The Mindful Academic Writer

Happy Morning through Presence

11/24/2014

0 Comments

My dog Biscuit, a golden doodle, has a habit of padding into my office while I'm meditating and giving me a good snarfle in the face as her first act of the day.

This is a little disruptive to the meditation I have going, but, as I decided this morning to snarfle her back, rather than ignore her as I sometimes do, I thought, "well, this too is a kind of meditation."

By immersing ourselves and really paying attention to almost any act, we can activate a sense of focus, the kind of "be here now" presence that brings awareness to our lives. And being present to something as simple and uncomplicatedly joyful as hugging a pet (or a child) or watching a bird run around the yard is a way of being present to the happiness in life.

For me this means really paying attention, to the noises my dog makes, to her doggy smell, to the texture of her fur, as well as to the feelings that arise in me when I give her a hug. Not a bad meditation for a Monday morning.

0 Comments

Taking time when there is no time

11/19/2014

0 Comments

Call it pre-Thanksgiving ruminating, but this week I've been thinking a lot about time outs--taking five for breathing, as I wrote about in the last post, and taking time to reflect.

Running up to Thanksgiving break, everything can feel like it's going a mile a minute and we lose track of, if not our priorities, then then at least the small things that support us and make accomplishing those priorities possible.

Over the past two weeks, I have had occasion to talk with friends who mentioned that they noticed I hadn't been posting in the blog very much of late. I had to confess (and I do so again now) that this semester is one in which I never really found my groove, never figured out a good schedule for myself.

As a result, lots of the things I do to support myself have gone by the wayside this term. This doesn't mean that I haven't done my writing, teaching, and service, but it does mean that I haven't always done the little things that make me feel sane as I do my job from day to day.

On Monday of this week, I took one to two minutes and made a list--what are the practices that make me feel at my best when done regularly. My list looks something like this:
Morning meditation
Blog
Daily writing
Deep breathing before teaching/meetings
Daily excercise
Quality time with B&B (husband and dog)
Gratitude journal before bed

Looking at such a list, I find myself anxious that this might seem self-indulgent--What does she think this is, a spa! This is real life!

And I know that many of these habits do not fall under the category of "the productive." However, what I've been reminding myself lately is that my best, most productive work self is actually not sustainable without at least some of these habits in place.

So, as we find ourselves in the busiest of times, perhaps it is nonetheless worth carving out the time for the "non-productive" but ultimately nourishing practices that sustain us.

0 Comments

Attending to breath

11/17/2014

0 Comments

At a dinner with friends this weekend, the topic of youthful vices came up, smoking, specifically. One of my friends offered an explanation of why smoking, despite the nicotine that gets one's heart racing, was a soothing practice for smokers. "It's because of the breathing," she explained. Smoking cigarettes makes the smoker focus on inhaling and exhaling and also slows down the breath.

As a former smoker, this made a lot of sense to me. It also reminded me of one of my original worries when I quit smoking. I smoked in college and in my first year of my Ph.D. When writing papers for my classes or my seminars, going out to smoke was my break and my reward for getting work done. When I quit, I worried that I wouldn't get to have breaks any more.

Because smoking invites a focus on the breath, it does offer a meditative aspect. A lesson might be drawn from the less healthy practice of smoking for those of us who have trouble concentrating on breath.

Let's say we take a 3 minute breathing break in the middle of the day. We could lay down on the floor, place a hand on our low belly, and draw attention to inhaling so that the hand rises, and exhaling so that the hand falls, trying to do so as slowly as possible.

Of course, this is where yogic breathing has the advantage over smoking--after such a practice, we are physically as well as mentally renewed and restored.

Sometimes lessons can come from strange places. I would never recommend that yogis or academics take up smoking, but we can learn from them nonetheless. Often, during a busy day, i think, "but there's just no time to take a little break!" But when I was a smoker, I did in fact find this time. If it's possible to find break time for something so harmful, isn't it possible to carve out 3-5 minutes for something much healthier?

0 Comments