Play It Again...

From The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.

In keeping the center of the I empty,
the miracle of life can enter and heal.

it is only when we are emptied of all noise and dreams of ego that we become truly teachable.

This is something I have always had a problem with... the need for silence and nothingness, particularly in meditations, and learning/study.

I've always been one of those people who struggles with 'empty' meditations, but find guided meditation and visualisation really quite enjoyable, and relaxing/satisfying. Also very productive. That said, I understand the notion of stilness within - try to practise that quite a bit, so... maybe that's the way I compromise.

I'm the same when I study. People I talk to say they always have to have silence, they can't work or study if there is noise. For me it's all about music... or nice sounds, for example the crackling fireplace that Mir gave to me the other day. I suppose something in that stimulates the two halves of my brain to work in harmony with each other and somehow improves my memory, or capacity to learn or something - I don't really understand it. All I know is that I retain things better, and I'm more creative if I have music or sound - and it has to be appropriate 'noise' - playing as I work.

Friends Don't Shoot One Another...

From The Book of Awakening: Having the Life You Want by Being Present to the Life You Have.

How many ways can a statue dream of living?
Every time I reach for you, we begin.
We begin.

To feel isolated is part of the human journey. But when we obey the feelings of hesitation and separation more powerfully than those of love, we start to experience numbness and depression this is when we start to live like statues, believing that all we can do is watch.

A little while ago, while looking at my messenger list, I realised it had been along time since I'd contacted one of the friends on there that I used to be close to. She was going to come and visit me, since she only lives up on Merseyside way, but then her work got in the way, and... we kinda just dropped out of touch. I was determined to get back in touch, but kept never noticing when she was online, so one day I sent her a text message instead and after that got back in touch, and... I like to think we've just picked things up where we left off. Good friends do that, right?

Not always...

Looking for something today, I happened on the print outs of some Emails from someone who I had loved as a very dear friend back in 2001. It wasn't an argument as such... actually she thought she was helping me... but really went about it in the wrong way entirely. It was at a time when I was suffering from depression because of the infertility I was suffering, and she out and said she thought I should have myself committed. Then when I asked another friend to intercede between us because I was too hurt to be able to not be angry, she objected, and asked me not to contact her again, to give her space. I did... and for a long long long time - I'm talking like 7 or 8 years - we didn't speak.

She's now a facebook friend, and we have each other's email addresses, but things are not the same, and I don't think ever will be. I'm not angry with her, I've forgiven the hurt, just... there's a lingering awkwardness. If she could have been so mistaken about me before, how can she understand me properly now?

Which of us, in that case, isolated ourselves from the other? And what hurdles do we face in rebuilding the kind of closeness that we enjoyed before? Can we even do that?