Monday, January 7, 2013

Unit 8 - My two Favorites

 
I believe that all of the exercises that we have done can be beneficial, however some were much more challenging to accomplish.  The first exercise that I truly enjoyed but also thought was very beneficial was the loving-kindness exercise.  This exercise is to send out loving kindness to the world and also to give it to myself.  Over the past two years I have gone through quite a bit personally.  So this exercise helped me to practice, forgiveness.  It helped me to let go of some anger and hurt feelings.  It reminded me to send everyone, even the folks that I do not care for loving-kindness.  This is one of the most valuable exercises because as long as I send out loving-kindness continually, I will have peace of mind.  The second exercise that I found truly useful was meditation.  Meditation can serve so many purposes, from keeping my stress level down, sending out good energy into the world, bringing myself into focus, calming myself when I am alarmed, clearing my mind, or bringing my heart rate down.   As this year gets into full swing I intend on dedicating a few minutes each day to meditation, including the loving-kindness exercise to keep me grounded and focused.  As the year progresses, I would like to graduate to more advanced mental fitness exercises, but I will do first things first.  Once I feel that these come natural, I will move on to something else.

2 comments:

  1. I also found the Loving-Kindness exercise to be beneficial as well as the Taste of Human Flourishing. I think that these two are very powerful and were two of the easiest to achieve. Good luck to you on your meditation journey and keep practicing.

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  2. Hi Sheri, good post! I had a hard time concentrating through some of our practice sessions, but I feel like the loving-kindness stood out to me like it did for you. It kind of makes it easier to let something go (like a grudge) if we visualize it in our minds. It is like if we see it actually leaving, even if only mentally, then it really is gone. I also feel that meditation is a good relaxation technique. I have not found much time to practice either of these things, but someday I will!

    Kamala

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