To see or not to see, that is the question.

 Blessings Darlings!

I am not a visually-oriented person.  Ask me to 'visualize' something and I'm going to have a very hard time with it.  Or fail.  Ask me to describe something I saw, I'm likely to fail.  This extends to my use of makeup (I don't use it), my taste in museums (I focus on reading the information more than looking at the actual objects), the type of meditations I find the most 'to my tastes'.  As a result of this, while I'm old and have been doing all sorts of metaphysical stuff for a long long time now - 'visual' stuff is not something that is usually part of my practice.

Today while meditating, I kinda got a breakthru' of sorts.  I was sitting there, doing the mantra I learned 40+ years ago when I took a Transcendental Meditation class.  The mantra is the beginning of a prayer or invocation to a Hindu Goddess, but I don't know the prayer/invocation or recall who the Goddess is.  And I'm not going to claim that I'm consistent about meditation, or of even doing mantra meditation every time, or THIS mantra meditation when I do mantra meditation.

Yeah, I'm a Bad Witch.

Anyway, suddenly I realized I could 'send' and 'see' the energy from the mantra going thru' my body.  And I could change where they mantra was centered and sending that energy from - it DIDN'T have to be from my throat.  It could centered in any of the major chakras (It's not like I tried centering it on my thumb, or my shoulder, but I didn't think of centering it from my feet.)  Hey, , afor ME this is a breakthru', and one that I've gotten in my mid 60's.  I'm extremely chuffed!

I did a quick practice of doing it in all the levels of my auras, using Ivo Dominguez, Jr.'s  "Emerald Heart" exercise, which rocked.

The point here is less the 'technique' or 'visualization', and more that we all have things that we suck at, visualization being one of mine.  And that it's okay to not be good at some stuff.  Find your best ways of working, and rely on those for the most part.  BUT - keep practicing at the stuff you suck at, too.  Because you may or may not get better or get breakthru's, but then again you just might.  I'm here to give you hope that someday you might suck less at it, just like me.

Frondly, Fern

Picture attributions!

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Start Menu - Part two - Focus your mind.

Blessings Darlings!

Having addressed your mundane life in the last "Start Menu" post, let's move on to another issue, focusing your mind/attention. 

No magic here yet - it all comes down to practice!

The most common technique that is used to develop mental focus is meditation.  This is not necessarily the same goal that some Eastern types of meditation have, although the techniques may be the same.  You are learning focus, not trying to still/obliterate, your mind. 

For this, pick a form of meditation and ... do it daily.  Twice daily would be even better.  Mantra mediation is fine.  Counting your breaths (usually to 3 or 5, then going back to one) is fine.  Focusing on a flame, walking your lawn digging dandelions, Zen walking meditations, studying the edge of a sword ... there are countless ways to meditate to focus your mind.

You mind WILL wander.  The goal is to have your mind wander less often over time.  So keep track of how often you get distracted.  Maybe have a bowl of dry beans, and remove one from the bowl every time your mind goes off on its own.  After you've finished meditating, count how many beans you've removed from the bowl.  Over time the number will go down. 

I've never hit zero myself, but I've gotten better over time.  You will, too.

Frondly, Fern