I do a lot of Buddhist or Eastern religion practices. Buddhists tend to take themselves far too seriously. That’s why I never joined any of the practice groups I have tried. Perhaps most people take themselves too seriously, and that gets in the way of their enjoying themselves and having fun.
This morning I asked “How long can I count inhalations from 1-10 before I lose count?” I lost (count) after 20″. I smiled at that failure, and then was even more amused when I failed much sooner and in the same way while walking Spike, my 13 lb. Chihuahua/Jack Russell cross. Smiling at failures beats crying!
All day I practice to become “The Perfected Yogi.” This comes from a single statement from my massive Buddhist and Eastern religion reading: “The perfected yogi is aware of every breath.” My idea of a perfected yogi includes his enjoying every minute of his life. I like that idea, so I use a variety of ways of to try to be aware of every breath. I currently come far closer to enjoying my every moment than I ever have. I’d say I’m up there around 90%, perhaps higher. I believe my playing Eastern practice games for more than 30 years, has gotten me to that enjoyment percentage.
If you like the idea of enjoying yourself, you might want to start with trying to estimate your enjoyment percentage. Then you’ll know your starting point. It’ll take a little work, but you can enjoy work. A reasonably accrurate percentage takes paying attention to whether you’re happy moment by moment. Where there’s no awareness, there’s no enjoyment, no happiness. We can look back on big chunks of time, say the past hour and ask ourselves, How much of that hour did I enjoy?” Our estimates probably won’t be very accurate. A simple scientific principle is that more observations give a more accurate estimate of the phenomena. So you might want to check every 5 minutes. Pause take a few breaths and ask yourself the question. I’d suggest that unless you’ve done something like this before, your idea of how much of the time you’re enjoying yourself is very inaccurate.
Enuf for this article. I’d love it if you’d comment below, tell me if you tried any of the above, how it went…more later.