Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Loving Presence Be kind. Understand. Help. FFS, I am , and long have been, the same all too often. Just as Socrates et al. tell us that no man does evil on purpose, bodhisattva Thich Nhat Hanh tell us that these zombies do not do so on purpose. They don't know, or they would choose differently. Now I know. Will I make better choices? If so, how often? How much presence can I express in my life? How much consciousness? How much mindfulness?

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Loving Presence I am so glad I found this book. It presents meditation so simply, in ways that resonate with me. I haven't yet attempted a MEDITATION with this uncomplicated sense, but I need to. More importantly, I need to find ways to slip small meditations into my daily life instead of waiting for the "right time" to MEDITATE . I fess the emphasis there is exactly the problem. Start small. Start tonight. Start.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Resting Perhaps it's just much simpler than I've tried so far. Maybe I've just been trying too hard. Relax. Be here. Be now. Stop worrying about it.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Resting Meditation as true presence. Usually, when I've considered meditating, I envision a blankness, a void where nothing exists and anything that does is a distraction. Perhaps having that wrong impression of my destination is the issue.... If meditation is, instead, fully experiencing the world as it is right here and right now, then that's a wholly different path from here to there than trying to erase everything from existence.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Resting Be there 100%. Be here 100%. Be now 100%. Be . . . aware, awake. Be satisfied with sufficiency. Srrive not but sink, rest.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Resting Find the natural state that allows me to rest and find comfort. That I can maintain and meditate with. It's always been a challenge for me. Perhaps that is the issie: it has been a challenge rather than a natural way of being. I can do better.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Freedom Hello, old friend I am not up to dealing with you right now. Please come later. A label becomes a key that frees. Now I can name it. Now it loses its power over me.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Freedom I try hard to remember to be happy about the ten thousand things in my life that are good. I try to notice when my car has been running well without need of many repairs in the past few years.* I try to see the weather as a gift come rain, come shine. And the sunsets and the dawns and the days of sunlight and the nights of stars and moon. I try to recognize how precious it is to spend time with my kids. Every time, not just special occasions. I try to be aware of how wonderful my wife is. To see and appreciate (overtly) all she does for me and our family. I try to notice when I do well, so that not all my reflection is filled with recrimination. If I deserve a pat, I'll take a pat, if only from myself. I look for the happy and try to encourage it. ===== * Unlike, say, Mrs. Student's car which is closing in on the magic balance of repair $ / month = car payment $ / month which pro...

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Freedom I miss lots of possibilities because I let myself worry about things that are not up to me. And so much of what is here now gets past me because I am not present, but in some mythical memory or some hypothetical future.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Concentration It does something to me when I concentrate, when I focus. I wish I could experience it more often. Peace. Joy. Concentration.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Your True Home Two different directions? I'm living like twenty . My mind goes lots of places at once when I'm not focused. And even when I am "focused,," sometimes. I get the idea, the connection and metaphor. But like I said before, sit down and breath has, up to now, been difficult for me. I'm hoping to break that streak.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Your True Home This helps. In my tries at classical meditation, I believe I have had brief periods of stillness. Keeping this in mind may help me shake the small interruptive thoughts in the back of my brain that tell me I cannot do it and why bother trying? Often, this is my largest hurdle: the nagging doubt that I can meditate successfully at all. There's that active tense again . . . 'that I can exist in a meditative state' would be better, if less comely said. So, I've done it before, I can do it again, eh? I can live with that.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Your True Home I've had trouble with meditation up to now. Bringing my mind to a quiet state has been difficult, unfulfilled, in my previous attempts. Perhaps because that last sentence was active? Bringing, rather than, say, following or allowing or watching. I know I've entered flow states during tasks where I could let my mind relax, but the traditional sitting cross-legged and breathing image of meditation had been unsuccessful for me.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh (ed. by Melvin McLeod), Your True Home Replace true home with inner citadel and this is a fully Stoic quote.

Today's Meditation(s): The Pocket Thich Nhat Hanh  (ed. by Melvin McLeod), A Life of Miracles Awareness, mindfulness. I often don't notice things I wish I did. And then I notice not noticing and notice again for a while. But it hasn't yet stuck.

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXXIV.2 (Graver) Just a bit of 2000 year old practical advice that works for me. I've always found that having to explain what I read (or what I think about what I read), in writing or conversation, is a thousand times better for my comprehension than mere ingesting of the material.

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXXIV.1 (Graver) Such a great turn of phrase by Seneca via Graver.  And a reminder that I need to keep up with my dailies here. And that I need to think more deeply about the content therein.

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXXIII.27 (Graver) Thats why I've never been a fan of drinking. Have a drunk too much? Sure. Many times. But the most recent was about seven or eight years ago (and none in decades before that). I hate hangovers. So I don't get them by not doing the thing that causes them. Revolutionary. I like a good dark beer and some mixed drinks, but almost never more than two. Guess Zeno would have trusted me....

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXXII.5 (Graver) It's all internal. All resistance. All understanding. All forgiving. All learning. Everything.

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXXII.4 (Graver) No matter where you go, there you are. ~ Buckaroo Bonzai If I'm not at peace in my daily life, what makes me think I will find peace in some far away place? A place that it is costing me a small fortune in airfare, hotel/AirBNB, rental car, dining out, entertainment, PTO at work.... If I'm unsettled by every thought, that's not gonna change in Tahiti. I need to work on myself, work on my situation, accept fate where I should, change things when appropriate, and focus on virtue. If I'm a good man, I'm good. The rest I can deal with as I may. (Oh yeah! Jetlag, too!)

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXXII.3 (Graver) Mere existence is not enough. Dissolution is too much. If I'm going to not 'have anything to do,' it's all too likely my mind will wander to my troubles and will fret over things unworthy of my worry. But, if I have something to feed my mind, something to make me think and wonder, then I have both a solution to this dissipation and a tool to make myself better. Ebooks are a godsend. I can read my philosophy anywhere I have my phone or an internet connection. Yes, I like and have all the same books in physical form, but I don't carry my physical library with me. It's too heavy.

Today's Meditation(s): The Creative Act , The Abundant Mindset (Rubin) If this were talking about things instead of inspiration, I'd call it a prosperity gospel and move on. But, since it is in the mental realm, and is (ideally) independent of outside forces, it makes sense If I leave myself open to possibilities, I will notice more and have them as options to do or not do as I will. I'll have options I wouldn't have and hopefully be more successful at whatever I'm doing: music, poetry, art, philosophy, writing, reading, understanding, adapting, caring, overcoming, inventing, playing, watching, giving, leading, following, disobeying, uniting, fighting, surviving, loving.

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXXI.28-29 (Graver) That damn hedonic treadmill. I want and I want and I want.  Then?  Poof!  It's forgotten and I'm on to the next thing. Between that and misunderstanding what is worth wanting, I wonder if I ever make progress. But I do.  I reread about 'what is up to me and what is not up to me.'  I meditate on recognizing indifferents and placing appropriate care on them.  I focus on pursuing virtue and expanding my concern to include all of humanity. So even if I sometimes backside, depositing value where it doesn't deserve to be, I am learning and improving, making my mistakes less frequent and less egregious.

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXXI.25 (Graver) This is something I began with my wife decades ago and have since expanded to almost everybody: the benefit of the doubt. If there two ways to interpret a situation, and one casts blame while the other does not, go with the generous interpretation first unless and until proven otherwise. I know, however, that some people do not believe this way and have been forced to mask in some areas of life. No need to numbly give others a means to hang me, should that thought ever arise in them.

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXXI.20 (Graver) If I sacrifice my good name for right action, if I play the role of the villain or the buffoon or the scoundrel so as to do the right thing. . . . I don't know if I have that strength. I hope so. I dream it so in my imagination. But I don't know what would happen in such a situation. Premeditatio malorum indeed. But reputation is an external, an indifferent. Could I not care? I should not care. But could I?

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXXI.19 (Graver) The reward for right action is having acted rightly. The reward for right action is having acted rightly. The reward for right action is having acted rightly. I knew that. I just love this uncomplicated way of saying it.

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXXI.19 (Graver) Help himself by acting virtuously; not 'helps himself' in a selfish way. And that's the goal: acting virtuously. Being generous. Being loyal. Being just. Being courageous. Being temperate. Being communal. Being the philosophy in active form.

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXXI.1 (Graver) I just love this. My decision to give should not be contingent on reciprocation. If nothing else, I rob the action of its moral worth it has by subverting it to a desire for praise (or thanks or some other currency). For me, charity should be abundant and anonymous. Done in someone's honor? Sure. But not my own. There's no need for that.

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXX.10 (Graver) If I really want to measure myself, to catalogue my merits and failures, deciding where I need work harder, I need to mentally 'lay myself bare' so as to strip away the myriad lies, the story I tell myself about who I am.

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXX.1 (Graver) This reminds me of the gatekeeping I see in many Stoic groups online. Be it FB, Reddit, or what have you, some contemporary Stoics feel that if you don't accept everything the ancient Stoics said, even the nonsensical ideas they have for cosmology and physics, then you aren't a Real Stoic™ . Seneca seems to disagree here. If something doesn't work, we are free to abandon it or modify it as necessary. We should be reluctant to get rid of even part their guidance, however; only giving it up after thorough investigation shows it to be hopelessly incorrect. These are the well-executed thoughts of people much wiser than we are and have been tested through the ages by countless adherents. None should be tossed aside out of hand. But that doesn't mean that we must take all of it as gospel. Just like most people recognize that we shouldn't take all the words in the Bible or the Torah or the Koran or t...

Today's Meditation(s): Letters on Ethics  by Seneca, LXXIX.18 (Graver) Virtue is its own reward. I should never do something for praise or recognition or other ego-gratifying ephemeral indifferents. Do it because it is the right thing to do, not because someone else will like me for it.