It's a Journey, not a Trip

This is my last blog from Japan for a few weeks.

Tomorrow morning at 7am Mayu is going to take me down to the local train station where I will start my journey to Houston, Texas, work there for a week, and then head over to Stefnee, Kansas to holiday for a week.

I have decided that these two weeks I am going to be taking myself on a "training journey" where I will be putting my money where my breath is, you could say.

I have been doing all this NewAge Wackhead talking about breathing, and being present, and aware, and conscious of the NOW moments for a while now, and some of you may be thinking, "has this guy been breathing too much fermented garlic juice or something? Did he hit his head on one of his bike rides and just not tell us or something? Is he dying of cancer or something?" No(w). No (w). No(w).

But I am serious about what I have been talking about.

And now it is time to take myself on some personal "shugyo" (training) like the monks might do alone up in the mountains by themselves to train their mind, body, and spirit.

The next two weeks, I am going to practice very hard at truly being 100% present in the moment of those 1,555,200 seconds that I will be away. I will follow Agreement #4 in "The Four Agreements" and DO MY BEST. And I will be very happy with doing the very best I can, even if it isn't perfect. I already am extremely happy with the excellent results I achieve during those two weeks. I can see it, feel it, imagine it, emote it and just simply (k)now.

"Be, all that I can be, in my breathing...."

What this means is that I will not be looking for things to blog about. I will not be taking photos to share with the world. I will not be making videos, processing, and uploading them at night after the day is done.

Instead, I will be spending every waking moment with the people that I am with, totally present with them, totally immersed in them, there, then, now, and as Thich Nhat Hanh says, practice "active meditation", or meditation in action.  (Passive meditation occurs when one sits quietly in a quiet place immobile and meditates).

If I find something tremendously profound, sure, I may share it on the blogs, but I won't be focusing on "what can I blog about". In the evenings once I am alone, if I am still awake, I will spend the time focusing on my breath, on meditation, on being present and aware, on communication with my subconscious and superconscious, developing the connection through my NOW moments, and through my emotions.

I will not be taking a trip this time around. I will be taking a journey; a journey of spiritual shugyo, or training the spirit, and the mind to help me grow into the new person that I am working very hard to become. One day I will be ready to divorce the old me from the new me, and that will be a day for quiet celebration.

It is time for me to stop "just sucking air" and transform.

Here's a thought for you to breathe over...

If any of you who come to read me or visit my page regularly want to give this "breath thing" a try, why not take the time you would use visiting me, or commenting on my blogs, videos etc, and actively block off that time and just practice breathing, being present, being in the NOW.

If it is five minutes a week that you visit me, then why not try doing nothing but breathing, being present and saying to yourself something like, "I am aware of taking in a long deep breath...... I am aware of exhaling a long, slow breath...." for five minutes and thinking about nothing else? If you find your mind wanders to other thoughts (and it will, I guarantee you this), just be aware of those thoughts, note them, then envision a paper bag on the right side of your mind that you can take those thoughts and put them in. Then go back to your breathing. And when another random thought pops in (and it will, probably with a vengeance), just do the same thing... be an observer, and put the thought in the paper bag.

This may sound weird, but the results you get from practicing this are unbelievable. You can actually become a "third party observer" of your mind's thoughts and not be emotionally attached to them. It's wonderfully liberating because we are so linked to our thoughts through emotions and physical responses and don't even realize it. But by practicing this regularly, it seriously allows you to become unaffected by the thoughts in your mind. And when you realize you can do this, this is when you finally understand that you have a mind, and the mind has it's thoughts, but you are NOT your mind. You can separate yourself from those thoughts that come and go, from the memories, from the past pains, and emotions, from it all. And the only way you can actually separate yourself and observe your own thoughts is if you are not your mind. If you were your mind, you would not be able to do this. But it works. I've proven it to myself that it works.

It is liberating, believe me. This is how I have been rewiring my neural net these past six months. And I have to especially thank Dharma for helping me with this by providing me with the tools to allow me to start working at this. Without her assistance, I never would have been able to come to this first step in a lifelong positive, active transformation that I am heading on. (I love you, Abby!)

Jen knows this works. Stefnee knows this works. They too are working on doing this same thing, and if you think I'm too wacked out to make any sense, ask them. We are all running on parallel tracks heading into our own various destinations, at different speeds that suit our needs, and the lay of the land as we track through it, but we are all working on transforming into more aware human beings. It is a wonderful thing to see them transforming and growing, and and wonderful to  know they see changes in me.

Enough of the NewAge Wackhead stuff, already, Cam!

OK, OK, Cam...

So if you don't hear from me until I get back to Japan in July... you know where I will be, and what I will be up to!

I love you!

Cam