Zen

Compound Beauty Part 2 of 2

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In the previous post I wrote about my neighbor and her beautiful garden. She’s always working on it. Her clippers are always in her right hand as she wanders through the garden. She’s a quick draw and will snip a dead shrub or feral branch in the blink of an eye. Her clippers are close at hand and she’s prepared.

Here’s lesson number two: Part of constant tweaking and improving is that you got to be prepared with the right tools. Make it easy to improve and tweak. Structure your day so that you have time to exercise, eat a good breakfast so you don’t snack on junk during the day, buy healthy food so that when you want to snack you have good food close by, set up filters on your email so that you give full attention to the right people.

Equip yourself with the right tools and it’s easier to improve day to day.

Compound Beauty Part 1 of 2

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I have a neighbor with a green thumb. Her garden is wonderful. It’s like the one in the film The Secret Garden, but in California. It’s full of flowers and trees like roses, maples and nasturtiums. With the flowers come humming birds, dragon flies and bumbles bees. It’s a beautiful place to just sit and be. Here’s what I’ve learnt from her style of gardening: Always be improving. Whenever she’s out in the garden she does a little weeding, clips a branch here and there, tames an unwieldy mint patch or waters a thirsty lemon tree. Maintaining her garden isn’t done once a week, it’s an ongoing labor of love. The result is a wonderful living and breathing sacred place.

It’s a good lesson for work and relationships. Always be clipping and making small improvements. Small improvements accumulate like compound interest – it starts to gain it’s own momentum. Next time you are mindlessly checking Facebook, stop and ask yourself a question: Instead of infinitely scrolling to nowhere, where could you be clipping, weeding or watering in your own life?

Square breathing ◻️

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My brother @socratixsw1 introduced me to a incredibly powerful deep breathing practice. It’s a relaxant after stretching or before bed.

Inhale for 5 seconds; hold your breath for 5 seconds; exhale for 5 seconds; when you’ve emptied your lungs, don’t breathe in again for 5 seconds; then inhale for 5 seconds. Repeat for 1 minute or 3 cycles.

5 seconds in, 5 seconds hold, 5 seconds out, 5 seconds no breath. Draw the square in your head – 4 sides of 5 seconds each.

Start out with 3 sets which gets you to 1 minute. The 3 sets will turn into 6 sets pretty effortlessly once you find your stride.

You’ll never believe the three things I’ve discovered

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Now that I have your attention. Take your fingers off the mouse pad or stop scrolling on your phone. Pause, take a deep belly breath and list three things you are grateful for.

I’ll start:

  1. Hot coffee in the morning
  2. Breakfast with the family
  3. A deep breath on a blue bird day

Try it. The list might surprise and delight you.

 

 

 

Where are you standing? On the edge or in the center?

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Staying in the center is safe. It’s stable and you have your footing. Shuffling out to the edge will get your stomach into knots and make you sweat – even if it’s ice cold. That feeling in your stomach is called risk.

It’s a different view of the world out there but you can only see it on the edge…and that knot in your stomach is why most people don’t venture out. I don’t think that feeling ever goes away – but it’s worth it and there’s no going back.

Pets and Patience

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I was chatting to an old grey hair friend the other day and he shared his rule for working with people:

When he meets with new clients, one of his questions is whether or not they have pets. It gives him a good idea about what they are like to work with. His theory is that pet owners are more comfortable with the imperfections of life and mostly roll with it. Animals vomit on that special carpet or scratch that fancy chair. Their hairs get everywhere. Dogs bark at inconvenient times like when the baby is sleeping, and cats don’t come when you call them. Living with animals is a practice of love and patience.

Animals teach us to throw our hands up in the air and say shit happens! We get exasperated and angry but give the dog a cuddle anyway.

Be okay with surrendering control. Life won’t follow your script. Animals are great teachers.