hallo joe and all the troops joe i am super busy at moment. grand daughter's 3rd birthday fairy party on 4th nov and the hubby's 70th hush hush top secret party on 11th nov
i thank you for your thoughts and links.yes will check out..many thanks yes i read the book on breath and it did take my breath away..finished it last night...and yes restless if no sleep at all... sometimes we are moved in mysterious ways...and as i think... i think what are those monks called who can control their breath...to the extent they hardly breath at all.. so i ask all this huffing and puffing about breath is that the only way?... i am thinking pulse...i note when i put my hands together as in prayer the tips of the fingers touching tightly i can feel the pulse... and i can count the pulse..i am wondering maybe this is the way for me... the breath thing just does not work no matter how hard i try.. breathing to me is a normal everyday event a natural..otherwise you dead... listening to pulse well that is something else... i remember as a kiddy listening to my breathing..and thinking how marvellous it is... so automatic..so freely given..a gift indeed.. but so with pulse..what a gift... i will go and get the book on breath... wait a minute ".... take a deep breath"...... the haiku way to inner peace..sylvia forges-/ poet ryan edward ryan yale psychologist harold bloom, virginia brady young joseph goldstein sharon salzberg have recommended the book kodansha International .... first edition 2002..www. thejapanpage.com do you know of the insight meditation society? i have not slept properly and soundly since i commenced reading this book on wed night.... it is simple beauty and relationship with nature is stunningly moving nothing i did not know but you so often forget so bare with me at the moment i am snowed under with family activities and so so needing to catch up on sleep i maybe off line for awhile however not off course forever breathing and forever pulsating and yes we must put our hands together in prayer for edgar those of us who care! and our hands together in prayer for all our brothers and sisters who have been devastated by hurricane sandy may their journey of recovery be swift good luck in the american elections... here in australia we will be observing with eagle eyes..that you folk make the correct choice the world depends on it choose wisely pretty please!!!!!!!!!!!!! merle Merle, That book sounds interesting. I wonder: what is the title? And who wrote it? Is it still in print? Just out?, or has it been available for a while? I wonder if you have the nice, large size (8 1/2 x 11 inch pages) classic Taoist books, illustrated with photographs, of Lao Tse's and Chuang Tse's books (see details in links below at the Amazon US site): http://www.amazon.com/25th-Anniversary-Edition-English-Mandarin-Chinese/dp/0679776192/ref=pd_sim_b_3 http://www.amazon.com/Chapters-English-Mandarin-Chinese-Edition/dp/0394719905/ref=pd_cp_b_1 These have been out since the 1970s, and are just beautifully made. Elegant B & W photographs, with Mandarin script overlaid, faced by a page in English. Not many words per page, really something to contemplate. Maybe to be "read" at a speed of one page per day... or one page per WEEK! Much of Zen lore is steeped in this Taoist legacy. See if it resonates with you. I think it will! And the illustrations may give ideas for paintings or drawings. The Editor, Jia Fu Feng, is a great Tai Chi teacher; the Photographer, Jane English, is also great at what she does. --Joe PS In what you wrote, it seems to me as if the stimulation and restlessness of the mind created by the reading is actually a good thing. "Practice" takes a lot of forms, and sometimes activity -- even activity of the mind, of course -- is what makes us "move" in our lives, and in our practice. Yes!, we can lose sleep over it! What could be a more important reason, or cause? ;-) > Merle Lester <merlewiitpom@...> wrote: > > i am reading a book about the breath..last night..then i could not relax to > go to sleep..my mind became activated into deep thought...the mind became > restless ...the images in the book were beautiful..relating to the seasons, > meditation and zen practises...yes billlllll i do have a problem..my mind... > to understand i need to understand through my mind...then i can move on..when > the mind is restless i cannot move on..and again i have no way from here to > going to a zen centre...merle
