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It is hard changing the way I talk to myself. It does work, but it can be challenging at times.

It's helpful to find a way to pause the inner monologue, so I can step back from it, reflect on it and then practise narrating things in a different way, which can help change my perceptions of things.

Sankaras are moral choices, intentions, the tendencies of the mind, the inner volitions, that produce our karma (our speech and action). 

When intentions are driven by craving and ignorance, they produce Samsara.

As beings become less ignorant of their intentions they can learn how to change them to something more helpful, which in turn changes their karma.

It takes time, and one will fail over and over again. I certainly do, I'm no angel. But I am learning that that is part of the training too, learning how to fail well, with wisdom (-:

Trying not to be so hard on myself when I don't always get it right. To experiment and play, investigate. To become a friend to myself instead of a horrible boss. Training myself to see the mind as a team, and to be compassionate and friendly towards it instead of bossy.

Training the mind is like when one learns to paint, or to make music, or learns a sport, or learns to ride a bike. Effort is needed at first, but the effort is something we already know about, it comes naturally to us. We use it without thinking when we learn a new skill.

I am concentrating mainly on learning to calm the mind at the moment. Developing serenity practices that help quieten the thought energies and bring the mind to stillness and balance. These are also samadhi practises. I find these practises very challenging at times, but they are very helpful and worth the time spent learning them.

I give up trying to be perfect.

To be anyone actually. It's rather tiring and burdensome.

I release the mind from its self-imposed burdens.

Then joy arises like the beautiful scent of a flower.

Or like a clear fountain of water, a wellspring I forgot was there.

Could this be the way to samadhi?

A way to cross the flood without straining and without halting?

Without grasping.

My latest article on Substack:

I'm struggling a bit at the moment. My health is not great and I think it's hard for people to understand the impact that cognitive difficulties has. I've been experiencing a lot of unpleasant mood swings, and it's not just in the mind, it's physical as well. I am experiencing debilitating fatigue, it feels unbearable sometimes, I sometimes contemplate taking my life because it feels so unpleasant, the thirst for non-existence gets really strong sometimes. Don't worry I won't kill myself, but the thoughts do occur quite frequently and they can be relentless.

Cognitive disability and mental illness is invisible to others in society, I look normal on the outside, and people don't know how much I am struggling unless I tell them, even then I sometimes get gaslit.

I dislike all the push towards ableism in society. I'm afraid to even say I'm on disability benefit at the moment. If my disability payments get stopped I'll probably end up dying on the street somewhere, because I won't be able to afford to live.

The biggest problem with the UK economy isn’t people claiming disability benefit, it's the billionaires, they're the great drain on our economies. We lose far more money from the super wealthy dodging taxes than we do on people claiming disability benefit.

Worry can feel like torture. 

Just sensing the breath can be helpful. Counting the breaths after each exhalation, up to five, and then resetting the count and counting up to five again. Sometimes I do this as a quick micro meditation. The counting is helpful to keep paying attention to the breath.

When the counting becomes easy and I am able sustain mindfulness of the breath, I stop counting and just be with the breath, like watching clouds in the sky.

There can still be thinking going on but it feels less intrusive and it's easier to not react to it or be disturbed by it. Eventually the mind stops resisting and thinking can stop and there is just a deep inner silence and stillness. A centred calm.

There can be a lot of noise outside but because the mind is absorbed in inner silence and stillness it is not disturbed by it.

It seems having a conscience makes someone a terrorist now.

In reality, it's those who support genocide and ecocide who are the terrorists.

The world feels quite Orwellian at the moment.

Gouache on paper 20x30cm 

My latest article on Substack:

Gouache on paper 20x30cm 

Gouache on paper 30x40cm 

Gouache on paper 20x30cm 

Gouache on paper 20x30cm