Mindfulness

[PartTimeBrewer]

              I am starting a new thread here mainly for purposes of my own catharsis. It is my intention, at least at this point, to make regular contributions. Of course, if anyone else has anything to add, they are more than welcome. If you have any input, please contribute.

              Over a year ago I decided to deal head-on with my self-diagnosed adult attention disorder, (ADD). The inability to stay focused was becoming too stressful. I found myself sitting around watching the clock tick, yet I couldn’t keep “on task” with any project I started. Nothing was getting done and just starting something was becoming depressing.

              The smart thing to do was probably to get professional help, so instead I decided to try to heal myself, at least as a first try. Cognitive therapy and pharmaceuticals (UGH) might be the approved way to go but I decided to try meditation first.

              18 months and countless self-help books later, I still can’t bring myself to a regular, formal meditation program. But, along the way, I discovered informal mindfulness. Yes, I know it is the “Fad” right now. It is hard to navigate modern social trends without “tripping over” somebody extolling the benefits of mindfulness.

              Let me add my voice to the chorus.

[Aggie]

Do twins ever realise that one of them is unplanned?
What if my dog only brings back my ball because he thinks I like throwing it
If poison expires, is it more poisonous or is it no longer poisonous?
Which letter is silent in the word "Scent," the S or the C?
Why is the letter W, in English, called double U? Shouldn't it be called double V?
Maybe oxygen is slowly killing you and it just takes 75-100 years to fully work.
Every time you clean something, you just make something else dirty.
The word "swims" upside-down is still "swims".
100 years ago everyone owned a horse and only the rich had cars. Today everyone has cars and only the rich own horses.
Your future self is watching you right now through memories.
The doctors that told Stephen Hawking he had two years to live in 1953 are probably dead. (He out lived them)
If you replace "W" with "T" in "What, Where and When", you get the answer to each of them.
Many animals probably need glasses, but nobody knows it.
If you rip a hole in a net, there are actually fewer holes in it than there were before.
If 2/2/22 falls on a Tuesday, we'll just call it "2's Day". (It does fall on a Tuesday!)

[PartTimeBrewer]

Your dog actually brings the ball back? For my dog it's all about keep-away.

[PartTimeBrewer]

"Zen does not confuse spirituality with thinking about God while peeling potatoes. Zen is just peeling potatoes."  ~  Alan Watts

[PartTimeBrewer]

"If we are facing in the right direction, all we have to do is keep on walking."  ~  Zen proverb

[PartTimeBrewer]

Of course the trick is to know whether I am facing in the right direction to begin with. I can't always know for sure, but I do realize that I have to at least stop and look instead of trudging on in autopilot.

[PartTimeBrewer]

"The more precise my vision of an outcome, the more likely I am to be disappointed."  ~  Patricia Ryan Madson

[PartTimeBrewer]

Good to keep in mind when making our holiday plans. It's not realistic to manipulate the situation so as to create the perfect celebration, particularly if we are trying to recreate, or even worse outdo some previous year's event.

[PartTimeBrewer]

"Things are as they are. Looking out into the universe at night, we make no comparisons between right and wrong stars, nor between well or badly arranged constellations."  ~  Alan Watts

[PartTimeBrewer]

Well, actually I have wondered at times about how the constellations got drawn, but I do get the point. The stars and their arrangements are just there, nothing correct or incorrect about them. Too often we miss the obvious by trying to build in meaning where there is none. That's what evolution has prepped us for; finding patterns and assigning meaning (like right or wrong) where there is none. Actually, that is probably why the drawings of the constellations sometimes seem so arbitrary.

[Aggie]

HELL EXPLAINED
>
BY A CHEMISTRY STUDENT
The following is an actual question given on a University of Arizona chemistry mid term , and an actual answer turned in by a student.
The answer by one student was so 'profound' that the professor shared it with colleagues, via the Internet, which is, of course, why we now have the pleasure of enjoying it as well.
Bonus Question: Is Hell exothermic (gives off heat) or endothermic (absorbs heat)?
Most of the students wrote proofs of their beliefs
using Boyle's Law (gas cools when it expands and heats when it is compressed) or some variant.
One student, however, wrote the following:
First, we need to know how the mass of Hell is changing in time. So we need to know the rate at which souls are moving into Hell and the rate at which they are leaving, which is unlikely. I think that we can safely assume that once a soul gets to Hell, it will not leave. Therefore, no souls are leaving. As for how many souls are entering Hell, let's look at the different religions that exist in the world today.
Most of these religions state that if you are not a member of their religion, you will go to Hell. Since there is more than one of these religions and since people do not belong to more than one religion, we can project that all souls go to Hell. With birth and death rates as they are, we can expect the number of souls in Hell to increase exponentially. Now, we look at the rate of change of the volume in Hell because Boyle's Law states that in order for the temperature and pressure in Hell to stay the same, the volume of Hell has to expand proportionately as souls are added.
This gives two possibilities:
1. If Hell is expanding at a slower rate than the rate at which souls enter Hell, then the temperature and pressure in Hell will increase until all Hell breaks loose.
2. If Hell is expanding at a rate faster than the increase of souls in Hell, then the temperature and pressure will drop until Hell freezes over.
So which is it?
If we accept the postulate given to me by Teresa during my Freshman year that, 'It will be a cold day in Hell before I sleep with you,' and take into account the fact that I slept with her last night, then number two must be true, and thus I am sure that Hell is exothermic and has already frozen over.
The corollary of this theory is that since Hell has frozen over, it follows that it is not accepting any more souls and is therefore, extinct.........leaving only Heaven, thereby proving the existence of a divine being which explains why, last night, Teresa kept shouting 'Oh my God.'
THIS STUDENT RECEIVED AN A+.

[PartTimeBrewer]

As a chemistry major, I can appreciate the actual science of this.

[PartTimeBrewer]

"Mindfulness is not concerned with getting us to point X when we're at point Y. It's about accepting that we're at point Y and working with that."  ~  #mindfulness