Thinking Blossoms

A busy little bee

It was nice enough catching this bumble bee  enjoying what may well be the Scottish bumble bee's national dish, thistle nectar, but quite incredible watching what she was up to. She was methodically following round the beautiful purple mandala composite flower pattern, anti clockwise, drinking from each cup of nectar in turn. It took her several minutes. Then of course she buzzed off in search of more sweet weeds in my garden, which is a tasty bee-haven of pesticide-free blossoms right now.

Thank you bumble bee for an object lesson in the beauty of doing something completely and methodically before moving on to the next task.

Here she is again a little while later and it is well worth clicking on the photo to see her more clearly:

And, following her lead, I have stuck in and completed one whole writing task in one go.

The follow-on benefit is that with a sense of completion from meeting my writing deadline, and from having done things so well in the process, I have been buzzing along with the next task and the next, till now I'm even blogging about it - nourished by thistle, bee and nectar imagery, as I hope you are too.

What's the task you could do, very well, that you could complete all in one go which would get you moving busily, and happily, on to the next task and the next? It feels great.

Still Moments on Busy Days

This daisy-chain of thought was initiated by reading a fellow coach's question on the very wonderful Eurocoach-list, on line community for coaches. They were asking about stillness in meditation and that got me thinking about how taking moments to be still of mind during the day affects any kind of meditation practice that you do. Taking moments of stillness does have an effect.

Think of that dandelion growing in a crack in the pavement on the intro for Coronation Street, just there whatever dramas are going on round and about. Well, this sunny yellow flowering plant - mustard I think?- is just there too, right now, down the road from me. I'm so glad some tidy-minded good soul hasn't pulled it up. It's proud, upright, sunny, quietly flourishing, cheering.....and still.

Cars whizz by and in between there are moments in which the place breathes out for a moment.

You can do this as a spiritual practice, as spiritual as any variety of meditation. Just listen out for those moments between what is happening.

In the coffee shop a lull between tracks, in a restaurant the time between topics and the moment the food arrives, walking down the street the moment before the lights change. In a quieter street the sounds of footfall dying away or the rise, and fall, of a conversation overheard.

Putting attention in the quietness is only a shift of the point of view from which one perceives. Moving attention there from being engaged in one activity after another and from noticing all the activity around one is simple. It's a moment to settle into oneself and to feel a contentment in being alive, even for just a moment. It can lead to a changed way of experiencing being in busy places. You can do it in the quiet of your own home too, for example coming out of your busy thoughts to hear the peaceful snores of an old pet.

See how this practice of turning your outer attention to stillness can nourish your stillness during inner meditative practice.

Living Bliss in New York

When travelling back from Florida where I was staying at the Hippocrates Health Institute (see my food blog ) my plane was delayed and they gave me a hotel and a flight out the following evening. Hip hip hooray! I'd never been to New York and there I was with a  free day in a new city. Oh the joys of googling and planning the precious few hours. I opted for the Guggenheim museum Art Gallery (Kandinsky and Frank Lloyd Wright, Yay!), a walk in Central Park, a wander along Maddison avenue, a Korean vegan lunch, a look up at the cloud-wreathed Empire State Building, the shortest ever Borders moment and back on the train back to the airport, happy, content, nourished, full of culture...

(and you can click on the photos to enlarge them)

Part of me wanted to concentrate on the city things as, after all, a park is a park. But that part of my magical day was, er, magically magical, unexpectedly so. 

Of course! walking in New York's lungs after a plane travel and tower-block hotel experience. Colour, beautiful plant forms, new vistas. This is some park. It's well cared-for and must add to much to the quality of life of Manhattan Islanders, such as these dog-walkers:

And though a sunny day is always nice, I loved the drizzly day as much as the spring green leaves did, misty, enchanting. Even the umbrellas were treats adding to the drama. 

There's something special about the tamed wildness of parks, plants gathered from the four corners of the earth and flourishing together - tamed but still wild, really. Like us actually, tamed and civilised yes, but still our real selves are part of nature. Whether you would want to sketch this curve of a Japanese-type branch or climb up the tree and sit in it it draws you in.

                                                                                                                                                                Looking back, in memory as in the enticing view under a bridge below,as I was leaving, the experience is framed in the buildings around, the frame for an amazing living art piece of greenery.

                                                                                   Nature gave so much, as it always does, to the day, even in the middle of an enormous city of buildings that touch the sky, including the Empire State Building:

                                                                                                 If reminder is needed, my day in New York is a reminder of how fundamental nature, and art, and architecture - all of them together really - are to life.

Never mind smell the coffee, smell the fresh air and the blossoms in the park.

.......and the Korean vegetarian lunch? - my other blog is my foodie one and I might well post about that delightful meal there.

Snakes

Don't expect a photo with this post - I wasn't about to get the camera out!

Several times I've seen them since I've been here (Florida that is - see my other blog -www.rawinscotland.com . One was at least a metre long, black, and snaking rapidly across the path.  One was small and brightly striped and not moving so fast. Each time I stopped, stock still and watched, not wanting to attract any attention until the snake was well on its way. I was glad I didn't tread on either so felt a twinge of relief each time that the snake seemed to be on its own journey and not ready to engage with me in any way. It wasn't scary though, just interesting. Two for the I-Spy book of snakes or a Girl Guide badge perhaps.

It reminded me of when years ago I spent weeks in a forest monastery in Thailand and was once sitting meditating by myself a little away from the huts in a slightly jungly patch of trees. As I opened my eyes I saw a large snake, at least a metre long (or has it been growing in my imagination in the interim?) slithering , left to right, less than two feet in front of me. I was in such a calm state from meditating that I was completely unfazed.

Probably a more helpful reaction in the circumstances than panic or fear!

In the moment when something potentially dangerous is going on, choosing to stay calm, uninvolved actually, is a helpful choice. When there is old contitioning there may be fear or panic and I think it's important to remember you have a choice about how you respond to past contitioning.

When there's an overtly emotional reaction it may actually make the situation worse - I wonder whether a frightened snake or a snake in the vicinity of a sudden flurry of human activity is more likely to bite?

What is there snaking around in your reality that is actually better ignored?  Responses to this appreciated - I think it's an important topic.

Celebrating the different nature of another place

I just like this photo (click on photo to enlarge). Not sure what I'll say that might be profound!!

It can be easy to notice all the beauty in a different place, but that sharpens the eyes for what is to be seen right where you are now. Even if it is just the the last leaf on a neglected potted plant on a windowsill it has beauty.

It's also easy to look across to what someone else has or at what their business is and to think 'Ooooh, that looks so good!'. But perhaps what you already have is good too?

Nature in Florida is very, very beautiful. But there's beauty everywhere.

I think one thing I like about these three little palm trees are that they are recently planted, nicely placed in an already lovely garden.

What can be added to whatever is already growing in your life, work and business?

Different stages of growth

I took these daffodils-in-city-square photos in Edinburgh before I left to spend a month here in Florida where I'm busy writing a book on wellness. It was gorgeous watching the spring unfolding in Edinburgh. This first photo  (click on photos to enlarge) shows the freshness and vibrancy of the daffodil flowers at their best. Something is going on with them underground all year round but this is their glory moment. And there's a young tree, not much more than a sapling, which still needs support in order to get off to a good start. And the green grass, present all year round whatever the weather. I'm sure you can find helpful metaphors there for different aspects of your business, perhaps various activities and projects at different stages and producing different results.

Then in this second photo there is the solid presence of a mature tree, no longer needing support. It just keeps growing from year to year. It yields seeds. In fact it's now also host to a fine dusting of something. Lichen? And in this photo you can also see the crocuses just starting to die back, their flowering just passing.

How would it be to look at your work, business or home life in this way, thinking about your various projects as different plant forms, growing and changing? Needing different care and attention from you as seasons pass?

I'm hoping to get some veggies going in my garden this year so who knows what tendrils of thought will grow from that!

And talking of veggies, plants to eat, my new blog is up and running. Still a few things to be done to perfect it but you are welcome to wander over for a look: Alive and Raw in Scotland ....and Beyond  I'd love to read your comments :-)

Mothers' Day

Traditionally it was Mothering Sunday. Working class girls like my grandmothers got the day off from being in service as maids in the big houses, to go home and visit their mothers before Easter. I think they made 'Simnel cakes' , fruit and nut cakes, to take home as gifts. No doubt they took flowers too. 

For an adult orphan like me Mothers day has a poignancy and I thought about my mother a great deal on Sunday.

I'll share...

Serendipitously I was staying with my friend Gill in London and walked out into her lovely garden as soon as the light was good for photos. It's all ahead of us up in Scotland and it was a delight to find primroses and violets blooming already. Gulp, I nearly cried. I used to get up early on Mothering Sunday and go to the woods to pick wild flowers for my mum. And, back to the present, another delight since my mother was an ace photographer in her spare time, I managed to figure out how to take flower closeups on my camera, so here are a primrose and a violet for you. Violet a bit out of focus, but hey.

I thought about her during the day when I was out and about in London too, especially when I was near Carnaby Street where my grandfather was born and brought up. His streets, my heritage (along with the music hall songs). And I was near Bloomsbury where my mother lived when studying at University College.

Unusual? Yes.

Twelve girls got into Dartford Girls Grammar School on scholarships each year and my mother was one. One young person got to university every three years on a Cooperative Society employees scholarship and, thanks to London grocer father, it was her. She had enough funds to do A levels in a year and her degree in two. She did. Even more unusual, she did Biology and chemistry. there's a faded newspaper cutting in her papers which rather patronisingly writes about a girl of her class being given the opportunity to study science....

And, by the way, when she got to university she was the first woman to wear trousers to UCL . I love her!

It's all a reminder to be very very grateful for those who came before us and gave us so much that has enabled us to become who we are.

And, when I think of all my mother taught me   (empathy, thinking scientifically, love of nature....), a reminder that all we do, at home from day to day, for our own little girls, and boys, carries so much into their future lives.

Perfection and Alignment

There's very little to say in words to match the perfection of this crocus in sunlight.

I've been thinking about  taking moments to just stop and appreciate life in all the ways it show itself, especially right now in spring flowers.

So far it's been a very busy century and I want to make sure I don't gallop along doing all the detail for wonderful plans without stopping sufficiently to breathe in nature, peace and the wonder of life unfolding.

We are part of nature, though that can be easy to forget when we are rushing around in machines and buildings, and tapping away at computers as I am now.

How can I just let myself unfold and trust that process? That's not a woo-woo question in any sense. Yes, I must use my wonderfully logical and creative brain, and also I must go with what my body says. When those seem at odds there is work to be done.

Sounds familiar? When it happens to me then stopping and looking at nature is one of my best ways of realigning myself. a flower, a cat stretching, a toddler laughing, people smiling, any or all of those.

I think that's enough from me.

I'll let the crocus say something itself.

Emerging into spring

After feeling like a mole burrowing around in my house all day, recycling my air several times probably, I got myself out into the light and sunshine to breathe and to explore what was happening in the Dell. Green appearing everywhere on the ground, wild garlic, bluebell and daffodil leaves everywhere, brightness and sunbeams. Higher up on branches some beginnings of leaves and many tight buds, some sticky-tight still. It feels oh so different from a few weeks ago.

There's a mood of hope in spring, newness, sprouting, fresh energy and all of that. It's worth getting out into nature and noticing all the signs, either for a joyful confirmation of change and growth in your own life and business,

Or, if things are tough right now, for a feeling that can draw you along with it into a better space and new ways of seeing things. Those bare branches with sticky buds, not much happening yet, but with work and preparation inside something will burst forth. Just thinking about that sort of stuff can be very cheering - just imagine what getting out there and seeing it all, and breathing in fresh air, might do.....

International Women's Day

 I picked up the mail at the gym and tore out Hilary Clinton' International Women's Day article. Women, she says, 'still comprise the majority of the world's poor, unfed and unschooled. They are still subjected to rape as a tactic of war and exploited by traffickers globally in a billion-dollar criminal business'

The photos I'm posting here are from my time in Uganda with my daughter last autumn. She's made friends with some women who live in a shanty town on the outskirts of Kampala. She's even stayed over with the one she's made special friends with, squashing in with children and chickens. The women are refugees from the north, many of them either widows or victims of rape by soldiers and many of them, and their children, have AIDs. There are few men in the community. The women have been making a living cracking rocks for concrete and making beautiful varnished paper bead necklaces. My daughter set up a charity to sell the necklaces in the UK so now the women can do less concrete-making and more sitting around making beads and stringing them into necklaces. they've been paying for some of their children to go to school and to have a bit more food so they can have the energy for school. If you want to contribute scrol down on the left to 'my charity'. All the money goes to the women. Well actually to the collective they've formed with the local arm of the charity so that the money gets thoughtfully spent between them.

It was magic going to visit them and all  here in the west with worries about the credit crunch have much to learn from the level of positivity and joy these women muster. They sang us a thank you song about how they used to have to crack rocks all day and now they can do that less and instead make necklaces. And they gave me, as the mother, a garland of necklaces. Some I've kept and love to wear. Some I've given to friends and some we have added to the stock to sell because this is a long term project. It's a step towards a better life for these few women.

On a bigger scale, Hilary Clinton says: 'Supporting women is a high-yield investment, resulting in stronger economies, more vibrant civil societies, healthier communities and greater peace and stability.'

Too right!