Mindful News Breaks~ Day #4
- By Susan Reynolds
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- 08 Apr, 2020
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April 9
24/7 connectivity in the digital age is helping us connect to one another during this unprecented time, but also keeping me glued to the news. I can watch on television, scroll through twitter feeds, and click on short video clips thorughout the day (and night). It can take intention and concerted effort to pull myself away from updates and daily press conferences, and it almost always requires some aspect of mindfulness. Gratitude, solitude, and time outside have been my go tos.
Gratitude: It’s so easy to consider what I’m grateful for during yoga, but sometimes during a stressful moment, not so easy. We’ve created a reminder, a do it yourself gratitude wall, in the kitchen for the off yoga times. Each family member posts sticky notes that have accumulated over time.
Solitude might seem unusual in a home filled with multiple family members, especially if each is working or studying from home, relegated to separate corners of the house, but often convening in the kitchen throughout the day. Cal Newport, in his book Digital Minimalism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World, explains that in our always on culture, we are suffering from solitude deprivation, but he doesn’t mean physical solitude. Rather, he talks about the lack of time we spend without stimulus of external information. Yoga is so great for this, but so is a moment or two in silence, stillness, and solitude, even if you are in a room with multiple family members.
Fresh Air and stepping outside of the house are essential breaks. We’re in the middle of Week 4 of Sheltering in Place, as counties in the California Bay Area were the first to issue an official mandate. We are now at the point where public parks are closed, games or sports that require hands to touch the same ball are banned, and other social distancing has ramped up. Having a dog has made the outdoors unavoidable, but with spring in the air, flowers budding, and warmer weather on the East Coast, going outside is one of my favorite ways to take a mindful news break.
On The Mat Yoga Blog
“There is a light in the core of
our being that calls us home—one that can only be seen with closed eyes; We can
feel it as a radiance in the center of our chest. This light of loving
awareness is always here, regardless of our conditioning. It does not matter
how many dark paths we have traveled or how many wounds we have inflicted or
sustained as we have unknowingly stumbled toward this inner radiance. It does
not matter how long we have sleepwalked, seduced by our desires and fears. This
call persists until it is answered, until we surrender to who we really are.
When we do, we feel ourselves at home wherever we are. A hidden beauty reveals
itself in our ordinary life. As the true nature of our Deep Hear is unveiled,
we feel increasingly grateful for no reason—grateful to simply be.”
—John J. Prendergast, PHD, The Deep Heart
Seems like it’s been rainy,
windy, dreary for eons. Which may have helped us shelter inside a bit more. I
remember reading years and years ago in a Seth book that weather can be
influenced, and even created by mass human emotion. Why not? We are far more powerful
than we currently acknowledge, and science is beginning to validate many
phenomena that had seemed inconceivable before. Those seemingly endless days of
“bad” weather seemed congruent with the emotional tone of covid her in New
England. And now SUN! Glorious, warming, invigorating, hope-filled Sun! Today I
will be outside basking and gardening and thanking. And I’m sure the whole
neighborhood, and most of New England will go outside, stand with our faces to
the sun and breathe a huge healing breath of joy. And maybe the collective
energy of that will resonate out across the word as a promise of brighter days
to come.
