Last week was challenging for me. I know I have learnt from the past though because I looked after myself. I had a massage last night, which was great. I continued doing my exercises. I continued to eat as healthy as I could be bothered with. I took some time out during the week and I feel like I am recovering from the upsets. I have had to really search my own behaviour and motives. All Upsets are Opportunities to Know the Truth. Some of the truths I didn’t really want to know!
I love my workplace. I totally enjoy being a teacher and many of my fellow teachers have become very dear friends to me. This week I have learnt who is amongst the people who surround me. I remember other times in my life when I have had this chance to see who’s who in my life. The reliable, perceptive friends who let you blurt out all your anger and hurt and give that valuable feedback and the sheep who go off to find a new person to kiss up to. I kind of knew who they were anyway. There were few surprises and they were mostly pleasant.
Self Sufficiency
I have been reading about the bird flu and terrorism and other possible dangerous consequences of living in cities and thinking it might be time to revisit my old ideas. I don’t want to sit on a hill meditating with the herbal tea but I would like to have some contingency plans for getting away from the insanity of society, should some wastage hit the fan in my world as it is some places all around the planet with seeming regularity. As a teacher I would like to prepare my students to be resilient without scaring them or making them too fearful about thier future.
This article:http://www.theage.com.au/news/opinion/veneer-of-civilisation-is-easily-eroded/2005/09/08/1125772644245.html reminded me of a workshop we had with our year 8’s last year about Medieval times. The man who was teaching them about knights and castles told them that in three days our civilisation would boil down to basically what happened in New Orleans. When I first heard it from him, it rattled me and reading the above article has yet again rang a warning bell. There are so many fearful scenario’s that could play out.
I don’t want to live in fear. I don’t want to expect the worst. I don’t want to ignore signs and be unprepared though. I have people I love that I want to protect. Where would I draw that line though? I love many, many people.
I made it to 21!
Repetitions that is, not years!
Today was smooth. It was an incredibly sunny, windless, spring day. My classes all were productive and enjoyable.
I reached the final level in my Tibetan rite exercises. Yes I have done 21 repetitions of the 5 rites this morning and I feel great. I never thought when I began at three I would make it to 21, well actually, the three was a breeze, I think it was at about 11 when I started to have doubts, but anyway, I did make it. It was a bit of a push each time, including this morning, but I feel a sense of satisfaction at my persistance. I am even pleased that I have made this habit of doing it every morning for the last 10 weeks. Yes, I feel good about this. If you haven’t heard of the Tibetan rites and are interested the website that I found out about them from is:http://www.shapeshift.net/5tibetans/ and also for more information about them, particularly the breathing http://members.ozemail.com.au/~clauspat/spin.htm. I don’t really understand all that is on the second site though to be honest. There are other sources of info on the internet, but I found these to be the quickest and simplest to start with.