I became aware of meditative practices and the evidence that being calmly focused on my breathing could help my self-knowledge. By the time I felt I had some experience with it, I was retiring from teaching. I found that Google offered free web sites and free blogging sites so I thought I would make use of them to further awareness of the usefulness of mediation. Then, with so much very good writing by Jack Kornfield and friends and Sylvia Boorstein and Andy Puddecombe and Dan Harris on meditation, as well as good audio in Audible.com, I found I had repeated my ideas enough.
But by then, I was in the habit of noticing what was happening to me day by day. I was enjoying noticing both external events and internal questions and impulses and thoughts. So, I kept writing Fear, Fun and Filoz. I found that there are said to be 600 million blogs but that most of them are written sporadically, not steadily. I also found that most of the ones I have seen charge a fee or require a paid subscription. I email my posts to about 100 people and a small scattering of Internet users look at the posts on the web page dedicated to the blog.
Writing and talking are the two main avenues we each have to express our inner selves and unique views. I have 4,815 posts online, going back to 2008. Lynn's book group recently selected "The Roosevelt Women" and I read it aloud to her. The author, a woman historian, emphasized that she had access to letters the women had written and that was her main source of information. She mentioned that today's communication methods don't tend to create orderly, erudite preserved statements that can be reviewed to understand a life.
My sister and I are both in our eighties and we both find our memories aren't what they used to be. She mentioned that she jots down notes all day. I said she might want to throw them in a box for her descendants to look over. Writing (and audio and video recordings) can be fun and valuable.
I tend to use this blog for considering my days and my web sites for more permanent information. Doing so certainly increases my awareness of how and what I am doing and the blessings I have.
