Conscious living Practice 19 - Exercise Caution

The other day my friend told me about an incident she witnessed where a young girl was crossing the road wearing headphones in her ears and unable to hear sounds of vehicles, accidentally bumped into a cyclist, hurting herself. Now, clearly if she had exercised some caution, the incident could have been avoided. Just like her, if we were to scrutinize our own lives, we would realize that we too sometimes miss exercising caution, where being cautious can be of help. 

Today onward I invite you to start building awareness to being cautious. This will definitely involve you to be mindful and take necessary steps to live a courageous but cautious life. 

Some examples of exercising caution : 

- Be mindful while walking on the road of vehicles around. Walk on pavement meant for pedestrians.

- Be careful while driving. Drive on the lane meant for driving and never overtake from the wrong side.

- Wear helmet while riding on a bike. Your head is the most precious part of your body. Protect it.  

- Do regular medical check ups. If you haven't done one in a long time, then schedule one now. 
- When the weather is cold and wind chilly, cover your ears and keep yourself warm.

These are just a few examples, I am sure you can think of many more where you can exercise caution. 

#consciousliving #practice19 #exercisecaution 

Conscious living Practice 18 - Minimize Procrastination

We all have that one task that we know we have to do, but keep putting off. Work accumulates over time and begins to hang over our head like the sword of Damocles. There is a very popular Doha of poet Kabirdas which most of us must have read in school. It reads -  kaal kare so aaj kar, aaj kare so ab, pal mein pralaya hoyegi bahuri karoge kab. It means : 

"What you have to do tomorrow, do today. And what you have to do today, do now. If the moment is lost, then how will you do the work". Basically, do whatever needs to be done now.

A very wise advice and something that can simplify our lives if we were to adopt it. 

I invite you to become a little more conscious of the tendency to procrastinate and to try to minimize it by trying to accomplish those tasks that you have been putting off🙂 

#consciousliving #practice18 #minimizeprocrastinstion 

Conscious living Practice 17 - Solution oriented approach

I felt this was the most relevant follow up practice to, Acceptance. When situations are difficult, it doesn't serve us to deny reality. Once we have accepted reality for what it is, we can have a 'solution oriented approach' and look at what we can do, to improve our situation. 

Problems are a part of existence, so instead of focusing on the problem and lamenting over it, let us train ourselves to focus on the solutions. 

The following image of what's in our control and what's not, is a very useful reminder that we can use in our life:

Join me, from this day on, to first accept anything that life throws at you. Time taken to accept a situation will depend  on the magnitude of the situation. Be gentle and patient with yourself. Once you have taken that first step, become solution oriented. 

#consciousliving #practice17 #solutionorientedapproach

Conscious living Practice 16 - Acceptance

I came across this really beautiful bunch of phrases on 'Acceptance'. It read:

When we don't accept an undesired event, it becomes anger;
When we accept it, it becomes tolerance.
When we don't accept uncertainty, it becomes fear;
When we accept it, it becomes adventure.
When we don't accept others bad behavior, it becomes hatred;
When we accept it, it becomes forgiveness.
When we don't accept others success, it becomes jealousy;
When we accept it, it becomes inspiration.

While most of you reading this, will be touched by it, and nod your heads in agreement, you will also agree with me, when I say that as much as it's beautiful and true, it's equally difficult and challenging to apply these concepts into our lives. 

When we are "non accepting" of our reality, we are resisting 'what is'. We have certain ideas about how things should be, or in other words, expectations. And when our expectations are not met, we get upset. 

Its important to understand that the expectations are nothing but ideas created by none other than ourselves. So if we can let go of the expectations / ideas of how things should be, and embrace what is, then our disappointment will not only be less, but can be transformed into something positive, as in the phrases we just read. 

I invite you to join me in becoming mindful of whenever you find yourself resisting reality. You can use the practice of 'accepting emotions as is' (conscious living practice 9) to deal with an unpleasant emotion. Become aware of the gap between expectations and reality and see if you can minimize that by altering your expectations or better still letting go of them. 

As you open up more and more to whatever situations present in front of you, the more easily life flows through you. 

#consciousliving #practices #Acceptance

Conscious living Practice 15 - Be Enthusiastic

I have mentioned in an earlier post as well that most of us live our lives like we are here forever. It's important to remind ourselves from time to time that every moment is going to pass and become a memory and it is up to us how
we wish to experience each ephemeral moment. 

Each moment is fresh and unique and offers us a choice of receiving it as we would like. Begin consciously shaping your experience with involvement and enthusiasm. 

Just to give an example, when I have too many utensils to wash ( when my maid is on leave ), I like to first switch into a 'gratitude mindset' and thank the universe for the abundance of food and utensils in my life and a chance to serve my family, I then like to play some music in the background if that's possible, and clean the vessels in a mindful and enthusiastic way. This transforms my entire experience. Boring chores such as drying clothes, folding clothes etc when done mindfully can be transformed into an enjoyable experience. And what to say of truly enjoyable experiences, such as dancing or singing? These can be made truly divine. 

Today onward, I invite you to start adding a bit of enthusiasm into each of your life experiences, and notice how that makes you feel, and notice how that transforms your experience. 

#consciousliving #practice 15 # be enthusiastic

Conscious living Practice 14 - Random Acts of Kindness

I read this beautiful quote by Ram Dass, a Buddhist teacher and author, it said: 

 "I invite you, when you are caught in your stuff and your heart is closed, to find someone else who is suffering - to be there with them for a moment. What I find when my heart is closed is that purity of their heart pulls me out of myself very quickly. For those of you who have gotten caught in individualism and separation - the act of serving another human being is a doorway back into your connection to the universe. Their real need pulls you out of yourself." 

I found that quote really beautiful. When we give our kind attention to others, we feel connected to them and the universe at large. Its like a little break from our own egoic selves. 

Just like the practice of loving kindness that we spoke about in post 10 ( conscious living practice 10 ), performing random acts of kindness has the capacity to open our hearts and connect with people around us. 

Like most other practices, this too requires us to practice it, consciously. 

Most days we are so absorbed in ourselves that we don't even recognize the opportunities that present themselves before us where we can show kindness. 

I invite you to actively start looking out for opportunities to show kindness - to your loved ones, family, friends, strangers, to animals, to your environment. And notice how that makes you feel. And how that alters your perception of the universe. 

#consciouslivingpractice14 #randomactsofkindness

Conscious living Practice 13 - Self Assertiveness

Self Assertiveness is an offshoot of Self love. The more we love ourselves, the more we value our thoughts, emotions and needs. And the more likely we are to be assertive of them. 

So if you haven't been practicing enough self love, then I suggest you go back to post 5 of this blog on "Self love" and strengthen that practice. 

I started the practice of Self love with a journal where I would write down all the things I loved about myself on a daily basis. I also did the mirror image exercise of looking into my own eyes in the mirror and telling myself, I love you. All this helped me to love and respect myself more and more. One day, someone said something that I felt wasn't right, and I immediately put forth my point of view in a polite but firm way. This really surprised me and I kept thinking, what just happened?. May be a few years back I would not have spoken out my feelings so eloquently. At that moment I knew it was the self love practice that did it. It made me more self assertive. 

Nathaniel Branden in his book, The 6 Pillars of Self esteem defines Self Assertiveness as "honoring ones wants, needs, and values and seeking appropriate forms of their expression in reality". 

He also goes on to add, that "Self Assertion does not mean belligerence or inappropriate aggression. It simply means the willingness to stand up for oneself, to be who you are openly, and to treat yourself with respect in all human encounters. It means the refusal to fake your person to be liked." I could not have defined self assertiveness as eloquently as that. 

Now that we all know what self assertiveness is, let's start becoming conscious of how many times we say, yes, when we want to say No. Let's begin to first recognize it's occurrence. Next, let's try to examine why this happens - are we trying to please someone? Is there some sort of fear/ insecurity? This sort of investigation will reveal to us more about our own personality. If we realize that this is happening more often than we would like, then we can remind ourselves the following - 

- Our life does not belong to others and we are not here to live up to other people's expectations.
- Our life is important and our time is limited. Saying yes to something means saying no to something else. Can we afford to make that compromise? 
- Let's be good to ourselves first, before being good to someone else.

Once we start standing up and speaking for our self, we will develop the confidence to do so more often and soon it will become second nature. The more we practice self assertiveness, the more authentic and real we

become. 

#consciouslivingpractices #practice13 #self assertiveness