journaling

Day 7 and Day 8 NaPoWriMo

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Ha, I seem to be doing a double dipping poetry day.

Day 7

You are oceans away from me,  the distance of our silence overwhelms me.  You are penny wishing well that takes my quarters and never gives any changes.. you sit statue against the sound of dripping tears, each one an echo of a prayer my heart never stops beating into me… One day you’ll look up to find me, and I’ll be an echo to the memory of a prayer you once said… because I’ve started tossing my quarters into my own well, and all I can see is change…

Day 8

Rose petals… whispers… rose petals… song… dance delicate lover, your scent is illuminating, I see who I am in your wonder… rose petals..and whispers lead me to your waiting arms… rose petals.. song.. the once we’ve been singing since our eyes first kissed… your lips are rose petals and song.. whispers I’m longing to hear… wrap your words around me like a love poem we never tire writing… and like this poem.. we, are, endless…

Day 4 & 5 Napowrimo

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So, yesterday got a bit busy, but today I’m making up for it with a double poetry post

 

Day 4

There are poems here, if you close your eyes and open your heart you can hear them.. They fly like fireflies through my caverns, little blinking illuminations, like snow globes you shake to remind yourself to “shake it up”… and each poem I bleed on to paper is shaking it up…  I write until my pen runs out of ink, my poems never run out of memories to fuel them… they are speed cars racing around tight bends, and crashing something beautiful into kaleidoscopic fragments… You might not get them, and I’m okay with that…. I’m not writing these for you, they are my poems, and they are hear… so close your eyes, and open your heart so you can hear them…

Day 5

Spring has sprung, and the birds… they are singing life back into the blossoms, and the grass, she is kissing our feet.. Dancing clouds move from images of cotton balls to animals and soon we’ll be blowing wishes on dandelions…  The crispness of the air gently reminds that winter, she’s only napping…  The clouds dance fiercely in the sunlight, and my feet… kissing the earth.

 

Nanowrimo Day 5

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Tonight I’m looking for falling stardust… my out stretched heart catching blessings like pennies on a homeless night..  My idea of God is a Cheshire cat smile shining down from a cloud… the cloud shifts from goddess to god to mirror… My reflection a blessing, my many imperfection worn like ink on skin kissing its way into forever… and most things.. are forever.. Like us, holding our outstretched souls hoping for a momentary miracle, a chance to let go, a flying kite signaling how free we are… every night I fly a bit higher, I dance a bit crazier…Look at that moon, she gets me drunk on moonshine, and I can help laughing.. a Cheshire smile across my face… a penny in my heart, and my soul… overflowing with blessing.

Nanowrimo Day 4

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Today I tossed a penny into a wishing well shaped like my heart…  Dreams come true, and my hands… are dream makers, my poems, echos of prayers kissing life into memories…  I’m learning slowly that perfection is found in falling down, life is about getting back up again, learning to dance with two left feet and my shoe laces tied together, but I dance… I sing a bit out of key, my voice.. tuned to my heart strings.. pluck me open, kick down the doors of my soul, lets dance in the rain, splash puddles under out feet, sweat glistening  something beautiful on skin… the moment sinking its way in… another poem kissing a memory, making beautiful love..

Napowrimo Day 3

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A Love Letter to my Broken Pieces

You lay on the floor, puddled memories drip from clenched eyes, tear holding softly to cheek.  My shadow sneaks up on me.. Memories sneak up on me, like hide and seek.. my anxiety never picks the safe places to hide… I wear my imperfections like tattoos on my face…  safe places are for dreamers, I’m someone that lives for a living… which is why I’m poor, but who needs a car when you can walk the line of a razor blade.. balance has never been my strong suit..so , I choose to teach yoga, hoping that in some ancient pretzel I can find nourishment…  I stand in the center ring of my circus, dreaming imperfectly beautiful dreams… coloring out of the lines…

 

Napowrimo Day 2

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There are days I wanted out… but you wrapped your arms around me like love, or.. broken promises.  The grip of all that we could be holds me like the echos of pennies tossed in wishing wells… dreams are sometimes nightmares, and we wake up screaming I love you into memories of how things use to be…  how things were when we first met… They said we wouldn’t last, but we proved them wrong, your name tattooed on my skin, you’re forever part of me.. ink kissing skin, spilling into poems… forever.

 

Mike Brazell

Napowrimo Day 1

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April is National Poetry Writing month!  What this means is that everyday for the month we write a poem.  It sounds easy enough, but it can really throw you for a loop.  I’m going to do my best this year to stick to getting a poem up each day of the month.

 

We were a beautiful mess.. We could sing back up to car wrecks, we were anthems to brokenness..  we wrapped broken promises around us hoping to keep warm, like your arms around me the day you left… You reached into my chest and etched your name on my heart… I write poems to forget, only to remember that poems never die…  you are etched into my skin, tattooed… You were the first, the ink touches my skin, the pain payment… the battle scars beautiful… our memories endless.

 

just a bit of stream of consciousness for tonight 🙂

 

You are Loved.  You are Beautiful.  You are Divine

Namaste!

Fasting Blog (The Pre-Fast)

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Today I am beginning a journey into a fast.  I have decided to share the journey here and to be a bit more transparent than I usually am with this process.  I sometimes tend to be more guarded with my process as fasting is a deeply personal venture.  When we start sharing we often will get criticism and judgment.  I will open up my process for discussion, but am not going to debate my fasting process or reasons for fasting.  That said, I feel that fasting is a powerful tool for both spiritual and physical alignment.  It is a way for us to let the internal organs rest, reset and align.  Fasting also brings us facet to face with our fears.  The fear of not having food, nutrition, or energy.

The biggest tool on a fast is a journal.  It is important to do a lot of self reflection while engaging the fasting process.  One, it allows you to do tunes in with where you are in the fasting process.   You want to pay attention to your health, where you are in the body and how you are connecting to the process itself.  I typically do not try to maintain strict time lines for fasting, but this time I am going to push past my own boundaries and go for an extended water fast.  I’ll be journaling the experience and of course blogging it here.   I am also going to do weekly video blogs that I’ll post here to give you updates on my progress.

I always start my fasts on a Monday (I’m a big OCD with dates and things, lol) so the Sunday before the fast I ease myself into the amount of water that I’ll be taking in for the duration.   I also give myself a few light, healthy low calorie snacks to ease me in to the fast.  The key is working with the body, bringing in the mind with ease, and allowing the spiritual component to also unfold.

So, that is just a bit of information for now.  I’ll post a bit more this evening.

Re-aligning with Purpose

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So, I took a bit of a break from working on blogs, writing and just about everything else.  When we engage spiritual work for a living we have to give ourselves space to take a step back, to re-examine our purpose and to decide what new directions we wish to explore.  Life is a dance and we sometimes need to take a break and wait for our favorite song to come on before we step back onto the dance floor.  One of the big things I know is that we have to give ourselves space to say no, to hold silence, and to rest.  So, I’ve been in hibernation.  Now, it is time to come out of the shell of my silence and bring into the work and world something new and engaging.  Life gets busy, and we forget to take time to reflect and align with the stuff that calls us.   My yoga practice has brought me a lot of balance (pun intended).  I find that with my yoga practice that regardless of how I feel emotionally that just moving my body helps the emotions to flow.   Some postures can be angry, some can be humble, others can open the valves of sadness, and others bring unconditional joy.   We hold a lot of who we are in the physical body.  It is often the piece of the puzzle that many of us forget to engage.  This body is the one living this beautiful experience.  Sometimes the beauty we live is a bit brutal, and the body remembers this.  It holds it, and we feel it.  I use my practice to move through this.  Over the past few weeks I’ve felt many emotions move through me and my practice.  The second action is journaling.  My journal helps to capture these moments for self reflection, so that I can sit with the narrative of my life experience and see the dance an its many parts.   

So, there is going to be more writing, more self-reflective posts and I am also going to be breathing life back into my other blogs.  Its time to move through the shell and to commit to this experience fully.   

You are Loved.  You are Beautiful.  You are Divine.  

Daily Practice: Keep a Yoga Journal

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journalingWhen we head out for our yoga classes, we pack our mats, our bags and even blocks, but we often forget to pack our journals.   The practice of journaling your yoga experience can really help you to embody the practice of yoga.  There is a lot that happens during a yoga session, and regardless of the type or style of yoga you are engaging it is important to catalog and dialogue with our practice.

Yoga is also much more than what happens on the mat, and being able to harness the power of our practice to move through our “off-mat” lives helps us to be unified with our actions, intentions and emotions.

I have always found journaling to be a powerful tool for assessing and dealing with emotions that come up.   Having a journal is like having a trusted friend that is there to listen, to help us process, and to help us connect to something below the surface.   If you are not currently keeping a journal I would really encourage starting one.  I’m not going to get into the nitty-gritty of what type of journal you should carry with you, but I personally prefer hand writing out my journals.  If you are going to be using your journal in your yoga class, I would encourage a paper journal and then you can transfer to your e-device.

Here are some things to consider including in your yoga journal:

  • What postures challenge you?
  • What external challenges are reflected to you by the posture?
  • What postures feel really good?  (This one is especially good if you are feeling deep release or relax from a posture being able to re-create that out of class will be important.)
  • What intention are you bringing into your practice?
  • What is yoga doing for you during this session?
  • Are there things in your life that yoga helps you move through?  How?
  • What emotions are you feeling during the class?   Which postures evoke those emotions?
  • Are you currently using a mantra?  What have the effects of that mantra been on your life?
  • What is the hardest part about yoga for you?
  • What is the easiest?

These are just a few questions, and I’ll dissect some of these as blog posts in the future.  You can also just write a list of gratitude, or doodle, draw, etc there really is not a right or wrong way to journal… the idea is to get energy moving and to capture your progress on all levels.  One of the things that I love about my older journals is being able to see my growth, to see what yoga helped me work through.

Mantras are also powerful magical tools.   Choosing to engage and stick with a mantra practice, and then seeing what effect that mantra is having on your life will let you capture those experiences for reflection.

You can also write quotes, intentions and ideas that you want to take into your practice with you.  You can also dedicate the energy of your practice to individuals, places and things in the world that might need a little extra push of energy.  Writing those down helps us to solidify the dedication of energy, and then as we carry our journals with us we also carry those we care for.

What is your favorite type of journal?

What is your journaling process?

Do you have resistance to journaling?  Can you identify the resistance?

What do you journal about?

Feel free to share int the comments below!

You are Loved.  You are Beautiful.  You are Divine.

Michael A. Brazell CFT CSN MAT PAT

www.michaelbrazell.com

michael@michaelbrazell.com