mindfulness

Useful Wisdom from Books about Nothing

Without realizing it, I’ve collected a few books about “doing nothing”, one for kids and a couple for adults. All have unexpected wisdom to offer.

Listing What You Like Yields Mighty Benefits and Poetry

At the great Artist’s Prints and Multiples, we came across these inspired fridge magnets. We realized that making lists of “likes” can provide the same benefits as counting blessings AND work curiously like poetry…

Extraordinary Words on Ordinary Things

In the course of a week, we came across some extraordinary writings secreted in the most unlikely places, in plain site.

Starting Here, What Do You Want to Remember? (William Stafford)

This came over our transom this morning via Ellen Silverman: a poem by William Stafford that immediately enlivened the day. It tunes the self to seeing, and being more fully here.

Alison Harris’ Skyscapes: “Being Attentive to What is At Hand”

Photographer Alison Harris spent six years photographing the sky from her window in Italy. The result is a series of photographs that gradually evolved into an exhibition in Milan. It also became a simple, contemplative practice that we can all easily do…

Wonders and Possibilities Hiding in Plain Sight

In Fly By Night, artist Duke Riley trained 2,000 pigeons to fly above the Brooklyn Navy Yard at dusk with tiny lights attached to their legs. The performance invites us to really SEE something we are so accustomed to that we’ve become blind to it:

Al Hirschfeld: What Happens if You Reframe Work as Play

Legendary illustrator Al Hirschfeld worked seven days a week and wouldn’t have it any other way. Nor did he ever consider retiring. He LOVED to work and felt at sea if he didn’t draw every day. He worked until he died just shy of 100 years old. The secret to Hirshfeld’s drive was the pleasure he took in work.

Injury’s Message + Band-aids’ Vast Possibilities

Over many years of cooking professionally, amidst sharp knives and fire, I learned that an accidental cut or burn was in fact a signal: a message from myself to myself that I was distracted. I needed to listen deeply to what was going on, or at the very least, slow down and take care. I…

Tree Cloud: What Might We See if We Were Really Looking

Our friend Christopher Eldredge emailed us this image on the very morning that we read this passage from Thich Nhat Hanh’s The Sun My Heart. And IT reminded us of Maria Robledo’s perfect image.

mindfulness practice 101: hang a reminder you’ll see first thing

Not being the best of meditators, we rely on Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh to gently guide us in mindfulness practice, which, he points out, you can do anywhere, anytime: washing the dishes, walking, cleaning the house, listening to a friend. In The Miracle of Mindfulness: An Introduction to the Practice of Meditation, he outlines…

meditation practices for those who can’t sit still

Our recent Facebook post about alternative ways to meditate got a lot of hits. Its single line —’Can’t sit still when you meditate?: try turning everyday actions into a practice’ — told us that there are A LOT of people who have trouble sitting and meditating. So we thought we’d elaborate. The solution is an…

7 happiness practices

Spotted at Dumb Little Man: 6 Unconventional, But Scientific Ways To Be The Happiest Person On Earth. Many of these six practices are based on neuroscience and other scientific evidence…but then EVERYTHING is these days. We figure, what have we got to lose by trying them out? Visualizing throwing an anxiety or negative thought in a…

windowsill still-lives: mindfulness practice in action

Mindfulness practice – learning to be present in each moment– is something many people are embracing these days. Business are incorporating it and classes abound. Perhaps the most often-recommended “exercise” is washing dishes mindfully, although we know few people who really do it. Recently, we heard of one that did, truly. No surprise, it is…