Lately, I felt an inner ache for a more peaceful and contemplative life. Over the last year, something has shifted inside me and my focuses have changed. Expanded, maybe. I want to be wholesome, not exclusive. After thinking a lot about how “small is wonderful” I began to cherish life in the smallest ways, to the biggest ways – in all the ways that life comes.
I have been contemplating how to live a bright, vibrant life and what this means to me. For me, this means to live with consciousness and presence.
To open up each moment and live in the essence of it. To pursue the quiet pastimes of reading, writing, thinking. I used to do a lot of that a few years ago, but as I started getting busy with other things (and sometimes busy with the wrong things), my practices of contemplation and solitude fell away. There’s nothing wrong with “busy”. But I want to be conscious of my “busy”. And I want to be happy during my “busy”.
If you want to change how your life feels there is a process to it. You first have to make the commitment to creating what you truly care about. In this way, your mind becomes organized and focused. Once your mind is focused, your emotions and feelings begin to re-arrange and organize themselves. Then comes your body and your vital life energies. They re-orient themselves to what you have focused on. Once these elements are pointing in the direction that you have committed to, your ability to create and manifest is awakened. And life will being to feel the way you want it to.
I would like to share with you some notes I written on what it is to live a quiet, contemplative life.
Quieten
This means to quieten our thoughts, our mind, our emotions. Turn the dial down on the sharpness of life. Live Hushed and be comfortable with silence.
Listen
To listen more. To be totally absorbed in listening. To stop my incessant running commentary of life. To be there more for another person. To listen to their stories. To listen to uplifting words and to only speak the words that grow wings on the back of the listener. To listen to the sounds of nature, the birds singing, the wind amongst the leaves. To listen to spiritual music, divine sounds.
Read
To curl up with a book on a Sunday afternoon, under the gray light of the late autumn sun. To read books that fill us with hope. To build stories in your mind. To read divine wisdom and gorgeous prose.Write
To sit at the table and handwrite a story, a letter, a poem, a diary entry, a prayer, a wish list.Contemplate
To lay on your bed with nothing but the sound of rain drops against your window pane and melodies of your thoughts and feelings. To contemplate true love, happiness, aspirations, values, dreams, hopes, the magnificence of life. To consider the feelings of others, your dharma, your next step.
To face difficult thoughts, inner challenges with bravery. To know yourself intimately. To observe your thoughts without judgment and to choose which ones to keep and which ones to let go.
Prayer
Beginning and ending each day in prayer. To live each day as a prayer. An ache. A dedication to something sacred.
MeditateSpending time in stillness, washed and cleansed by the golden light of the divine.GentleTo practice non violence; non violence in words, thoughts and deed. To be a gentle presence. To come and go swiftly, and with ease, like a soft warm breeze.PresenceTo melt into every moment. To pay attention on life flowing around you. To become part of humanity. To do what ever is required of you in that very moment and do it well and with heart. To be there for someone or something. To truly be there. To see things with clarity. To be born again in every moment.Simplicity Simplifying your routines, your day, your heart and your mind. Finding the essence of it all. Have only things that you love and add value and beauty to your life.
Wholesome
Whole foods and wholesome heart. Let everything in our life be as organic, pure and wholesome as it can be.
NatureRevelling in how glorious nature is. Hand picking flowers. Adoring earth. Growing and helping things grow. Watching the seasons change. Learning to love the rain.SunriseTo stop ignoring a miracle that happens every morning. To share a sunset with someone we love. Or in solitude. To wake up with the earth. To perform sun salutations each morning. To live with the cycle of the sun.BeautyAlways looking for the beauty in everything around us. To create something beautiful in this life time and in this world. To make beauty our craft.AppreciationTo think about what we are grateful for. To share that gratitude. To write a thank you note. To make a phone call. To show up at a doorstep with home made jam or hand picked flowers or a warm hug.
Walks
Go for walks, just you and the road. Listen to something pleasant. Think pleasant thoughts. Become inspired by nature and life as it happens around you. Just walk. Just walk with no particular destination in mind. Walk and walk and walk until you want to come back home.
Friendships To be a better friend. To truly listen to a friend and exist in their world. To cherish your friend and the friendship they bring. To sit with a friend, to laugh together and share stories.Fresh, Bright, Vibrant To open your windows and the let the sunlight and freshness pour into your room. To keep our internal energies vibrant and pure. To live in holy cleanliness. To renew our inner energies and our surroundings.SilenceSpend some part of your day in silence. We live in such an overstimulated world, where life in silence feels not only uncomfortable but unbearable sometimes. But be silent anyway. Listen to the sounds that happen around you naturally. Birds singing, wind in the leaves, laughter, distant conversations, footsteps, the sound of your own breath. I have learned that the only time we can truly listen, is when we are silent.PeaceCreate peace around you, and make your life glow with peace. Try to resolve all conflict situations with your peaceful energy and intentions. Step away from conflicts. Focus on peace instead. Let things be. Let people be. Let life happen. Accept reality with love and open arms. This is reality. Choose peace.
Calm
Try to everything you need to do calmly. Fold your laundry calmly. Cut the vegetables for dinner calmly. Face uncomfortable situations calmly. Speak calmly. Make decisions calmly. Think calmly.
SpaceCreate space in your life, both physically and metaphorically. De clutter your home. Create space in your home. Let the energies flow. Create space in your life for the new to enter. Opportunities need space to grow. Be open.—–Just some ideas for us to think about this Sunday. Sunday’s are always my most slow paced and contemplative day of the week. I would like to let this energy leak and spill into the rest of the week too. Take care,Malavika xo
