Nikitha
I can’t believe that today is the last day of May. May be it is!
Reviews are scary at times. But they help us face the reality.
Reality of May:
In the last post, I mentioned two things which were my priority for May – Meditation, learning Tamil.
Meditation:
The only improvement in it was I did it twice a day. Apart from the morning Pranayamam, I was meditating in the night before I went to sleep. Meditating in the morning was easy. Because after a good night’s sleep, the number of thoughts which bombard the brain are lower. But in the night, the entire day’s happenings kept revolving in my head. It seemed impossible to let each thought go. I was trying to train myself to meditate in the worst case scenario. To deal with that, I kept my diary beside me and dumped every thought which kept passing in my head. That helped in cooling the heat of thoughts. I could meditate with less disturbance after that.
Meditation calmed my brain a little before sleep. I could fall asleep immediately after that.
Sadly, I could not feel much improvement in quality of meditation. I didn’t know if I spent even a few seconds thoughtless or not. But at this stage of meditation, I don’t think it is really important to buy a devise and measure the quality of my meditation.
I shall continue this for the next month. But this time I will concentrate more on quality.
Learning Tamil:
I speak a few sentences in Tamil everyday with my friends now. They correct my mistakes. But I have not really learnt a lot of new words. Watching movies was just like revision. Even though I was not doing any deliberate practise from the words of movies, they helped in passive learning. Unseen advantage of watching movies was, I was getting my daily dose of laughter.
Apart from the two I prioritized, other areas which were continuation of April:
1. Exercise: I followed the same routine. Haven’t changed anything in it.
2. Writing: I did terribly in this when it came to writing blog posts. I started a few articles but couldn’t finish them at all.
3. Reading: I spent 17 hours on reading this month which is one hour lesser than last month. But I read two really good books.
4. Waking up: On the days I was tired, I forced myself to sleep more. Otherwise, I was able to be awake by 6 daily.
Lessons learnt this month:
Whatever I have written above are for the days I stayed at home. But when I was on vacation, by default I discontinued routines for a change. But the vacation taught me a lot:
One: Small habits can be continued wherever you are:
I was still doing elevate even on vacation. Because it just takes five minutes of my time.
Two: Don’t break a habit without making a plan on coming back:
After I came back from vacation, I found it tough to catch up with my habits. I had lot of other pending work which occupied my mind all the time. I have learnt that I need to plan on the work I will have to handle after a break and how I will get back to each habit. This is a useful lesson for the next vacation
Three: Vacations help in discovering yourself:
Productivity is not about working for 365 days. I have been more productive and happier after returning from vacation. It also helped me discover myself. Plan your vacations along with your work.
Goals for June:
1. Art:
Lately, I have ignored painting or sketching or zentangles. My art material looks at me with a sad face whenever I clean my room. I want to spend just ten minutes on zentangles everyday to start with.
2. Writing:
I am unhappy with the progress I have made in writing. This month, I am going to complete all the half written articles and publish them.
3. Exercise:
I will improve my exercise routine by adding a few new exercises. It not only increases my exercise time but also makes it interesting.
That’s all folks!
How did your May go? What are your plans for June?
Plan right away.
Happy planning!
This comment has been removed by the author.
I have had the similar outcomes with Meditation in my beginner days too.
I trick here is to avoid making an effort to become thoughtless.Instead,you should carefully follow your thought just like your follow a kid whose trying to hide.As the kid turns back to see you,the thought vanishes like wise.
Well,that's what worked for me.
For a detailed account you can go through Jiddu Krishnamurti's meditation talk in YT
Thanks for the suggestion. I will try that 🙂