Feeling a bit better....

Just popping by to say hello. I am beginning to feel a bit better so hopefully will be around again soon.

I started incorporating this chant daily into my life a couple of months ago after my friend Veronique suggested it to our group on Freeing Your Wings. I let is slip a bit during December when I was struggling with a bit of depression again but part of my new year plan is to get back to it. I use this clip from Youtube to help myself focus and for me at the moment, it is the right length of time and leads me into a quiet meditation at the end. I am combining this with my daily meditation from Mark Nepo's book, "The Book of Awakenings" which I hope will help me start my days in a much more uplifted and calmer way.

The other thing I am doing is walking every day...for pleasure...so shopping and errands will not count (I have let myself do that in the past). I have managed it so far even in this wind and rain. With the seafront at the bottom of my road, I really should be able to commit to this properly so I intend to give it my best shot. I was shocked earlier today at how easily I had gone "downhill" in my mood after yesterday which shook me into walking this afternoon and, as I should have learned by now, it helped.

I hope you have some intentions set for the new year that will bring you peace and tranquility too. Please do let me know if you have by adding a comment here.

Love Lynda xx

Time for some positive thinking....

.....because creativity keeps me positive! :-)

Emotions....why do they get the better of us?

Goodness, apart from my wonderful walk by the sea yesterday I felt pretty low. Taking down the Christmas tree was not a good start to the day, it always makes me sad but the whole day felt really hard. I was irritable too which is not like me. I am one of those people who get sad, upset, anxious and depressed but not often cross. Still I felt it yesterday and did not really know why. I don't like feeling like that. That has been replaced today by feeling pretty low and anxious...a more normal state of mind for me. I wish I didn't. Still I found this picture which reminded me that even when we feel sad there is beauty all around us that we just need to remember. I rather liked this idea of being covered with beautiful flowers even when your insides feel bad. I am going to try and imagine myself covered in flowers just like this today and hope that gradually the sad feelings are overcome by the beauty and tranquility of the flowers.

Blowing up a storm!

I braved the seafront again today after feeling it was a bit too dangerous the last few days with the violent storms we are having. When we left the flat yesterday we noticed the sea looked half as high again as it usually does. It was really odd. We can see the sea as we leave our building and I suppose you get used to the way the horizon looks each day. At the moment it is so much higher. When I got to the esplanade this morning, I kept back along the path by the beach huts which is some way back from the sea itself but the waves were still crashing over the beach wall in several places. Half the beach is now on the prom. It looked and sounded magnificent, one of those moments of "awe and wonder" certainly. It still surprised me though to see some foolish people, even with small children, up close to the sea wall and running back as the waves crashed over. Apart from the very real possibility of being swept over, the waves up hurling up large stones as well.

Still there were also lots of people, keeping well back, just enjoying what is undoubtedly a spectacle of nature. I have lived here for 43 years and I have never seen the sea like this before. Anyway, after a while the heavens opened up again and I got drenched but actually it doesn't bother me. I just loved the whole outing, it was really glorious.

Mark Nepo.....Love this wisdom!

Be still and listen....

I am so absorbed in two new books I have discovered by the wonderful Mark Nepo. I will be adding more about him but for today I wanted to share the beginnings of one of those books "Ten Thousand Ways to Listen" through which I am striving to reconnect with my inner self at the moment .... so lots about finding quiet and time for reflection, being still .... and listening to my inner self. I found this lovely picture which seems to complement this really beautifully and wanted to share it with you all. Hoping you too are finding some inner peace now after the holidays.

New beginnings....old ways

Time to start afresh with my Dancing Daisies blog now the new year has started. I hope so much that those of you who have come here from Freeing Your Wings will enjoy being part of this new community. I called this post "New beginnings .... old ways" because I hope that Dancing Daisies will become very much like FYW in its content and in its community. I feel sure that those of us who are staying together, despite the changes, will continue to pay attention to our world and to our spiritual journeys, to be astonished by the confirmations that we receive and to tell each other about it all. I hope so, so much.