❧
I'm still trying to describe an invisible process that can only be observed by it's outward appearances. My interaction with the external world from the inside out is the most difficult stuff for me to write about.
The walking meditation I developed for my self to observe when I'm out walking to get a modicum of aerobic exercise worked really well for me today. What happened was nothing new. I've attempted to do it before. The goal is so nebulous in construction and so hard to hold in place long enough to develop an idea about it, that it always surprises me if I have any success at all.
A lot of what the practicing is about is breath. Not so much breath control. That part of it is fairly easy if you've ever practiced meditating when sitting. I count even numbers when I inhale, and odd numbers when I exhale. That's not as easy. Couple that with inhaling when I step with my left leg, taking two steps, and exhaling with the step of my right leg.
So, I deliberately arrange to start by exhaling at the time I step with my right leg and mentally counting the number "One", and left step, right step, and count "Two" when I step with my left leg, then right step, and inhale again on the next left step... ad infinitum.
That's not too difficult for me anymore. Occasionally, for example, a customer may come out of one of the shops and that breaks my concentration, but I just start again and establish my count again.
What I did today that was one toke over the line was that I attempted to introduce another activity, and that was to concentrate on breathing from my taint instead of just my lower belly. I do that constantly in my sitting meditations, but to do it when I'm walking in public instead of while I'm alone in my room takes a little more patience.
I was able to stay focused for about a half mile. That's very good for me. Probably the best I've ever done while walking.
When I woke up this morning I realized I had laid down to take a nap and ten hours later I got up in the early morning. I was dreaming about being on the road as a bum again. I was as skinny as a rail, and I never got sick. I couldn't afford a doctor, so I just didn't get sick.
The reason that I was skinny is that I'm not that good at begging, and I had to really be hungry to do what I needed to do to feed myself. I seem to be headed back to that sort of life style, except that I'm staying in one place now, and have money to buy food if I want it, and a kitchen and a refrigerator. I'm not healthy anymore, and I think that's why.
The drugs they prescribe for autoimmune dis-eases are almost as bad for you as the disease. I'm learning a lot about the expression "autoimmune disease". There are quite a few diseases that come under that label, and all of them are horrid. Diabetes being the most well known.
The way the term "auto" is used in autoimmune is the same way it's used in autohypnosis. Self-hypnosis. With autoimmune diseases your own immune system has turned against you and doing the very opposite of protecting against intruders. It's a real drag, man, but that's death for you. It's called the aging process. The immune system is said to build what it takes for your body to survive in a cold, cruel world, and then when you get too old for it to support it turns on you like Judas and nails you to the cross.
The most offensive part of this process is to be forced by the powers that be to treat hope for the future as mere baggage. Hope is the only reason anybody needs to face the future. Hope is the only product on Earth anybody got for sell. Getting old is realizing all the money in the world can't buy enough hope to ward off the inevitability of death.
Abiding the ignorance of those do-gooders whose self-appointed calling is to cheer you up and take hope in your future in heaven with God. Hope is all they got for sale too. Hope for a better day when yo' days are numbered? How ridiculous is that?
❦