Y5 – Day 92 – On Doubt and Worry

“Doubt is a pain too lonely to know that faith is his twin brother.” – Kahlil Gibran

Being saddled with doubt and worry is a detriment to your health. Both harangue with uncertainty. They stagnate forward motion. Doubt makes you uncertain and worry causes anxiety. Each stem from and exude fear.

Doubt crops up when you expect events and relationships to follow your plans yet fret they will not. As you enter a party, doubt undermines your confidence. You distrust people will like you. Doubt assumes and expects the worst. It surrounds itself with negative naysayers. To challenge the ebb and flow of life, emboldens cynicism. Furthermore, it feeds the bitterness of disbelief. Luckily, the antidote to doubt is faith.

Worry, on the other hand, harps on anxiety. Like doubt, worry craves a situation (like getting the job) will work out and makes you afraid it won’t. You agonize as you constantly forecast gloomy weather. Worry has you embedded to a specific result. You fixate on a particular outcome. This leads to dread. You fret and suffer with a trembling despair you will ever work again, for example. Worry takes over your common sense, logic and the laws of probability. To banish dark worry, respond to it with the light of hope and optimism.

Plenty of stress and misery comes from both the ambiguity of doubt and the anguish of worry. It is a vicious, unhappy and crazy cycle of doom and gloom. If you continue to delude yourself you can control anything but your own reactions, the more out of control you will feel. I know this powerlessness feels like defeat, but don’t allow doubt to raise your suspicious antennae and entangle your mind. Instead, accept life on its own terms and counter with your best self.

In place of rehashing the past and predicting a dismal future, await life with wonder. Live in the present moment. 

Behind every fear you have, is a lack of love and faith.

I understand my doubt and get beyond my worry when I trust in love and my beliefs.

Y5 – Day 91 – Ayurveda

Ayurveda is the Vedic sister science and nutritional discipline to yoga. It is an ancient system wherein your pre-determined body type or dosha requires certain foods and herbs to stay balanced and healthy. According to your dosha, a list of meals and movement are prescribed to stabilize and strengthen your metabolism and emotions. It is likewise accepted as a form of disease prevention, maintaining weight and enhancing ageless beauty. It submits to the concept we are all different, not one remedy for all. For example, beans may work for some folks, but bother others with painful gas. You may be allergic to nightshades, but your friend feels her best when she eats tomatoes, peppers and eggplant.

“As long as we are not living in harmony with nature and our constitution, we cannot expect ourselves to be really healed. Ayurveda gives us the means.” – David Frawley

Y5 – Day 90 – Earth Science

I thought I believed in science as much as I believe in spirituality.

In any case, I have a deep sense of connection with my DNA to all of life.

Yet, as I grow older, I am suspicious of science and not of sacred matters. Science is man’s interpretation, deduction, reduction and theory of observation, experimentation and rationalization. It may be pigeon-holed, narrow or politicized. It is not irrevocable and it is not without its drawbacks (think: nuclear).

Whereas, the informative six senses between me and nature are an immediate draw and power that holds infinite layers of wonder. Its truth is absolute. Its glory is astonishing. Its poetry is sincere.

Mother Earth, GAIA, Pachemama is screaming to get us off her back, to stop polluting her waters and soils and to care for her and all her sentient beings.

Y5 – Day 88 – Harvesting

Thank you to contributor V from Oregon for this scrumptious array of produce from a farm in Portland where she toils in the black dirt and reaps rewards. Red and yellow onions braided with violet flowers and raffia twine, drape the kitchen wall. Hot red chili peppers hang clothesline style. Meanwhile, yellow squash and orange gourds stand alone like regal sentinels. Honey, golden cherry and crimson red tomatoes crowd into recycled green baskets. Various colored potatoes (not pictured well but next to gourd) collect inside a stainless bowl. A feast of surprising color combinations, taste sensations, seasonal September delights and satisfaction for the sustainable gardener.

Y5 – Day 87 – Mandalas Intro 2

In nature, flowers spiral out of a center, in concentric circles. For example, imagine the lotus, the daisy and the Black-Eyed Susan. Shells and ferns coil out from a nucleus. Snowflakes and spiderwebs revolve and form intricate designs from a core as well. Rock geodes and tree trunks cut in half show pure mandalas formed over hundreds of years.

Mandalas are nothing less than intrinsic to our galaxy. Indeed, our cells and atoms are mandalas. 

Dr. Seuss was right when he wrote Horton hears a Who and described how a whole world lives inside a speck of dust. I recall being entranced by the childhood pastime of happily crafting mandalas with Spirograph.  

Mandalas illustrate and embody the interconnectedness of our weblike existence, 

Coloring in mandalas are not only a way to play, infusing our creative juices with guidelines, curves and hues, it is likewise a process wherein we relate to, and engage with, the cycle and circle of life.

Y5 – Day 86 – Mandalas Intro

It is interesting to note that mandalas exist in American indigenous tribes, Eastern religious sects and nature. 

Mandala in Sanskrit means circle. Mandalas are symbols of the universe. They are a spiritual diagram of the cosmos. In many cases, their geometric pattern includes a square. Each side of the square is a T shaped gate, representing a portal. Within these gates is a center point. Mandalas are a meditative tool. They help us create a sacred space and find focus. 

Native American mandalas include dream catchers and labyrinths. When we ponder the patterned circles, we come across various metaphors. You may see and understand the web of life, the infinite voyage of our soul’s journey, the power of nature or celestial wisdom. 

Tibetan Buddhist monks have a ritual wherein they fill in huge, floor mandalas with colored sand for days. They meticulously pour handfuls or finger amounts of sand onto sacred, encircled shapes. When they finish their multicolored live artwork, they blow the surface off, dispersing and destroying their handiwork. This is a symbolic reminder of the immediacy, fluidity and impermanence of life.