Today I received another email about someone I know having an experience of vertigo. In all my teaching days, I think once, maybe twice, someone has told me they had vertigo. Now in three weeks I know of more than a dozen. All the usual thoughts come to mind, feeling out of balance, overwhelmed, confused and disoriented. We are not being able to make heads or tails of what's happening around us. Things feel upside down.
I think it's also a virus going around. However, illness comes through the path of least resistance, and that we're having a mini-swell of ear problems, is interesting. I think we can't believe our ears!
I had it too. It started between the first and second debates when I unintentionally got lured into the intensity that surrounds this election. That week the stock market also plummeted and for a little while there was a group freefall.
No wonder so many felt dizzy. The economy, the election, the stock market, gas prices; we were reeling. I scrabbled around in my inner and outer life trying to find my footing on ground that felt like it was moving.
To find my balance, I meditate. I meditated a lot. I noticed that so many people, whether they had vertigo or not, were a little, or a lot, wobbly.
Louise Hay gives this affirmation for vertigo.
I am deeply centered and peaceful in life. It is safe for me to be alive and joyous.
I took that to heart. I began offering a series of world service meditations here locally. I wanted to help ground some of this raggedy energy. After the meditations, people expressed deep gratitude to have a place to put this psychic restlessness. It felt good to be able to plant it into a form inside the meditation. It didn't matter what party anyone was with or whether they were personally feeling the pinch of the economy; everyone was feeling this.
I began writing these reports because I wanted to bring a note of calm inside the continual change that humanity is experiencing these days. People who are sensitive to energy need to remember that sometimes the feelings they are feeling are amplified by what is "in the air."
Today I drove up to Ojai to visit some friends at Meditation Mount. This is a sacred site where the land is imbued with so much lightforce that it is palpable. As I drove up there, I could feel the magnetic pull of the place. I felt myself subtly aligning and reorganizing. Where many people have meditated, there is an accumulated consciousness that is organized and cohesive.
I sat with my friend on a bench as the sun set and the whole sky lit up like an alive apricot. In mid-sentence we both just stopped talking. We went into a spontaneous meditation. The red-orange of the light flooded the sky. We both sat there silent and full. I felt myself line up with everything. I lined up with the land, with the sun, with myself, with the planet, and every being on it.
In that moment, I remembered the note that I wrote to myself this morning on my bathroom mirror. It says, "Love is the answer."
Oh yeah.
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2008 by DIANA LANG
Tonight - Tuesday, October 28th at 7:30 - is the last of three World Service Meditations, held at Woodland Hills Community Church in the theater. All are welcome. There is no charge for this event.
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
Diana Lang
from the City of Angels
818/888-7319
www.DianaLang.com
**************
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Tuesday, October 28
Thursday, April 10
4.9.08
Last night I had the privilege of giving a talk at Krotona School of Theosophy up in Ojai. It was a perfect Spring day and before I spoke I was taken on a tour of the grounds, the school, and the many various buildings by the director herself. I felt honored to walk with her and hear some of the stories and history of this esteemed place.
As we walked through many different scenes, rooms and colors, I was taken by the order and the love that was everywhere around me. She explained the origins, the architecture and the esoteric meanings of what I was seeing. She showed me where to get the best view of the mountains. She showed me the rose gardens and many sculptures, paintings and photographs. All of it, taken care of. Every single thing was cared for. I could feel it as I walked through. There was nothing overlooked or not considered. Everything had its place and its function and had been "thought about". The word that came to mind was "care". Conscious caring.
I like to keep my environment like that. Well, except my desk. But for the most part, my home, the space that surrounds me, I care for, like it belongs to me, like it is a part of me, because it is an extension of me. I am in relationship with my environment and I want to take care of it. I shepherd my space the same way I would for a pet or a garden. I feel I have some responsibility to it. The way I know that I've done this is by how it feels. Does it agitate or calm? Just like our appearance, or our voice, we can be agitating or calming. Our very bodies can bring peace to our world or disharmony. Our homes, our environments can bring a sigh of relief or create ambient tension. I am aware of these things like I am aware that a plant needs water. It is something that matters to me because it's under my care and is part of the physical extension of my life. I can help it shine.
Krotona is like that but on a grand scale. While I was at Krotona I was acutely aware of the consciousness of the many people that had contributed to this care of every single little thing. I could recognize it because I do it. You know that old saying, it takes one to know one. This is a spiritual principal, just like like attracts like. As I walked the grounds I found myself taking long, deep breaths. Breathing in the rabbits that were hopping about and the golden apricot rays of light shining long beams through the dust and the pollen as it neared sunset. I could feel the loving intelligence and the guiding hands that had brought this place to such a high vibration.
So when at one point on my tour I came across something different than that, it struck me so strongly that I took a picture of it, the only picture I took that day, because on some level this image of out-of-orderness gave me a sense of relief. Which surprised me. It's very disharmony made me notice the masterful harmony all around me even more. I was able to see the beauty that was all around me by its very contrast. Here I was in one of the most beautiful, thought-fillled places in Southern California, and here also was this spectacle of something out-of-order. It reminded me of the humor in the world, the playfulness of consciousness rather that the relentless seriousness of it as it can sometimes become, and I laughed and laughed, took my photograph, didn't even know why I took it at the time, just had to, and went on with our tour. And now I find myself wanting to share this so very much. Many of you know I haven't written in this format for a while. Isn't it interesting what inspires, which for me it turns out is about beauty and grace and form, which is not so surprising at all I realize now as I finish writing this piece.
Beauty is complex and simple. It is yin and yang, dark and light. For a moment I was given a gift yesterday, a little window where all of this became so very apparent. Harmony is divine, and everything, in its way is divine. Upside-down, right-side up, on-its-side, beauty has an elegance and grace to it that is recognizable. All we have to do is notice it. It's everywhere. It's right where we are sitting right now. Look around you.
Being a musician and particularly a piano player the exact pinpointedness of this particular image gave me the relief and the backdrop I needed to recognize the beauty that I had been literally wading through. It put my perception on its end, quite literally. So practical and irreverent to place a grand piano - a Steinway grand piano - on its side in one of the most sacred places on the earth. It was perfect.
bowing to divine order again
and sending you blessings and blessings,
~Diana
p.s And just so you know, I know everyone at Krotona would want you to know that the piano was set like this for just a short while they reorganized the room it would soon grace again.
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2008 by DIANA LANG
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
www.DianaLang.com
from the City of Angels
LifeWorks@aol.com
818/888-7319
**************
Planning your summer road trip? Check out AOL Travel Guides.
(http://travel.aol.com/travel-guide/united-states?ncid=aoltrv00030000000016)
As we walked through many different scenes, rooms and colors, I was taken by the order and the love that was everywhere around me. She explained the origins, the architecture and the esoteric meanings of what I was seeing. She showed me where to get the best view of the mountains. She showed me the rose gardens and many sculptures, paintings and photographs. All of it, taken care of. Every single thing was cared for. I could feel it as I walked through. There was nothing overlooked or not considered. Everything had its place and its function and had been "thought about". The word that came to mind was "care". Conscious caring.
I like to keep my environment like that. Well, except my desk. But for the most part, my home, the space that surrounds me, I care for, like it belongs to me, like it is a part of me, because it is an extension of me. I am in relationship with my environment and I want to take care of it. I shepherd my space the same way I would for a pet or a garden. I feel I have some responsibility to it. The way I know that I've done this is by how it feels. Does it agitate or calm? Just like our appearance, or our voice, we can be agitating or calming. Our very bodies can bring peace to our world or disharmony. Our homes, our environments can bring a sigh of relief or create ambient tension. I am aware of these things like I am aware that a plant needs water. It is something that matters to me because it's under my care and is part of the physical extension of my life. I can help it shine.
Krotona is like that but on a grand scale. While I was at Krotona I was acutely aware of the consciousness of the many people that had contributed to this care of every single little thing. I could recognize it because I do it. You know that old saying, it takes one to know one. This is a spiritual principal, just like like attracts like. As I walked the grounds I found myself taking long, deep breaths. Breathing in the rabbits that were hopping about and the golden apricot rays of light shining long beams through the dust and the pollen as it neared sunset. I could feel the loving intelligence and the guiding hands that had brought this place to such a high vibration.
So when at one point on my tour I came across something different than that, it struck me so strongly that I took a picture of it, the only picture I took that day, because on some level this image of out-of-orderness gave me a sense of relief. Which surprised me. It's very disharmony made me notice the masterful harmony all around me even more. I was able to see the beauty that was all around me by its very contrast. Here I was in one of the most beautiful, thought-fillled places in Southern California, and here also was this spectacle of something out-of-order. It reminded me of the humor in the world, the playfulness of consciousness rather that the relentless seriousness of it as it can sometimes become, and I laughed and laughed, took my photograph, didn't even know why I took it at the time, just had to, and went on with our tour. And now I find myself wanting to share this so very much. Many of you know I haven't written in this format for a while. Isn't it interesting what inspires, which for me it turns out is about beauty and grace and form, which is not so surprising at all I realize now as I finish writing this piece.
Beauty is complex and simple. It is yin and yang, dark and light. For a moment I was given a gift yesterday, a little window where all of this became so very apparent. Harmony is divine, and everything, in its way is divine. Upside-down, right-side up, on-its-side, beauty has an elegance and grace to it that is recognizable. All we have to do is notice it. It's everywhere. It's right where we are sitting right now. Look around you.
Being a musician and particularly a piano player the exact pinpointedness of this particular image gave me the relief and the backdrop I needed to recognize the beauty that I had been literally wading through. It put my perception on its end, quite literally. So practical and irreverent to place a grand piano - a Steinway grand piano - on its side in one of the most sacred places on the earth. It was perfect.
bowing to divine order again
and sending you blessings and blessings,
~Diana
p.s And just so you know, I know everyone at Krotona would want you to know that the piano was set like this for just a short while they reorganized the room it would soon grace again.
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2008 by DIANA LANG
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
www.DianaLang.com
from the City of Angels
LifeWorks@aol.com
818/888-7319
**************
Planning your summer road trip? Check out AOL Travel Guides.
(http://travel.aol.com/travel-guide/united-states?ncid=aoltrv00030000000016)
Monday, November 12
11.12.07
conscious moments
by Diana Lang
I like to think of life's momentous experiences like beads on a string. Those moments that are important, valuable or rare are like beautiful colored beads that we lovingly thread onto this string of beads. Each bead symbolically represents a moment, an experience, a special person. As life goes on a gorgeous necklace of our lives is created, full of these moments that have meant something to us.
This little metaphor is a way to imagine making our lives more conscious. By recognizing these moments more often we become more fully alive to our experience. It is easy to see how a marriage or a birth of a child would be a bead on our string, but what about today? What about right now?
I like to think of every moment as being valuable. What I bring to it is what I get out of it. My own consciousness can make this moment something or nothing. A conversation can be life changing or mundane and forgettable. It is not the situation that is creating the meaning; it is the consciousness that I bring to it. So now a conversation with a friend or looking out the window on this rainy day can become memorable and a bead, or not.
One of the ways I make my moments conscious is by using my breath. When I awake in the morning or go to sleep at night I take a conscious breath. In between daily rituals like my morning tea or meditation, or taking a walk or going to the grocery store, I take a breath to establish myself in the place where I am. I was there. Now I am here, and everything is different. Between every activity and often even between thoughts, I pause and take a breath. Now, I am doing this. Now I am thinking this. This is a practice of becoming consciously aware.
A conscious breath says, "here I am." I was driving to work. And now I have arrived. The breath is a way for me to register that this is a new moment full of all the opportunity and potential that every moment is imbued with.
This is one of the most valuable tools I have. I use it all day long. Between every client and every class, between every activity in my day, I take a conscious breath. I also do this inside my experiences while they are happening like a song that is lifting my heart or a movie that touches me in a certain way that I want to always remember. I want it to be inscribed in my consciousness and in my heart. These aware moments then are indelibly written in my consciousness. They become part of me. They are beads on my string.
I call this whole phenomenon "being awake". There is a wide-awakeness about this way of being in the world. I am feeling, noticing, being, with all of my senses. I am practicing staying open to my experience.
Integrated deeply within this philosophy is nonjudgment. Judgment limits our experience of the moment. When we make a determination that says something is always like this, then it is. We then can go on automatic pilot, moving through our moments in one big swell. Time feels like it's going by too quickly. We can lose track of our lives. Days, months, years can go by without us really being in them.
By breathing in a moment we are choosing to stay awake to our life, whatever it brings, however it goes. This life-breathing awareness brings about a real connection to life. We breathe it in and receive the experience rather than reject it. Cynicism, sarcasm and judgment are all ways of separating from our experiences. We can remain untouched and unmoved. It is a kind of closure.
By breathing in the moment we are agreeing to be in it, to remember it; it goes on our string of beads. It belongs to us.
A spiritually conscious life is a life that has capacity. How much awareness we can hold is equivalent to our depth. This can be felt. It looks like magnetism or charisma. It is compassion and understanding.
A conscious breath is a physical/spiritual acknowledgement of the moment. My inhalation and exhalation establish me in the new moment that I am in. This way of breathing starts to create a living wellspring of moments that are now conscious. We start to realize we are holy and that every step we take is part of our sacred journey.
When we use the breath like this, life becomes a living meditation, seamlessly connecting the dots of our experience, one to another, like beads on a string, and soon we have a collection of moments that is an acknowledgment that this life and everything in it, is sacred.
By practicing conscious breathing we can live a more full and dimensional life. Every moment can be a surprise and a gift. As we move through the world with awareness and awakeness, our world is blessed by our open mind and heart.
Breathe your life in deeply. Live your life completely. Recognize that this moment, right now, is special and add it to your life's string of magical moments. Know that today is a new day and anything can be.
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2007 by DIANA LANG
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
**************************************
See what's new at http://www.aol.com
by Diana Lang
I like to think of life's momentous experiences like beads on a string. Those moments that are important, valuable or rare are like beautiful colored beads that we lovingly thread onto this string of beads. Each bead symbolically represents a moment, an experience, a special person. As life goes on a gorgeous necklace of our lives is created, full of these moments that have meant something to us.
This little metaphor is a way to imagine making our lives more conscious. By recognizing these moments more often we become more fully alive to our experience. It is easy to see how a marriage or a birth of a child would be a bead on our string, but what about today? What about right now?
I like to think of every moment as being valuable. What I bring to it is what I get out of it. My own consciousness can make this moment something or nothing. A conversation can be life changing or mundane and forgettable. It is not the situation that is creating the meaning; it is the consciousness that I bring to it. So now a conversation with a friend or looking out the window on this rainy day can become memorable and a bead, or not.
One of the ways I make my moments conscious is by using my breath. When I awake in the morning or go to sleep at night I take a conscious breath. In between daily rituals like my morning tea or meditation, or taking a walk or going to the grocery store, I take a breath to establish myself in the place where I am. I was there. Now I am here, and everything is different. Between every activity and often even between thoughts, I pause and take a breath. Now, I am doing this. Now I am thinking this. This is a practice of becoming consciously aware.
A conscious breath says, "here I am." I was driving to work. And now I have arrived. The breath is a way for me to register that this is a new moment full of all the opportunity and potential that every moment is imbued with.
This is one of the most valuable tools I have. I use it all day long. Between every client and every class, between every activity in my day, I take a conscious breath. I also do this inside my experiences while they are happening like a song that is lifting my heart or a movie that touches me in a certain way that I want to always remember. I want it to be inscribed in my consciousness and in my heart. These aware moments then are indelibly written in my consciousness. They become part of me. They are beads on my string.
I call this whole phenomenon "being awake". There is a wide-awakeness about this way of being in the world. I am feeling, noticing, being, with all of my senses. I am practicing staying open to my experience.
Integrated deeply within this philosophy is nonjudgment. Judgment limits our experience of the moment. When we make a determination that says something is always like this, then it is. We then can go on automatic pilot, moving through our moments in one big swell. Time feels like it's going by too quickly. We can lose track of our lives. Days, months, years can go by without us really being in them.
By breathing in a moment we are choosing to stay awake to our life, whatever it brings, however it goes. This life-breathing awareness brings about a real connection to life. We breathe it in and receive the experience rather than reject it. Cynicism, sarcasm and judgment are all ways of separating from our experiences. We can remain untouched and unmoved. It is a kind of closure.
By breathing in the moment we are agreeing to be in it, to remember it; it goes on our string of beads. It belongs to us.
A spiritually conscious life is a life that has capacity. How much awareness we can hold is equivalent to our depth. This can be felt. It looks like magnetism or charisma. It is compassion and understanding.
A conscious breath is a physical/spiritual acknowledgement of the moment. My inhalation and exhalation establish me in the new moment that I am in. This way of breathing starts to create a living wellspring of moments that are now conscious. We start to realize we are holy and that every step we take is part of our sacred journey.
When we use the breath like this, life becomes a living meditation, seamlessly connecting the dots of our experience, one to another, like beads on a string, and soon we have a collection of moments that is an acknowledgment that this life and everything in it, is sacred.
By practicing conscious breathing we can live a more full and dimensional life. Every moment can be a surprise and a gift. As we move through the world with awareness and awakeness, our world is blessed by our open mind and heart.
Breathe your life in deeply. Live your life completely. Recognize that this moment, right now, is special and add it to your life's string of magical moments. Know that today is a new day and anything can be.
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2007 by DIANA LANG
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
**************************************
See what's new at http://www.aol.com
Sunday, November 4
11.4.07
Fires and Lawsuits and Bears
STRESS AND THE BREATH
by Diana Lang
Recently here in Los Angeles, our beautiful mountains from Topanga to Big Bear were on fire. Raging wildfires tore through the sage and the wild sumac that go up like firecrackers from this long drought we've been in. I watched from a half mile away as great, chugging helicopters filled to the brim, dumped their loads of ocean water on burning, smoking hillsides. I watched in awe as these great flying machines were pushed around by the hot, dry, wicked winds of Santa Ana that emerge every October like clockwork here in the City of Angels. Our beautiful heroic firemen could barely keep up.
Friends of mine were evacuated and fought the fire with their garden hoses. Fortunately, all of the people I know personally are fine, just beat up emotionally and psychically. But many did not fare as well. Thousands up and down Southern California were displaced, hundreds of homes burned to the ground, and many more were damaged badly.
When we have a crisis, whether natural or personal, how we handle our stress makes a difference in how we move through the experience and also how we remember it.
If stress isn't processed it can become a kind of post-traumatic stress syndrome like vets returning from war or natural disaster survivors. The compressed and relentless tension from a long endurance test of worry leaves an indelible impression on our lives. Anxiety and fear, that can range from hope to despair, takes us on an emotional roller-coaster ride that can leave a permanent mark on our psyche and photographic-like imprint in our unconscious minds, where just the smell of smoke from a nearby chimney can produce a panic attack.
This goes for any stress. Whether it be the stress of school exams or job worries, relationship problems or health concerns, stress takes a toll on our health and how we age.
By listening to our bodies we can learn better how to manage stress. We can do this by breathing deeply and consciously. By conscious breathing we can stay present to our experience so that we can process it. As David Viscott, M.D., a wonderful friend and mentor said to me so profoundly when I was seventeen, "Mental health is determined by our ability to stay emotionally current." I never forgot this and it has proved to be true. What we can't feel, we can't heal. It becomes the unconscious material of our life that leaks and spurts out unexpectedly. We wonder, how did this happen to me, because we don't see it coming, because it's unconscious.
A willingness to stay aware, by talking about it, crying about it, feeling about it, are all parts of the various stages of healing. And it all starts with the breath. Holding our breath is a way to feel in control. It stops us from consciously feeling what we are feeling. The feelings are still there, we are just holding them back. How many times have I heard my clients say they are sorry for crying, as if they have done something wrong. Crying is breathing. Crying is feeling. Laughing is feeling. Understanding is feeling. When we feel, we start to heal.
This process of breathing and feeling is a choice to experience our life with our heart's wide open. We are choosing to live largely and fully. We are fully engaged and awake to our experience - come what may!
By breathing, by staying conscious, we are making a choice. It is the opposite of reacting. It is a choice to respond. It is giving ourselves the time to decide how we want to respond. We can than choose how to respond from a world of choices instead of the knee-jerk reaction that just happens. The breath then becomes a catalyst both physically and symbolically of life force. It says, I want to experience my life fully and deeply, and we breathe it all in.
When you find yourself in a stressful situation remember to breathe. It will help you get centered and evaluate what is happening around you better. Your mind will be calmer and you can make the decisions that you need to. You become like a lighthouse in a storm. This lets you stay centered, relaxed and ready, clear and perceptive, so that whatever your next is, it is taken from a place of connectedness and your inner knowing. You literally light the way for yourself and for others.
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2007 by DIANA LANG
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
**************************************
See what's new at http://www.aol.com
STRESS AND THE BREATH
by Diana Lang
Recently here in Los Angeles, our beautiful mountains from Topanga to Big Bear were on fire. Raging wildfires tore through the sage and the wild sumac that go up like firecrackers from this long drought we've been in. I watched from a half mile away as great, chugging helicopters filled to the brim, dumped their loads of ocean water on burning, smoking hillsides. I watched in awe as these great flying machines were pushed around by the hot, dry, wicked winds of Santa Ana that emerge every October like clockwork here in the City of Angels. Our beautiful heroic firemen could barely keep up.
Friends of mine were evacuated and fought the fire with their garden hoses. Fortunately, all of the people I know personally are fine, just beat up emotionally and psychically. But many did not fare as well. Thousands up and down Southern California were displaced, hundreds of homes burned to the ground, and many more were damaged badly.
When we have a crisis, whether natural or personal, how we handle our stress makes a difference in how we move through the experience and also how we remember it.
If stress isn't processed it can become a kind of post-traumatic stress syndrome like vets returning from war or natural disaster survivors. The compressed and relentless tension from a long endurance test of worry leaves an indelible impression on our lives. Anxiety and fear, that can range from hope to despair, takes us on an emotional roller-coaster ride that can leave a permanent mark on our psyche and photographic-like imprint in our unconscious minds, where just the smell of smoke from a nearby chimney can produce a panic attack.
This goes for any stress. Whether it be the stress of school exams or job worries, relationship problems or health concerns, stress takes a toll on our health and how we age.
By listening to our bodies we can learn better how to manage stress. We can do this by breathing deeply and consciously. By conscious breathing we can stay present to our experience so that we can process it. As David Viscott, M.D., a wonderful friend and mentor said to me so profoundly when I was seventeen, "Mental health is determined by our ability to stay emotionally current." I never forgot this and it has proved to be true. What we can't feel, we can't heal. It becomes the unconscious material of our life that leaks and spurts out unexpectedly. We wonder, how did this happen to me, because we don't see it coming, because it's unconscious.
A willingness to stay aware, by talking about it, crying about it, feeling about it, are all parts of the various stages of healing. And it all starts with the breath. Holding our breath is a way to feel in control. It stops us from consciously feeling what we are feeling. The feelings are still there, we are just holding them back. How many times have I heard my clients say they are sorry for crying, as if they have done something wrong. Crying is breathing. Crying is feeling. Laughing is feeling. Understanding is feeling. When we feel, we start to heal.
This process of breathing and feeling is a choice to experience our life with our heart's wide open. We are choosing to live largely and fully. We are fully engaged and awake to our experience - come what may!
By breathing, by staying conscious, we are making a choice. It is the opposite of reacting. It is a choice to respond. It is giving ourselves the time to decide how we want to respond. We can than choose how to respond from a world of choices instead of the knee-jerk reaction that just happens. The breath then becomes a catalyst both physically and symbolically of life force. It says, I want to experience my life fully and deeply, and we breathe it all in.
When you find yourself in a stressful situation remember to breathe. It will help you get centered and evaluate what is happening around you better. Your mind will be calmer and you can make the decisions that you need to. You become like a lighthouse in a storm. This lets you stay centered, relaxed and ready, clear and perceptive, so that whatever your next is, it is taken from a place of connectedness and your inner knowing. You literally light the way for yourself and for others.
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2007 by DIANA LANG
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
**************************************
See what's new at http://www.aol.com
Sunday, October 28
THE RHYTHM OF LIFE
The Rhythm of Life
by Diana Lang
The breath is a cycle.
Inhale . . . exhale.
It is like a little life. A little experience. The breath teaches us about cycles. It teaches us that if we inhale, we must exhale. That something has a beginning and an end. It teaches us that life goes on, even after we exhale, another breath will be taken.
Every day, every moment, we are breathing. We don't have to remember to breathe, it happens automatically without any conscious effort on our part. It is like a metronome of our beingness.
Everything breathes. People, animals, everything on earth has an inbreath and an outbreath. In a sense, even the earth has a breath. Think of the ocean tide coming in and out, like an inhalation and an exhalation. Or the cycle of a day from sunrise (inhale) to sunset (exhale).
These are all little inbreaths and outbreaths of life. We inhale when we are born and we exhale as we die. There are Great cycles and small cycles, like the cycle of a ten-minute meditation or the cycle of a life.
If you start thinking of things in cycles both large and small, you will start to feel a whole new correspondence and connectedness to the flow of life. There are cycles within cycles, from breath to breath, minute to minute. Minutes are parts of hour cycles, hours are part of day cycles, and so on. We have all kinds of cyclic markers arising out of our intention based on inbreaths and outbreaths of months, seasons, birthdays, holidays, etc. All of them little cycles, little breaths, with intentions planted inside them with little time-released seeds that will sprout in these cyclic incubators of intention.
Situations and events have a cycle and a rhythm too. For instance, how I start a project affects the outcome of the project. How I begin something makes an impression like a thumb pressing into soft clay that molds the shape of things to come. The intention I put into anything I put my mind to, affects its outcome.
Imagine the power of intending consciously into these cycles of experience. Think of planting a conscious seed into this next cycle, whether it is a project you are working on or the general flow of your day. Imagine purposefully intending into a cycle of a new moon to a full moon, or this birthday to the next one.
As we near the cycle of the New Year, we have a powerful and timely opportunity to practice this idea of rhythms and cycles. The group awareness of a single day has even more power when so many minds collectively are looking at the same subject similarly, and at the same time! The New Year is a powerful cycle of time for renewal and re-intention.
And our breath is our reminder in every moment of these cycles. The breath is the bridge between the soul and the self. It is nonphysical. It is the amorphous mist that bridges matter and spirit. As we inhale and exhale we are in relationship with our lives. We can be inspired ("in spirit") as we breathe spirit in, and as we exhale we share our spirit with the world.
Breathing is as constant as the ocean tides. We breathe in, we inspire, we breathe out, we expire, a little death and an end of a cycle. When we breathe in again we are reborn once more.
Think of your next breath like this.
"I take a breath and I am born anew.
I take a deep breath and I can begin again.
And with this breath I recognize this new cycle that I am beginning now."
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2007 by DIANA LANG
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
You can see archives of these reports on Diana's blog at:
http://dianalang.com/weather_report.html
www.DianaLang.com
from the City of Angels
LifeWorks@aol.com
818/888-7319
**************************************
See what's new at http://www.aol.com
by Diana Lang
The breath is a cycle.
Inhale . . . exhale.
It is like a little life. A little experience. The breath teaches us about cycles. It teaches us that if we inhale, we must exhale. That something has a beginning and an end. It teaches us that life goes on, even after we exhale, another breath will be taken.
Every day, every moment, we are breathing. We don't have to remember to breathe, it happens automatically without any conscious effort on our part. It is like a metronome of our beingness.
Everything breathes. People, animals, everything on earth has an inbreath and an outbreath. In a sense, even the earth has a breath. Think of the ocean tide coming in and out, like an inhalation and an exhalation. Or the cycle of a day from sunrise (inhale) to sunset (exhale).
These are all little inbreaths and outbreaths of life. We inhale when we are born and we exhale as we die. There are Great cycles and small cycles, like the cycle of a ten-minute meditation or the cycle of a life.
If you start thinking of things in cycles both large and small, you will start to feel a whole new correspondence and connectedness to the flow of life. There are cycles within cycles, from breath to breath, minute to minute. Minutes are parts of hour cycles, hours are part of day cycles, and so on. We have all kinds of cyclic markers arising out of our intention based on inbreaths and outbreaths of months, seasons, birthdays, holidays, etc. All of them little cycles, little breaths, with intentions planted inside them with little time-released seeds that will sprout in these cyclic incubators of intention.
Situations and events have a cycle and a rhythm too. For instance, how I start a project affects the outcome of the project. How I begin something makes an impression like a thumb pressing into soft clay that molds the shape of things to come. The intention I put into anything I put my mind to, affects its outcome.
Imagine the power of intending consciously into these cycles of experience. Think of planting a conscious seed into this next cycle, whether it is a project you are working on or the general flow of your day. Imagine purposefully intending into a cycle of a new moon to a full moon, or this birthday to the next one.
As we near the cycle of the New Year, we have a powerful and timely opportunity to practice this idea of rhythms and cycles. The group awareness of a single day has even more power when so many minds collectively are looking at the same subject similarly, and at the same time! The New Year is a powerful cycle of time for renewal and re-intention.
And our breath is our reminder in every moment of these cycles. The breath is the bridge between the soul and the self. It is nonphysical. It is the amorphous mist that bridges matter and spirit. As we inhale and exhale we are in relationship with our lives. We can be inspired ("in spirit") as we breathe spirit in, and as we exhale we share our spirit with the world.
Breathing is as constant as the ocean tides. We breathe in, we inspire, we breathe out, we expire, a little death and an end of a cycle. When we breathe in again we are reborn once more.
Think of your next breath like this.
"I take a breath and I am born anew.
I take a deep breath and I can begin again.
And with this breath I recognize this new cycle that I am beginning now."
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2007 by DIANA LANG
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
You can see archives of these reports on Diana's blog at:
http://dianalang.com/weather_report.html
www.DianaLang.com
from the City of Angels
LifeWorks@aol.com
818/888-7319
**************************************
See what's new at http://www.aol.com
Tuesday, October 23
10.23.07
The castle in Malibu burned down.
I was there not a few weeks ago.
We were taken up the road to the big house
by horse-drawn carriage
and greeted by the owner
who was all dressed in white lace
(that you could see through).
She looked like she was waiting to get married
to a fairy tale prince.
She was radiant
and proud of her home
and the whole thing was so beautiful
if not surreal,
with knights in shining armor in dark corners
and Elvis' purple cadillac parked there by the front door
And then it burned down to the ground.
It was one of the very first losses
in these Great Fires in Southern California
and I wondered how does a house made of stone
burn down.
Please, everyone be safe.
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2007 by DIANA LANG
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
You can see archives of these reports on Diana's blog at: http://dianalang.com/weather_report.html
www.DianaLang.com
from the City of Angels
LifeWorks@aol.com
818/888-7319
**************************************
See what's new at http://www.aol.com
I was there not a few weeks ago.
We were taken up the road to the big house
by horse-drawn carriage
and greeted by the owner
who was all dressed in white lace
(that you could see through).
She looked like she was waiting to get married
to a fairy tale prince.
She was radiant
and proud of her home
and the whole thing was so beautiful
if not surreal,
with knights in shining armor in dark corners
and Elvis' purple cadillac parked there by the front door
And then it burned down to the ground.
It was one of the very first losses
in these Great Fires in Southern California
and I wondered how does a house made of stone
burn down.
Please, everyone be safe.
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2007 by DIANA LANG
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
You can see archives of these reports on Diana's blog at: http://dianalang.com/weather_report.html
www.DianaLang.com
from the City of Angels
LifeWorks@aol.com
818/888-7319
**************************************
See what's new at http://www.aol.com
Sunday, October 21
10.21.07 Nature's Rhythm
I was at the local grocery store today and noticed they were playing Christmas carols. Not every song, but mixed in. It kind of snuck up on me as I found myself humming along to "White Christmas". I'm thinking to myself, it's not even Halloween yet.
All of nature is winding down around us and we are speeding up. The leaves are falling from the trees, fruits and flowers are waning, while we are racing to 2008. The tractor beam of "the Holidays" pulls us headlong into what would be by nature's rhythm a quieting time. By the time the holidays get here, we're all exhausted.
This all reminds me to slow down. To remember to take my time and take a deep breath. To follow nature's lead. To exhale. To let my attention turn inward. To let my leaves fall.
The faster things are moving around us the more important it is to be centered. It's like being in the eye of a hurricane; everything is quiet. There is this great hush while all around you the world is whirling.
Meditation brings us to that calm center. Life goes on with all its horn-blowing and noise, but the quiet part of us, the part of us that "knows", is completely still. Always. And all we have to do is come to this place. Return to this place within us. Where that stillness abides. And remember who we are, and what we're doing, and why we are doing it. We can exhale.
Meditation is the fastest way I know to become centered. The faster things are moving around me, the more profoundly I can slow down time. It's more noticeable because of the speed. It also doesn't occur to me as naturally as when I am already in a relaxed place. When things are moving quickly, I have to remember.
And truly, I want to remember. By remembering I can save myself hours and hours of fixing and reworking. I can regroup. I can decide again about my autopilot responses and feel which way to go, using all my senses, not just my automatic reflexes. I can choose a higher way, a better way with a higher outcome than the first thing that comes to my mind.
Meditation is a tool. It gives us a choice when it feels like we don't have one. It gives us brakes when it feels like we're being swept along. Meditation gives us a cosmic PAUSE button and the power of will to make the highest choice for highest good for all concerned.
As life crashes and heaves forward we can tread softly and thoughtfully. We can look for the little glints of light that are hidden in our loved one's eyes or in the sparkle of a dewdrop on a flower's petal. We can feel the light and the love that is in every sacred moment.
And we can inhale again.
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2007 by DIANA LANG
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
You can see archives of these reports on Diana's blog at: http://dianalang.com/weather_report.html
www.DianaLang.com
from the City of Angels
LifeWorks@aol.com
818/888-7319
**************************************
See what's new at http://www.aol.com
All of nature is winding down around us and we are speeding up. The leaves are falling from the trees, fruits and flowers are waning, while we are racing to 2008. The tractor beam of "the Holidays" pulls us headlong into what would be by nature's rhythm a quieting time. By the time the holidays get here, we're all exhausted.
This all reminds me to slow down. To remember to take my time and take a deep breath. To follow nature's lead. To exhale. To let my attention turn inward. To let my leaves fall.
The faster things are moving around us the more important it is to be centered. It's like being in the eye of a hurricane; everything is quiet. There is this great hush while all around you the world is whirling.
Meditation brings us to that calm center. Life goes on with all its horn-blowing and noise, but the quiet part of us, the part of us that "knows", is completely still. Always. And all we have to do is come to this place. Return to this place within us. Where that stillness abides. And remember who we are, and what we're doing, and why we are doing it. We can exhale.
Meditation is the fastest way I know to become centered. The faster things are moving around me, the more profoundly I can slow down time. It's more noticeable because of the speed. It also doesn't occur to me as naturally as when I am already in a relaxed place. When things are moving quickly, I have to remember.
And truly, I want to remember. By remembering I can save myself hours and hours of fixing and reworking. I can regroup. I can decide again about my autopilot responses and feel which way to go, using all my senses, not just my automatic reflexes. I can choose a higher way, a better way with a higher outcome than the first thing that comes to my mind.
Meditation is a tool. It gives us a choice when it feels like we don't have one. It gives us brakes when it feels like we're being swept along. Meditation gives us a cosmic PAUSE button and the power of will to make the highest choice for highest good for all concerned.
As life crashes and heaves forward we can tread softly and thoughtfully. We can look for the little glints of light that are hidden in our loved one's eyes or in the sparkle of a dewdrop on a flower's petal. We can feel the light and the love that is in every sacred moment.
And we can inhale again.
Diana Lang
THE WEATHER
©2007 by DIANA LANG
Please feel free to pass these letters along, they are a gift and a service.
If you wish to be added to or deleted from the mailing list, please let me know.
You can see archives of these reports on Diana's blog at: http://dianalang.com/weather_report.html
www.DianaLang.com
from the City of Angels
LifeWorks@aol.com
818/888-7319
**************************************
See what's new at http://www.aol.com
Friday, September 28
9.16.07
Hello everyone. My name is Diana Lang. I am a writer and a teacher of yoga and meditation since 1980 and have worked with thousands of people over the years to help them learn techniques and perspectives that help relax, rejuvenate and enlighten. This blog will offer tips and tools for stress reduction and deep relaxation in real life. I will present ideas and things you can apply immediately, on the job, in traffic and at home, even if you don't have 15 minutes to meditate. These are things you can do right now, right while you are reading this or in between patients that will center you and relax you and help you in more ways than you know.
I like to start at the beginning of things and the breath is that. It's the first thing we do when we are born and it's the last thing we do as we die. It is the metronome of our lives. It is a physical manifestation of our energy and our life force. The breath indicates how much life force we will let ourselves take in, just enough, or deep, liberating, life-giving breaths.
Much of the time we are holding our breaths. You might be right now. Notice if the breath is shallow or deep as you are reading this now. It wouldn't be surprising if it is shallow. Reading is a common time to hold your breath. When we concentrate, when we focus, the breath becomes more and more still. When we are excited or passionate, like when we are laughing or crying, the breath gets deeper and fuller.
Our breath reflects our ability to take in life. The inhalation is our ability to let it in; our exhalation is our ability to let go. All of us have a propensity to do one segment of the breath better than the other. I have noticed that many health care professionals tend to be better exhalers than inhalers. We give it all away. We need to inhale more. But breathing in deeply can seem to mean taking on more responsibility, feeling more, and we may already be overwhelmed. But the breath that we are not taking is also the breath we are not getting, and the more you give, the more life force you need, the more breath you need.
Some of us hold our breaths all the time. We take minimal breaths in and out, just enough to keep the body running. Others of us will be good inhalers. We take the breath in well but may have a harder time letting go.
Of course the optimal breath is to breathe evenly in and out. And as we do more oxygen is moved through the body, our hormones and chemistry change, our organs can function better, from our lungs to our brain.
A deep breath says I am here, I am awake, I am with myself fully. With a deep breath you can embrace the day and your patients, and not lose yourself.
So take a deep breath now and see how you feel. Go out into your day with a big breath and feel yourself seize the day and add your beautiful and loving note to this world even more!
**************************************
See what's new at http://www.aol.com
I like to start at the beginning of things and the breath is that. It's the first thing we do when we are born and it's the last thing we do as we die. It is the metronome of our lives. It is a physical manifestation of our energy and our life force. The breath indicates how much life force we will let ourselves take in, just enough, or deep, liberating, life-giving breaths.
Much of the time we are holding our breaths. You might be right now. Notice if the breath is shallow or deep as you are reading this now. It wouldn't be surprising if it is shallow. Reading is a common time to hold your breath. When we concentrate, when we focus, the breath becomes more and more still. When we are excited or passionate, like when we are laughing or crying, the breath gets deeper and fuller.
Our breath reflects our ability to take in life. The inhalation is our ability to let it in; our exhalation is our ability to let go. All of us have a propensity to do one segment of the breath better than the other. I have noticed that many health care professionals tend to be better exhalers than inhalers. We give it all away. We need to inhale more. But breathing in deeply can seem to mean taking on more responsibility, feeling more, and we may already be overwhelmed. But the breath that we are not taking is also the breath we are not getting, and the more you give, the more life force you need, the more breath you need.
Some of us hold our breaths all the time. We take minimal breaths in and out, just enough to keep the body running. Others of us will be good inhalers. We take the breath in well but may have a harder time letting go.
Of course the optimal breath is to breathe evenly in and out. And as we do more oxygen is moved through the body, our hormones and chemistry change, our organs can function better, from our lungs to our brain.
A deep breath says I am here, I am awake, I am with myself fully. With a deep breath you can embrace the day and your patients, and not lose yourself.
So take a deep breath now and see how you feel. Go out into your day with a big breath and feel yourself seize the day and add your beautiful and loving note to this world even more!
**************************************
See what's new at http://www.aol.com
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