not judging those who do.

I was feeling anxiety about an upcoming event and I started getting all these thoughts in my head. An old story about me played in my head, essentially a limitation and I found myself “predicting” the future.

My mind took me to a place where the future event had already happened and I had screwed things up. It was merely a thought but I was living it in the here and now as if it was real. I realized that no one can tell the future but the pain would not go away. It was calling out to be felt/loved like a small child.

I had a conversation with a friend and we talked about how there are good days and bad days and something that was so common sense clicked later when the following day I woke up feeling much better. The pain tried to creep back up later but I was wide open to accepting it and it did its thing and left.

What he said just kind of drives home the fact that all pain is temporary and we don’t have to feel this way forever. When you’re in pain you project into the future as if you are always going to feel this way but that’s just not true. There are good days and bad days and our job is to be there with ourselves on those bad days and not run from ourselves which makes us feel more isolated and alone and does the opposite of what we are trying to achieve.

The future event didn’t even end up happening so that just proves further how much of it is a lie. Now I have another event coming up and I don’t feel as anxious after the awareness I’ve gained.

I’m more aware of my body and I can feel myself literally resisting thoughts and how my body reacts to certain thoughts/feelings/emotions.

It’s all pretty enlightening stuff but I’m only a step of the way there.

Today I realized quite literally what it means that we are the sky not the clouds. As I laid on my back and watched the clouds drift by. We are infinite, we are the sky–not the cloud which is passing by.

I’m looking forward more than ever to where life takes me as it seems that everything is lining up perfect for me to step into my power. The test is here. No pressure though.

Thank you for reading~

Eye Contact

Writing prompt #1 “Eye Contact”

Samantha remained frozen, deadlocked in the middle of Ethan’s view. She looked like a deer in headlights. Her heart beat rapidly.

“E…than,” she murmured.

Ethan stared back at her, similarly. His eyes were wide and his heart also beat rapidly.

“Sa…mantha,” he mouthed silently.

The two walked toward each other without breaking eye contact. Not even for a second. Once they were within an arm’s distance they shook hands. Still not breaking eye contact.

“You look even better in person,” Samantha said.

“You too,” Ethan said examining her from head to toe.

Ethan spun around and signaled towards the table adjacent to them.

“Should we sit?”

“Sure,” Samantha said.

The two sat down still looking into each others’ eyes.

“I can say,” Ethan started. “Looking at your eyes for this long, they really are beautiful.”

“Thanks,” Samantha said. “I can say your eyes are the prettiest brown eyes I’ve ever laid my eyes on.”

The two of them chuckled. Ethan explained how he had never received a compliment on his eyes like that and he thought them to be pretty normal.

“That’s the first time we’ve broken eye contact,” Samantha joked.

“How do you feel in this moment?” He asked her, all smiles.

“Feel like this has been the best decision I’ve made all year.”

Ethan perked up at the sound of that and wore a huge smile on his face.

“I think this could work out,” he said.

“I think so too,” she said.