Listening the forest grow, healing ourselves and reaching the stars

"In the practice of our days, to listen is to lean in, softly, with a willingness to be changed by what we hear."
- Mark Nepo -

These days, we listen to answer back, not to listen only. Do this next time, as a little exercise. Listen with intention, carefully, without judgement, just for the sake of it. And see what change. Because listening is one of the most needed skills, it is a must, and the good news is that we can become better listeners, with practice. Empathy will follow soon after we master this skill, and then we will observe a dramatic increase in a quality of our emotional and overall life. Just do it!


"It is never too late to heal the mind and to bring to ourselves and to those around us the compassion and kindness that arise from that healing and integration."
- Dan Siegel -

Listening and developing of empathy is one of the many steps we need to make in order to achieve perfect balance. And like the Chinese saying, the perfect moment to start this was 10 years ago. The second perfect moment is now. Doesn't matter how low we can get, or where we feel we are right now. The perfect moment to start is the present moment. If we are down, is it still fine, because now we can rise. It is never too soon. It is never to late. The biggest and most consistent amount of change in my life came after my 37th birthday. I was asleep until then. I was lost in the night of the spirit. And i wake up.


"The redwoods, once seen, leave a mark or create a vision that stays with you always...It's not only their unbelievable stature, nor the color which seems to shift and vary under your eyes, no, they are not like any trees we know, they are ambassadors from another time."
- John Steinbeck -

They are there, as witnesses from another time, from another space. The are majestic, and they are giants among us. But they were not like these all the time. They started as a humble acorn. They were a small tree once. But given enough time, they grow. They reach the height that will make us to look in awe. So are we. We can be majestic too. Given enough time. Given enough learning. Given enough inner fire.

Three thoughts for Sunday

"The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience." Emily Dickinson said. We are too often thinking about the negative side of life, and we will not remember when was the last time when we were in awe, when our mind stopped and we couldn't even breath in front of some majestic beauty.

"Childhood is the world of miracle and wonder...as if creation rose, bathed in the light, out of the darkness, utterly new and fresh and astonishing."  said Eugene Ionesco to us, and it is not a coincidence that one of the way to achieve huge self-esteem, will power and independence is to achieve our childhood dreams. Of course, many are completely irrelevant to us today, but in fulfilling them, in one way or another, we will reach the hidden fountain of eternal youth. It is something almost magical, an alchemy process which will invigorate and regenerate our body, mind and spirit. Try this today, all you need is pen and paper, make a list of your childhood dreams and try to achieve some of them Observe how you feel after it.

"Words are but the vague shadows of the volumes we mean. Little audible links, they are, chaining together great inaudible feelings and purposes." is a quote by Theodore Dreiser. And it is true, words can hurt or heal. One of the most interesting actions worldwide that I was watching is You Matter Marathon. Take a look and see one elegant way to change the world around you and bring joy to others.

That's all for today. Wish you an awesome week!
G.

Technology, attention span and the real worlds

Motto: Technology challenges us to assert our human values, which means that first of all, we have to figure out what they are. (Sherry Turkle)

Look at this picture. Can you see something familiar? Do you see this too often? Why? What do you think it is the solution?

We got hooked, we got a whole life and expectancies inside that little screen. And in doing this, we forget to look around us, to see that majestic tree, that bunny shaped cloud, the rainbow behind the neighbor house. 

And we don't have time. We never have enough time, spare time is an urban myth, it is a legend similar to Excalibur, the sword from the stone. Just for you to know, right now, year 2016, the human attention span is 8 seconds (down from average 60 seconds 30 years ago). The goldfish has a 9 seconds attention span. That's telling us something, right? Everybody complain, but nobody want to learn that looking at the screen will change the way that we perceive the world, and speaking about something else, did you know that being in awe for one minute will modify your time perception, making you to feel that you have enough time for the next 24 hours? You see, i am good enough to give you the solution too. Now it is your turn. Go out, put everything in action. 

And thank me later for it.

Yours truly,

G.

Spirituality and happiness

Apparently there is a link between spirituality and happiness. According to a research done by Myers in 2000, spiritually oriented people report higher levels of happiness, also according to a research made by Smith & co in 2003, spiritually oriented people report significantly less depression. There is a theory believing that the core of any real spiritual practice is the feeling of awe.

Scientist revealed that a brief experience of awe (10-60 seconds) will boost happiness, increase intellectual curiosity, deepen our sense of modesty and humility, lower cytokines levels(very important step in achieving a perfect immune system), change the perception of time (making us to feel that we have more time to grow). On an more earthly level, awe will make us to feel less entitled, less self-important, to need less money to spend and to become more altruistic. In a study made by Frances Kuo, awe is related to crime drops, better discipline for children, especially girls, lowered ADHD reactions for children, greater trust for neighbors in community.

Just to define it, Awe is the feeling of being in the presence of something vast and greater than self, that exceeds current knowledge structures.

Ideally, you can cultivate awe by going in nature, especially on high peaks or ancient forests, gigantic waterfalls, but you can also experience it in urban settings too, being at the top floor of a skyscraper, for example. If you cannot do this, as last resort, it is good to watch at least 5 minutes of awe inspiring videos once a week.