It’s funny that today was supposedly Blue Monday (the most depressing day of the year), because I easily had one of my most productive days ever. I knocked about a dozen things off of my To-Do list, got to check off just about everyone of my Joe’s Goals boxes, ate really healthy, exercised pretty strenuously, even found time to read for both myself and work. So I say “bah” to you depression. Cheer up.
Apr
1
I’ve been reading a few books by Thich Nhat Hanh, a Zen Buddhist monk, and I came across a passage today in Peace Is Every Step that really struck a chord with me.
One day, I offered a number of children a basket filled with tangerines. The basket was passed around, and each child took one tangerine and put it in his or her palm. We each looked at our tangerine, and the children were invited to meditate on its origins. With some guidance, they began to visualize the blossoms in the sunshine and in the rain. Then they saw petals falling down and the tiny green fruit appear. The sunshine and the rain continued and the tiny tangerine grew. Now someone has picked it and the tangerine is here. After seeing this, each child was invited to peel the tangerine slowly, noticing the mist and the fragrance of the tangerine, and then bring it up to his or her mouth and have a mindful bite, in full awareness of the texture and taste of the fruit and the juice coming out. We ate slowly like that.
This story reminded me of when I was younger and would watch Mr. Rogers, or Sesame Street when they would take a visit to some big factory or show you the behind the scenes of how something worked and how cool those episodes were. I specifically remember Mr. Rogers visiting a crayon factory (which was particularly awesome because of all the bright colors and mess) and then later that day looking at my crayons and thinking how awesome it was knowing how they got there. I don’t know what I did after that because I can’t draw for shit, but it was cool knowing how the crayon had come to be.
Granted, it’s much easier to get into the state of amazement as a child, but I’ve been slowing down and trying to appreciate everything a little bit more today. I wish I could have found the crayon video, but most of the Mr. Rogers videos on YouTube are all prank call vids, so here’s a random episode that I found.