The first fast and facing crises with awareness

Last Sunday Mike and I completed our first weekly fast (one day of the week without eating solids) which went well. There were two times during the day when I definitely felt ravenous - after lunch and after dinner time. At these times I drank some vegetable juice which I had prepared in the morning, that way when I was hungry (and grumpy) then I didn't have to think about the effort involved in juicing, the hard work (and cleaning) was already done.

Luckily I didn't feel too hungry when I went to bed either, certainly not to the point that it kept me awake. A dose of beetroot and celery juice filled me up enough to stave off any hunger pains; Mike preferred the apple and carrot juice combination instead.

I can't report that I noticed any great change (in health) that day or the next, however I was largely distracted by my father going to hospital late Sunday night with a fever, so I wasn't focused on the fast at that point.

On a separate subject, lately I have been overwhelmed by distressing stories: in books, movies and on the news. Having recently finished reading a very disturbing book called Glamorama by Bret Easton Ellis (author of American Psycho, to give you some idea of the book's contents) and then watching movies such as Enter the Void and Oldboy as well as the always-depressing news, I was completely fed up with unpleasant stories.

There ARE good people in the world doing good things and I honestly believe there aren't enough stories being told about THEM. So with that in mind, on Sunday night Mike and I sat down to watch one of my favourite movies: Peaceful Warrior which is about facing adversity with awareness and being the best you can be. A truly inspiring movie based on an even more inspiring book (based on a true story).

Part way through the movie I had to hit 'pause' to take the call that my dad was in an ambulance on his way to hospital. After some discussion around what needed to be done immediately by the family (nothing by me that night, my duties started the next morning), I was able to finish watching the movie with a new level of awareness of the moment. My own crisis aided my attention to the moment and I was able to handle everything without being overwhelmed by the emotions I was feeling. I simply watched them rise and fall away in a wave-like pattern.

To paraphrase a line from the movie, "This is a scary time in your life, are you Paying Attention to it?" Well I was able to pay attention and the results of that experiment were far more enlightening than not eating food for a day.

Mike and I will fast again this Sunday (and each Sunday for the rest of March) to really give the fasting a proper try, so I will report back on any new findings. 

And if you are also fed up with all the torture-themed gore-fests labelled as entertainment out there. What stories (books/movies etc.) do you recommend for revulsion fatigue?

A dream or a new reality?

Good morning world. I had to start early to get this out.

Last night, in fact, this morning at some time between 4am and 5.30am I had the most amazing dream. The details aren’t important, but it was full of fear and fantasy; a life-and-death situation. Over the years I’ve learnt that (for me at least) the details of the dream aren’t important, the only message to be read in dreams can be found in the over-riding emotion you are left with when it is over.

In this case, when my alarm went off and I realised that my world of chases and drama was over and it was time to get up and go to work, all I wanted to do was go back to sleep to face my fears and fulfill my potential in THAT world. In this world, I was just going to go sit at a desk and answer a phone, while ‘dreaming’ of my life that is to be.

Is that what life is? A boring alternative reality? It reminded me of a quote from one of my favourite movies of all time: Waking Life. “Giacometti was once run down by a car, and he recalled falling into a lucid faint, a sudden exhilaration as he realized that at last, something was happening to him.”

That is exactly how I felt upon awakening this morning. Given the chance I would have chosen a life of danger and immanent physical threat, over the usual day-to-day drudgery – just to feel alive. It’s a terrible irony to feel more alive when dreaming than when awake.

But, to move past ‘wishing’ for another life, the concepts in Waking Life show us we can say yes to each moment. That each moment of our lives and our existence are unique and amazing in their own way. Way of the Peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman (my favourite book) and the movie that followed, Peaceful Warrior also explain this concept beautifully.

On my way to work this morning I didn’t pull out my smart phone and play games, or read a book. I meditated. I felt the breeze on my face at the train station, heard the conversation of strangers on the train, and noticed the play of light on the leaves of the trees. Gorgeous.

Now I don’t need the risk of danger or the thrill of the chase to be happy with life. 

I can just say yes.