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Hmm. This viewpoint is in direct opposition to my daily life, where I look out my window and hope none of that is going on around here in my town.
On the pro side, what I do develop from tv watching are eye-moving skills, bladder-holding skills, and the ability to develop a big butt.
Compare this with the skill set I’d gain if I stuck to my daily practice of yoga, tai chi, and qigong, along with a good walk or ski. I’d develop a fit and healthy body, a much calmer and more patient mind, as well as the coordination to move myself around without falling over my feet all the time.
Oh, the daily practice brings me more than that too. Over time, let’s say forty years, I’ll be refined by the activities I do so that the tai chi is me and I am the tai chi. Ever watch someone who’s done something for a very long time? Such as a woodcarver who easily slides blade into wood, quickly and effortlessly creating a marvelous carving? Then when you try it yourself, the blade jumps out, slices your thumb, and leaves you cursing and bleeding all over? Keep at it for forty years.
The hardest step can be what to choose for a daily practice? An easy way to go about it is to include activities that help your body, mind, and soul. Say you have a hobby of stamp collecting. It engages your mind and your soul…because you’re passionate about learning more about stamps, right? And you often get into that meditative space when working with them. That’s two, but the third, your body, isn’t getting what it needs to be healthy and balanced along with the other two. So take your body out for some physical activities to get the blood flowing and the muscles moving.
You’ll find that when body, mind, and soul are all healthy, happy, and achieving positive gains, you are going to be in a much better place as well. A place where you can give depression a heave ho, saying, I’ve got better things to do today. Ta ta.
Not to say that depression can be that easy to get rid of. It’s a major problem in our society. There are too many of us out there searching for purpose, for a reason to reach old age, for a sudden blast of grace that takes us out of our present situation and puts us in a fairy tale. Sometimes it feels like everyone is against us, as well as everything from the car breaking down yet again to the sun taking off to some tropical place for the winter.
I say, Pssshaw. Don’t let it crush and smother you. Instead, create your own life and your own purpose. If you don’t see what you want out there, for example, the job you want, or the focus you want, well, go get it. Develop it. Do it.
And I believe no one else should do it for you. It takes away your own ability to empower and charge your life with energy and purpose.
Just don’t let the big picture of everything you want to accomplish overwhelm you. That’s what a daily practice is for. If you take a look at superheroes, they spend much of their time saving the world. Even so, by necessity, some days they’re at home darning the holes in the cape and doing some deep knee bends. It doesn’t mean they’re failing at being superheroes because they’re not doing something spectacular that day. It’s just all part of the daily practice.
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Photo Credit: Sonja Mildner
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