"never leave home without Betty & Pansy"!

The word is struggle.

Not such a bad word really. Struggle denotes something that doesn't come easily. And there is always the possibility that that which does not come easily means more in the end. Lessons learned. Larger impact.

Practice. Yoga practice. Meditation practice. Asana practice. Life. Has never come easily to this girl. There has always been this back and forth tug-of-war between lethargy and ambition. Spontaneity and routine. Pain and joy. Though I have learned that structure is the type of discipline that is needed. Structure in which to find the ease.

So how does one go about finding this structure?

When the mind, the heart, and the body all want different things. Past the point of simply fitting it all in. It has become like a new beginning. Beginner mind. Starting over from scratch.
This is the task at hand.

I have come to a point where I want to offer new things... And one can only do that through practice and learning. Expand. The mind. The knowledge. The consciousness. The heart.

So let us pause for a moment. And visualize that the reset button has been pressed.
Here we go again. Pause. Rewind. Play.

------

The cat is snoring.

------

Show and tell time. Something to share from the new book that I am reading. "Paths to God: Living the Bhagavad Gita" by Ram Dass. Nicole's must read book of the year (so far). Please enjoy.

At what point do people become "us" instead of "them"?
Who is "them"?
I've told this story before, but it's worth repeating because it spells out the issue so beautifully. It concerns a discussion I once had with my father (back in the early 1970s), about a set of records I'd isssued called Love, Serve, Remember.
My father said to me, "I saw those records you put out. They look great. But I can't understand: Why are you selling them so cheaply? You're selling 6 records for $4.50? You could probably get $15 for those records -- well, $9, anyway!"
I said, "Yeah, Dad, I know, but it only costs us four and a half dollars to produce them."
He asked, "How many have you sold?"
I said, "About ten thousand."
He said, "Would those same people have paid nine dollars for them?"
I said, "Yeah, probably they would have paid nine."
"You could have charged nine," he said, "and you only charged four-fifty? What are you, against capitalism or something?"
I tried to think how I could explain it to him. My father was a lawyer, so I said, "Dad, didn't you just try a case for Uncle Henry?"
He said, "Yeah."
I asked, "Was it a tough case?"
"Oh you bet. Very tough," he said.
"Did you win it?"
"Yeah," he said, "but I'll tell you, I had to spend a lot of time on that damn case. I was at the law library every night, I had to talk to the judge -- a very difficult case."
I said, "Boy, I'll bet you charged him an arm and a leg for that one!"
My father looked at me as if I'd gone crazy. He said, "What! -- are you out of your mind! Of course I didn't charge him -- Uncle Henry is family."
I said, "Well, Dad, that's my predicament. If you show me anybody who isn't Uncle Henry, I'll happily rip him off."

-------------

Be well. x. -n.