Tuesday, June 17, 2008

pursuit of simple pleasures.

I've forgotten how freeing it feels to have a bike and ride it down all the nook and cranny streets you never before knew existed! ah, to keep experiencing these simple pleasures .... now if only i could read more these days! sometimes, i think i'm addicted to the computer ... and while i think the Internet is a wonderful interactive tool, it's amazing how fast time passes while you're on it .... I am craving writing some actual letters to friends very soon. And getting through that first required reading book (for my Montessori training) ... soon ... very soon!

2 comments:

  1. wholeheartedly agree with your thoughts here, karen!!! i've been so much less interested in the computer the past 6 months, myself. can't explain why, just probably my heart's desire for peace and a genuine connection to nature, and the community around me. and i don't know about you, but i get on these google search kicks (mostly about health) that set off these chains of ruminating thoughts. (karl's friend jokes that the computer is used as a "truthbox" for everything. how sad, but true! does anyone even use an encyclopedia anymore?) not to say i *don't* enjoy keeping up and reading about my friends, but if i can contain the internet to only the most important things, like friends and important business, i know i am *so* much happier. a heartfelt and deep correspondence matters so much more to me!

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  2. i do the EXACT same thing, and after several hours of frantic and tangiental searching, i can easily convince myself i have SYMPTOMS of X and Y disease. we were just talking (blair, angie and i) in the car last night about how you just have to make a conscious decision to opt out of the media's sensationalistic sells. For example, did you know that cancer deaths have actually been rapidly declining for years now? Yeah .... I was expressing to them that I was where you seemed to be a few years back: constantly anxiety-riddled, not at all because I'm unhappy with myself or with my life, but because I feel I've been recently awakened to all that's going on around me. My idealism is being shattered left and right, and perhaps it's my fall from such a high height that infuriates such intense, nearly physical anger (i.e. the anger takes a physical anxiety-induced toll, tightness in my body, panic attacks, etc.) at all the stupidity and ignorance people have ... i.e. driving Hummers, using plastic bags at the store, "needing" the latest do-dads and trends ... etc. Just like you had to do, and eventually did successfully, I have to create my OWN world in which I am putting into action everything I'd like to see everyone else be doing. It's funny ... deep down I realize I can only control what I do, but that anger ... and perhaps frustration at not being able to change others' reactions to their world ... seeps in and soils everything. So I'm at a stage of evolving ... past that, and just learning to ACCEPT for GOOD that I can make a difference, however small ... and to KNOW that I just MUST let the other external stimuli GO. That's where I'm trying to come in with purposeful daily meditation, etc. I know I'll get through this phase. But boy is it tough. Yes, I agree on the Internet thing: great tool for interaction with friends and quick business, but I'm re-discovering consulting books, and picking up old finds at sales like "Birds of the World." I think it's easier to do this now that I have a teacher's mind. As we don't have a computer in the classroom, but access to hundreds of books! As I recall ... that's all we used as children to complete our reports! I recall sitting for hours in the NBPL ... a stack of books by my side ... and just researching myself dizzy. I loved that old research room with the fireplaces ... now unfortunately the magazine room .... but i digress. what fun to live our lives *just* the way we want to! but how hard the path to realigning ourselves on a road not paved with concrete. Still, i walk on.

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