Tai Chi Workshop In Blackrock Community Centre Saturday Morning Long Form 10.30 Short Form and Partner Work 11.30 -1.30

Working on connection in role back and split .

We just finished the 'mini form'. Well done, it is great
to see how much ye have learned in a few short weeks.


A Spiritual Conspiracy
by Author Unknown

On the surface of the Earth exactly now there is war and violence and everything looks horrible. But, simultaneously, something quiet, calm and hidden is happening and certain people are being called by a higher light. A quiet revolution is settling from the inside out. From bottom to top. It is a global operation. A spiritual conspiracy. There are cells from this operation in every nation on the planet.

You will not watch us on TV. Or read about us in newspapers. Or hear our words on radios. We do not seek glory. We do not use uniforms. We arrive in several different shapes and sizes. We have costumes and different colors. Most work anonymously. Silently we work out of the scene. In every culture in the world. In large and small cities, in the mountains and valleys. In the farms, villages, tribes and remote islands.

We might cross paths on the streets. And not realize ... We follow in disguise. We are behind the scenes. And we do not care about who wins the gold of the result, and Yes, that the work gets performed. And once in a while we will cross paths on the streets. We exchange looks of recognition and continue following our path. During the day many are disguised in their normal jobs. But at night behind the scenes, the real work begins.

Some call us army of consciousness. Slowly we are building a new world. With the power of our hearts and minds. We follow with joy and passion. Our orders reach us from the Central Spiritual Intelligence. We're throwing soft bombs of love without anyone noticing; poems, Hugs, songs, photos, movies, fond words, meditations and prayers, dances, social activism, websites, blogs, acts of kindness ...

We express ourselves in a unique and personal way. With our talents and gifts. Being the change we want to see in the world. This is the force that moves our hearts. We know that this is the only way to accomplish the transformation. We know that with the silence and humbleness we have the power of all oceans together. Our work is slow and meticulous. As in the formation of mountains.

Love will be the religion of the 21 century. Without educational prerequisites. Without ordering an exceptional knowledge for your understanding. Because it is born of the intelligence of the heart. Hidden for eternity in the evolutionary pulse of every human being.

Be the change you want to see happen in the world. Nobody else can make this work for you.

We're recruiting. Perhaps you will join us. Or maybe you have already joined. All are welcome. The door is open.

We have reached the last posture of this 'mini form'. I have loved
teaching it and sharing the joy of Tai Chi. Allow this practice to
reveal yourself to you.

                              where enquiry

                              hurries on

                              the hill shapes

                              take their time

                              

                              take your time

                              the rise and swell 

                              of the hills are yours

                              their weight ant implication

                              rest and aspiration

                                     Thomas A.Clark 

 

A Serving of Gratitude May Save the Day

Cultivating an “attitude of gratitude” has been linked to better health, sounder sleep, less anxiety and depression, higher long-term satisfaction with life and kinder behavior toward others, including romantic partners. A new study shows that feeling grateful makes people less likely to turn aggressive when provoked, which helps explain why so many brothers-in-law survive Thanksgiving without serious injury.

But what if you’re not the grateful sort? I sought guidance from the psychologists who have made gratitude a hot research topic. Here’s their advice for getting into the holiday spirit — or at least getting through dinner Thursday:

Start with “gratitude lite.” That’s the term used by Robert A. Emmons, of the University of California, Davis, for the technique used in his pioneering experiments he conducted along with Michael E. McCullough of the University of Miami. They instructed people to keep a journal listing five things for which they felt grateful, like a friend’s generosity, something they’d learned, a sunset they’d enjoyed.

The gratitude journal was brief — just one sentence for each of the five things — and done only once a week, but after two months there were significant effects. Compared with a control group, the people keeping the gratitude journal were more optimistic and felt happier. They reported fewer physical problems and spent more time working out.

Further benefits were observed in a study of polio survivors and other people with neuromuscular problems. The ones who kept a gratitude journal reported feeling happier and more optimistic than those in a control group, and these reports were corroborated by observations from their spouses. These grateful people also fell asleep more quickly at night, slept longer and woke up feeling more refreshed.

“If you want to sleep more soundly, count blessings, not sheep,” Dr. Emmons advises in “Thanks!” his book on gratitude research.

Don’t confuse gratitude with indebtedness. Sure, you may feel obliged to return a favor, but that’s not gratitude, at least not the way psychologists define it. Indebtedness is more of a negative feeling and doesn’t yield the same benefits as gratitude, which inclines you to be nice to anyone, not just a benefactor.

In an experiment at Northeastern University, Monica Bartlett and David DeSteno sabotaged each participant’s computer and arranged for another student to fix it. Afterward, the students who had been helped were likelier to volunteer to help someone else — a complete stranger — with an unrelated task. Gratitude promoted good karma. And if it works with strangers ....

Try it on your family. No matter how dysfunctional your family, gratitude can still work, says Sonja Lyubomirsky of the University of California, Riverside.

“Do one small and unobtrusive thoughtful or generous thing for each member of your family on Thanksgiving,” she advises. “Say thank you for every thoughtful or kind gesture. Express your admiration for someone’s skills or talents — wielding that kitchen knife so masterfully, for example. And truly listen, even when your grandfather is boring you again with the same World War II story.”

Don’t counterattack. If you’re bracing for insults on Thursday, consider a recent experiment at the University of Kentucky. After turning in a piece of writing, some students received praise for it while others got a scathing evaluation: “This is one of the worst essays I’ve ever read!”

Then each student played a computer game against the person who’d done the evaluation. The winner of the game could administer a blast of white noise to the loser. Not surprisingly, the insulted essayists retaliated against their critics by subjecting them to especially loud blasts — much louder than the noise administered by the students who’d gotten positive evaluations.

But there was an exception to this trend among a subgroup of the students: the ones who had been instructed to write essays about things for which they were grateful. After that exercise in counting their blessings, they weren’t bothered by the nasty criticism — or at least they didn’t feel compelled to amp up the noise against their critics.

“Gratitude is more than just feeling good,” says Nathan DeWall, who led the study at Kentucky. “It helps people become less aggressive by enhancing their empathy. “It’s an equal-opportunity emotion. Anyone can experience it and benefit from it, even the most crotchety uncle at the Thanksgiving dinner table.”

Share the feeling. Why does gratitude do so much good? “More than other emotion, gratitude is the emotion of friendship,” Dr. McCullough says. “It is part of a psychological system that causes people to raise their estimates of how much value they hold in the eyes of another person. Gratitude is what happens when someone does something that causes you to realize that you matter more to that person than you thought you did.”

Try a gratitude visit. This exercise, recommended by Martin Seligman of the University of Pennsylvania, begins with writing a 300-word letter to someone who changed your life for the better. Be specific about what the person did and how it affected you. Deliver it in person, preferably without telling the person in advance what the visit is about. When you get there, read the whole thing slowly to your benefactor. “You will be happier and less depressed one month from now,” Dr. Seligman guarantees in his book “Flourish.”

Contemplate a higher power. Religious individuals don’t necessarily act with more gratitude in a specific situation, but thinking about religion can cause people to feel and act more gratefully, as demonstrated in experiments by Jo-Ann Tsang and colleagues at Baylor University. Other research shows that praying can increase gratitude.

Go for deep gratitude. Once you’ve learned to count your blessings, Dr. Emmons says, you can think bigger.

“As a culture, we have lost a deep sense of gratefulness about the freedoms we enjoy, a lack of gratitude toward those who lost their lives in the fight for freedom, a lack of gratitude for all the material advantages we have,” he says. “The focus of Thanksgiving should be a reflection of how our lives have been made so much more comfortable by the sacrifices of those who have come before us.”

And if that seems too daunting, you can least tell yourself —

Hey, it could always be worse. When your relatives force you to look at photos on their phones, be thankful they no longer have access to a slide projector. When your aunt expounds on politics, rejoice inwardly that she does not hold elected office. Instead of focusing on the dry, tasteless turkey on your plate, be grateful the six-hour roasting process killed any toxic bacteria.

Is that too much of a stretch? When all else fails, remember the Monty Python mantra of the Black Plague victim: “I’m not dead.” It’s all a matter of perspective.

by John Tierney

I just had to share this article on Gratitude - so uplifting and inspiring.

Withdraw and Push.

Investigating Crossing Hands with Ray and Liam

                  Breath and attain one-pointedness,

                      Then the harmony of heaven

                    Will come down and dwell in you.

                      You will be radiant with life.

                          You will rest in Tao.

                                    Chuang Tzu

White Crane Spreads Wings

We are working being fully aware during the whole of an application.
Aware in connecting, yielding, and responding. This is interesting
and demands full concentration. When we can keep our attention with
the other person the work is more alive, exciting, and fun.

Start Where You Are

We already have everything we need. There is no need for self-improvement. All these trips that we lay on ourselves--the heavy-duty fearing that we're bad and hoping that we're good, the identities that we so dearly cling to, the rage, the jealousy and the addictions of all kinds--never touch our basic wealth. They are like clouds that temporarily block the sun. But all the time our warmth and brilliance are right here. This is who we really are. We are one blink of an eye away from being fully awake.

Looking at ourselves this way is very different from our usual habit. From this perspective we don't need to change: you can feel as wretched as you like, and you're still a good candidate for enlightenment. You can feel like the world's most hopeless basket case, but that feeling is your wealth, not something to be thrown out or improved upon. There's a richness to all of the smelly stuff that we so dislike and so little desire. The delightful things--what we love so dearly about ourselves, the places in which we feel some sense of pride or inspiration--these also are our wealth.

When we hear about compassion, it naturally brings up working with others, caring for others. The reason we're often not there for others--whether for our child or our mother or someone who is insulting us or someone who frightens us--is that we're not there for ourselves. There are whole parts of ourselves that are so unwanted that whenever they begin to come up we run away.

Because we escape, we keep missing being right here, being right on the dot. We keep missing the moment we're in. Yet if we can experience the moment we're in, we discover that it is unique, precious, and completely fresh. It never happens twice. One can appreciate and celebrate each moment--there's nothing more sacred. There's nothing more vast or absolute. In fact, there's nothing more!

Only to the degree that we've gotten to know our personal pain, only to the degree that we've related with pain at all, will we be fearless enough, brave enough, and enough of a warrior to be willing to feel the pain of others. To that degree we will be able to take on the pain of others because we will have discovered that their pain and our own pain are not different.

-Pema Chodron

Pause for a moment and remember someone or something you love. . . . .

Imagine allowing your heart to fill with this love. . . . .

Now imagine this love spreading out and filling all your organs

Your Liver Your Kidneys Your Bladder Your Lungs . . . . .

Now let it expand and fill your Whole Body, to the tips of your
Fingers and Toes and right up to the top of your Head .

Take Your Time Slow right down and really feel this loving energy.

Now can you imagine this Love expanding beyond your Body and filling
the room.

Let it expand , through the walls, through the building , let it expand
to fill the whole world and beyond.

This Love Is Always Loving You . Always waiting for You to look inside
and Feel its Quiet Loving Presence.

         

         I am too alone in the world, and yet not alone enough

         to make every hour holy.

         I am too small in the world, and yet not tiny enough

         just to stand before you like a thing,

         dark and shrewd.

         I want my will, and I want to be with my will

         as it moves towards deed;

         and in those quiet, somehow hesitating times,

         when something is approaching,

         I want to be with those who are wise

         or else alone.

         I want always to be a mirror that reflects your whole being,

         and never to be too blind or too old

         to hold your heavy, swaying image.

         I want to unfold.

         Nowhere do I want to remain folded,

         because where I am bent and folded, there I am lie.

         And I want my meaning

         true for you. I want to describe myself

         like a painting that I studied

         closely for a long, long time,

         like a word I finally understood,

         like the pitcher of water I use every day ,

         like the face of my mother,

         like a ship

         that carried me

         through the deadliest storm of all.

               - Rainer Maria Rilk

Today is World Kindness Day

Thich Nhat Hanh once said, "Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile and sometimes your smile is the source of your joy." Lets spread some love and kindness with our smiles today.

Investigating High Pat On Horse

>

Hermits in New York

Let's take hermits. People today think being a hermit is a very unhealthy thing to do. Very antisocial, doesn't contribute anything to everybody else - because everybody else is busy contributing like blazes, and a few people have to run off and get out of the way. But I'll tell you what hermits realize. If you go off into a far, far forest and get very quiet, you'll come to understand that you're connected with everything. That every little insect that comes buzzing around you is a messenger, and that little insect is connected with human beings everywhere else. You can hear. You become incredibly sensitive in your ears and you hear far-off sounds. And just by the very nature of isolating yourself and becoming quiet, you become intensely aware of your relationship with everything else that's going on.

So if you really want to find out how related you really are, try a little solitude off somewhere, and let it begin to tell you how everything is interdependant in the form of what the Japanese call 'jijimugi'. 'Ji' means a 'thing event,' so it means 'between thing event and thing event, there is no block.' Every thing in the world, every event, is like a dewdrop on a multidimentional spider's web, and every dewdrop contains the reflection of all the other dewdrops. But you see, the hermit finds this out through his solitide, and so also human beings can aquire a certain solitude, even in the middle of New York City. It's rather easier, as a matter of fact, to find solitude in New York City than it is in Des Moines, Iowa.

But the point is that a human represents a certain kind of development, wherein a maximal sense of his oneness with the whole universe goes hand in hand with the maximum development of his personality as somebody unique and different. Whereas the people who are of course trying to develop their personality directly and taking a Dale Carnegie course on how to win friends and influence people, or how to become successful - all those people come out as if they came from the same cookie cutter. They don't have any personality.

--Alan Watts

Step Forward, Deflect Downwards & Punch from Heartworker on Vimeo.

In T'ai Chi we are reminded to forget self and follow the other,
another way of saying connect.

Connect with your whole self give the task in hand or the person
in front of you full wholehearted attention.

Imagine your energy reaching out to meet the person and surrounding
them with warm interested attention. Let yourself feel your energetic
interest.

We are so blessed to have so many ways that we humans con connect
and communicate, life becomes an amazing adventure when we begin
to see each encounter as the miraculous opportunity that it is.

Totality Not Perfection

The very idea of perfectionism drives people crazy. The perfectionist is bound to be a neurotic, he cannot enjoy life till he is perfect. And perfection as such never happens, it is not in the nature of things. Totality is possible, perfection is not possible.

There is a tremendous difference between perfection and totality. Perfection is a goal somewhere in the future, totality is an experience herenow. Totality is not a goal, it is a style of life. If you can get into any act with your whole heart, you are total. Totality brings wholeness and totality brings health and totality brings sanity.

The perfectionist completely forgets about totality. He has some idea how he should be, and obviously time will be needed to reach that idea. It can't happen now -- tomorrow, day after tomorrow, this life, maybe next life ... so life has to be postponed.

But if you have an idea what you want to be in the future, today you will live very partially because your main concern becomes the future. Your eyes become focused on the future, you lose contact with the real and the present -- and the tomorrow will be born out of the real with which you are not in contact. The tomorrow will come out of today, and today was unlived.

The English word devil is very beautiful. If you read it backwards it becomes lived. That which is lived becomes divine, and that which is not lived becomes devil. Only the lived is transformed into godliness; the unlived turns poisonous. Today you postpone, and whatsoever remains unlived in you will hang around you like a weight. If you had lived it you would have been free of it.

--Osho

Here is what science has to say about why geese fly in V formation.

I found it to be fascinating and inspiring.

As each bird flaps its wings, it creates an uplift for the bird immediately following.

By flying in V formation the whole flock adds at least 71% greater flying range than if each bird flew on its own.

When a goose falls out of formation, it suddenly feels the drag and resistance of trying to go it alone ... and quickly gets back into formation to take advantage of the lifting power of the bird in front.

When the Head Goose gets tired, it rotates back in the wing and another goose flies point.

Geese honk from behind to encourage those up front to keep up their speed.


Finally...and this is important...when a goose gets sick, or is wounded by gunshots, and falls out of formation, two other geese fall out with that goose and follow it down to lend help and protection. They stay with the fallen goose until it is able to fly, or until it dies; only then do they launch out on their own, or with another formation to catch up with their group.

Wouldn't it be great if we could learn to have the sense of a goose, and stand by each other like that.

Tai Chi Workshop In Blackrock Community Centre Saturday Morning Long Form 10.30 Short Form and Partner Work 11.30 -1

Untitled from ann on Vimeo.

Love and forgiveness go together. In order to love ourselves and others we need to forgive ourselves and others for hurts real and imaginary. The course in miracles tells us all hurts are imaginary and whether or not you agree with this or not, the fact remains, that you suffer when you feel hurt.

Exercise Dissolving Resentment.

There is an Emmet Fox exercise for dissolving resentment that I have found to be really powerful in freeing up old hurts and allowing me to feel more loving and energetic.

Sit quietly, and close your eyes, allow your mind and body to relax.

Then imagine yourself sitting in a darkened theater, and in front of you is a darkened stage. On that stage place the person you resent the most. It could be someone in the past or present , living or dead.

When you see (or feel) this person clearly , visualise goods thing happening to this person - things that would be meaningful to him. See him smiling and happy. Hold this image for a few minutes and then let it fade away.

Next step, as this person leaves the stage, put yourself up there. See good things happening to you. See yourself smiling and happy.

Be aware that the abundance of the universe is available to all of us.

Practice this exercise daily for a few weeks and I guarantee you will feel a big change in your energy , and wonderful increase in your happiness.