The Point of Light Exercise

As we head pell mell into the 21st century it is becoming obvious that our world is headed for some sort of ‘psychological entropic meltdown’.

Take today for example (keeping in mind that I am SUPPOSED to be taking it a ‘wee’ bit easy these days):

I arose at my usual 6:30 a.m., made coffee and read the news online, while fielding questions in my inbox and searching for some freebie terrains for Terragen.

By 7:30 I had found a few terrains, perused about a dozen online newspapers, read the sports pages on my fave sport sites, browsed through the forum at Canucks.com, drank my cup of coffee and was heading out the door for wee puff on my pipe.

By 7:38 I was back in the house just in time to hear Mini-Bear causing a ruckus in his room while Little Bear shook the cobwebs out of his nogging and tried to change Mini-Bears nappy and put on fresh shorts and tee shirt. Meanwhile Mrs. Bear had come downstairs, checked her freshly dyed skeins of wool and roving, grabbed a cup of coffee, put in her ‘ears’, read the first emails of the day in her inbox (She is WAY more popular than I am it seems…) and sorted yesterdays stack of snail mail.

8 o’clock found Mini-Bear in front of the TV eating his breakfast (muff-min please!) and sipping juice while Little Bear finished the last of his breakfast and started in on tidying the living room. Mrs. Bear was well ensconced in her wool empire and I was finishing off the dishes and tidying the kitchen.

By 9 o’clock the living room and kitchen were done and Mini-Bear and Little Bear were heading out the door to the park to play on the jungle gym. Quiet time at last perhaps?

Nope, at 10 the newspaper delivery man dropped off the 400 flyers and papers that Little Bear delivers around town on Fridays. After the usual chit-chat about the weather and crops (he also farms) I was able to sneak in just a small wee puff on my pipe and it was back inside to finish downstairs tidying and check the latest radar summary (ok, I am a bit OCD about the weather…).

10:30 I started whipping together a brunchy-lunch for all of us.

By 11:30 Mini-Bear was back in the kitchen working with his Resource Teacher for an hour (he has some speech issues but is making great progress!). The session ran long so after shooing the RT out the door at 1 pm Mrs. Bear and I headed off to town, first for some X-Rays for me then off to the car dealership about our trusty steed.

Back by 4, Little Bear jumped on his bike and headed out to deliver flyers (he was babysitting this afternoon), Mrs. Bear sat down on the veranda with laptop and answered more emails while working on a new pattern for her sock club and some sort of shetland wool shawl (her own spinning and dying of course).  I popped down to the grocery store and bought the ingredients for a salmon salad (too hot to cook – the salad rocked btw…).

By 6 the salad was ready, Little Bear roared in between rounds of flyer deliveries and we all ate dinner.

By 6:30 Little Bear was back on the road and the rest of us were out on the veranda, enjoying the cooler evening air (while Mrs. Bear read more emails and checked the weather – she is a bit OCD about weather as well…).

7:00 pm we FINALLY stopped, settling down in front of the tube to watch the Jays win their 4th in a row (10 innings – walkoff hit by Voodoo Joe Inglett – datsa mah boy!). Mini-Bear was in bed by 9 and Little Bear tottered off at 10.

Soo what did we accomplish today?

I am not quite sure other than frying out a whole bunch of brain cells running around like chickens with our heads cut off all day. And from the emails I get and online conversations it seems that everyone I talk to is in the same boat.

So how do you focus on days like this? or on any day for that matter?

If you find yourself scattering and ungrounded a little exercise that I use (that might work for you…) is what I call The Point of Light exercise. Now chances are pretty good this is not an unique exercise under this name. Mrs. Bear says it seems mighty Buddhist to her and others have said that they remember something similar in their travels.  In any event here it is, for what it is worth…

The Point of Light Exercise

1. Find someplace comfortable – an easy chair, piece of the back lawn under a tree, even the front seat of your car (PLEASE park the car first!!).

2. Shake your hands out a bit just to relax and get a bit of cool air running over your hands and arms.

3. Sitting quietly raise your hands in front of your face so that they are pressed lightly together palm to palm about a foot in front of your face (I think some call this steepling).

4. Now imagine a spot between your hands about mid palm and on that spot sits a tiny point of light.

5. With your eyes open or closed, contemplate that point of light, feeling yourself moving into the point of light as you explore it.

6. Take the time to explore the light, how it looks, what is inside, how it feels (texture and heat wise) etc. and enjoy the point of light.

7. After contemplating this tiny point of light until you feel your breathing slowing down and your heart beating softly, slowly back your mind out of the point of light until you can see outside your hands.

8. Release your hands and softly shake them out.

What I have found is that I feel incredibly focussed after this exercise, my synaptic juices flowing nicely and sometimes answers that eluded me pop right into mind. It only takes a minute or two in real time but the revitalizing effect of it can last with me for several hours.

As I said, it works for me and might not do a thing for you. But in this crazy world rushing toward psychological entropic meltdown it might help you focus back on what is REALLY important.

BB!

Kwee