I meant to write this blog entry about meditation a few months ago but life got in the way. As it always does. So here I am now. 

I have been doing yoga with great delight for the last couple of years; 11 months of the year. August is the month off. 

This summer, at the tail end of July, before we bid farewell to each other with a Namaste, and curtsied in yogi respect, my teacher asked me to think about one thing I would like to add or change in my life during the month away from my practice. And try and incorporate it in my daily schedule for 10 minutes a day.

More than anything I need to be less nervous, more calm. Have a more zen-like approach to life. 

My mind is erratic, I find myself screaming at people at work. Of course, the unprofessionalism encountered at work as well as my work conditions would bring even the most placid person to the edge of the cliff! But still, we could all gain from finding some serenity and peace of mind and heart. And I am the first in line.

I have dabbed into meditation a few times in the last few months. I can’t necessarily get the heartbeats to slow down but I love sitting on my meditation cushion for 10 minutes (or less if time is pressing), shutting my eyes, and staying still for just those blissful moments when nothing is pressing, nothing needs to be dealt with, sorted, or managed, no problem is urgent enough to require immediate tackling.

There is a misconception that during meditation, one is meant to manage to NOT think. Impossible. Thoughts cannot be stopped. You’re just supposed to watch them pass by, without judgement. The trick (if ever there was a trick) I use is to visualise your third eye, feel the movement of the breath in your abdomen going up and down like an elevator, and when extra help is needed, I slowly repeat a mantra – a word with no meaning, a word which doesn’t invoke thought - to myself. By using a mantra (the most obvious mantra for meditation is the sound ‘om’), you can focus your attention on the sound (instead of the word itself) without fueling your thought process. Not easy. But I’m hoping I will keep at it, because as Malcom Gladwell writes in ‘The Outliers’, the secret to success in any field lies in the hundreds of hours practicing a specific task. So if I keep at meditation, will I become the zen master I aspire to be?? Not sure it works this way, but hope dies last! 

For the rest of summer 2013, there was work and there was rest, puerile fun with the nieces, a nephew bidding for space in an environment filled with girl energy, and then, there were books. Lots of books. And lucky me, I thoroughly enjoyed all of my picks. Here they are:

Enjoy the weekend ahead!