The tables were turning; seasons shifting like sand. The exploding sun of an epic summer was beating just beyond the mountains, and it was calling for its heroes. The Warrior, the Adventurer, and the Artist had become somewhat complacent in their new roost, tucked away in Jack's Point, just beneath the Remarkable mountains. They were to be challenged, and tested for their true standing within my being.
Joshua St Clair is my life's primary project - how is it ever to work out if the dominating facets of my character are never exercised, and shy away from the trials? Ra the sun God would be displeased! He had a roaring summer prepared for St Clair, on the condition that the heroes showed up to an acceptable standard.
First to prove his worth within me was the Warrior. So, I focussed on training the Warrior.
What does it mean to be a Warrior? This is a lifelong Mahjong puzzle, and by no means have I solved it at 21 laps around the sun, but I am trying my best to figure it out and embody what it really means. Perhaps that is one of the main secrets - to truly try the best that we can as human beings in this precious lifetime. The Warrior-Monk is a common archetype that we have seen in many cultures of this world, and they are known to be very virtuous, noble, and Righteous human beings. This is what I see being a Warrior to truly mean - to consciously decide to become the righteous rulers of our own life, reclaiming the reigns from the society in which we were raised, and to follow our hearts with great diligence and discipline.
Here, I wanted to raise some practices that I introduced to my own life, as a means of strengthening the Warrior spirit, and disciplining my character.
'Practice makes perfect' is spoken by many of our peers - a phrase that curls its way onto many tongues. Despite its common use, I would say that it is quite a profound statement. It points to our conscious ability to perfect something in our life through deliberate practice. Such is the process of Mastery. Being aware that we can become ruthlessly effective at any skill we decide to, is the first step to achieving such proficiency. The next step is being diligent with our genuine intentions to improve, and doing the practice every day. It all comes down to how disciplined we are in our day to day life.
I would say that working towards mastery of a still grants us a capacity to offer ourselves to the world with great brilliance and authenticity. And it's Deliberate Practice that sharpens our blade and improves the edge we have with that special skill we have decided to master.
As far as the weathered warrior is concerned, training/practice means life or death, and there is no two ways about it. He must practice his combat skills, lest he be annihilated in the face of the enemy. Thankfully, we don't face such brutal scenarios in our modern world. But we do come in contact with an onslaught of situations which challenge our character. If we apply the process of mastery to our own life, and take responsibility in harnessing the various elements of our life through practice, then we will be well on our way to achieving grand dominion over our minds and our worlds.
Every day, we are born again. An entire journey awaits our footsteps, filled with pockets of excitement as well as snarky booby traps. The very first moments of the day offer us an opportunity to set the pace of our internal clock; to ensure it ticks steadily, and not like an enraged beetle.
I've found cold showers to be a particularly enlivening practice to incorporate in the morning routine, as it effectively jump-starts our engine. Before introducing this practice, I was very fond of morning slumber, which often times left me feeling groggy and not fully awake in the mornings even after 8-10 hours of sleep. I counteracted this morning haze with the electric shock of a cold shower, which instantly purged my sleepiness, and perked my mood.
Yes, it is terrifically difficult to step into a cold shower. But that's precisely why it can be so powerful. During our day, we face a myriad of different obstacles and challenges as we tackle the tide. By jumping head first into a cold shower, we are training our instant-response to 'get shit done', acting with presence instead of letting the mind mull things over. It improves our discipline to step into scenarios we are innately uncomfortable with. I'd say this is quite a powerful thing, especially if we can follow through on such a gruelling practice when we are most off guard.
Meditation is the most powerful way to calm the mind and body. We are beings passing through a world of happenings. Our mind is a very efficient station, but oftentimes all the thoughts and emotions that emerge leave us fried and fizzled out. Stimuli clouds our world, attacking us like bull-frog darts. Our day to day regime always seems so busy; we are zipping around the place like firecrackers, showing up to things, maintaining our stature, trying our best to not peel in the face of our duties and responsibilities. Where are we amidst all of this clamour?
Meditation is like blowing a bubble around our precious being, and taking a moment to really and truly be with ourselves. I'd say that nothing is more beautiful than our own divine presence. Sitting in silence gives us a chance to become our own best friend, and find immense self love from within. Meditation is like laying down on a waka, and letting our minds' underlying current carry us back to our core. That's where our true home is, away from the dazzling bright lights of our modern world, with its tantalising promises of satisfaction that are so short lived. Turning inward is where life's true reward lies, but it requires the discipline and diligence to be still.
In my own experience, meditation is the practice that allowed me to explore my own nature and heart. I noticed how noisy it was outside, and how all the sparkly things were distracting me from my true callings in life. When I introduced the practice of meditating for 20 minutes every day, I started to notice the whispers of my heart, but I couldn't quite make out what it was trying to communicate. After an entire year of meditating every morning for 20 minutes, it became blindingly obvious to me how important spiritual practice is for the cultivation of one's being, so I took my practice to the next level by meditating for one hour every day. That's when I really started to cradle my life, and hear my hearts whispers. From then on, I let my heart be my compass, guiding me down the road. The heart is infinitely wise, and I simply cannot refuse it's callings. That's why I am here writing about all of this.
Journalling is my golden habit! It is most powerful for transmuting our life experience into treasure that we can stash away and always flick back to. As we continue on our life journey, the journal is tracing our footsteps, containing within its pages the story of our life, however epic we decide to make it. But journalling is so much more than just telling our life story as it happens. It is a way to work through the details of our life and process things in a mindful and focussed way, as opposed letting the mind off its leash to handle matters, which will likely leave things unresolved.
It is a grand surfacing of all the debris that builds up during our life experience - it takes all that floating gunk, washes it ashore for us to sort through; removing it from the crystal ocean.
Life is complicated. So much shit happens! And our mind likes to chatter to itself about that shit, munching on it as if it tastes good! Instead of being tormented by things that happened in the past, we can sift through matters in a journal, thus approaching things from a higher perspective, learning the lessons that we need to learn, and freeing ourself from the burden. Likewise, there's so much joy and beauty in our lives, but it oftentimes gets moved to the side and unappreciated. Journalling to count our blessings is a marvellous way to reimburse ourselves with deep gratitude for life, and love for the things we have.
In my own experience, my journal is my greatest companion. It comes with me everywhere. It knows absolutely everything about me. It listens! And it will never judge. I'd say that's a brilliant friend to have. When I started to journal every day, I found so much more peace, because I had a moment to really flesh things out, to contemplate ideas, to calm stresses and worries, and to re-live the best moments of my life with imagination and renewed enthusiasm. Journalling allows me see things from a brand new, untainted perspective, where I can understand things properly without the concoction of emotions spinning things in complicated directions. As far as my Warrior spirit was concerned, Journalling was strengthening the connection to my heart, and bringing more peace to my soul.
You may have noticed that the main theme throughout these practices is the cultivation of the heart. It is because this is what I believe the True Warrior to be about. He follows his heart! He doesn't listen to anybody else, because he doesn't need to. He is his own councillor. His own emperor. Because he has harnessed his heart and its grandeur, and is actively cultivating its majesty.
The Warrior is righteous. He is noble. And he will fight for Truth, Love and Peace until his last breath sweeps across the land.
Joshua St Clair is my life's primary project - how is it ever to work out if the dominating facets of my character are never exercised, and shy away from the trials? Ra the sun God would be displeased! He had a roaring summer prepared for St Clair, on the condition that the heroes showed up to an acceptable standard.
First to prove his worth within me was the Warrior. So, I focussed on training the Warrior.
What does it mean to be a Warrior? This is a lifelong Mahjong puzzle, and by no means have I solved it at 21 laps around the sun, but I am trying my best to figure it out and embody what it really means. Perhaps that is one of the main secrets - to truly try the best that we can as human beings in this precious lifetime. The Warrior-Monk is a common archetype that we have seen in many cultures of this world, and they are known to be very virtuous, noble, and Righteous human beings. This is what I see being a Warrior to truly mean - to consciously decide to become the righteous rulers of our own life, reclaiming the reigns from the society in which we were raised, and to follow our hearts with great diligence and discipline.
Here, I wanted to raise some practices that I introduced to my own life, as a means of strengthening the Warrior spirit, and disciplining my character.
Deliberate Practice / Training
'Practice makes perfect' is spoken by many of our peers - a phrase that curls its way onto many tongues. Despite its common use, I would say that it is quite a profound statement. It points to our conscious ability to perfect something in our life through deliberate practice. Such is the process of Mastery. Being aware that we can become ruthlessly effective at any skill we decide to, is the first step to achieving such proficiency. The next step is being diligent with our genuine intentions to improve, and doing the practice every day. It all comes down to how disciplined we are in our day to day life.
I would say that working towards mastery of a still grants us a capacity to offer ourselves to the world with great brilliance and authenticity. And it's Deliberate Practice that sharpens our blade and improves the edge we have with that special skill we have decided to master.
As far as the weathered warrior is concerned, training/practice means life or death, and there is no two ways about it. He must practice his combat skills, lest he be annihilated in the face of the enemy. Thankfully, we don't face such brutal scenarios in our modern world. But we do come in contact with an onslaught of situations which challenge our character. If we apply the process of mastery to our own life, and take responsibility in harnessing the various elements of our life through practice, then we will be well on our way to achieving grand dominion over our minds and our worlds.
Cold showers
Every day, we are born again. An entire journey awaits our footsteps, filled with pockets of excitement as well as snarky booby traps. The very first moments of the day offer us an opportunity to set the pace of our internal clock; to ensure it ticks steadily, and not like an enraged beetle.
I've found cold showers to be a particularly enlivening practice to incorporate in the morning routine, as it effectively jump-starts our engine. Before introducing this practice, I was very fond of morning slumber, which often times left me feeling groggy and not fully awake in the mornings even after 8-10 hours of sleep. I counteracted this morning haze with the electric shock of a cold shower, which instantly purged my sleepiness, and perked my mood.
Yes, it is terrifically difficult to step into a cold shower. But that's precisely why it can be so powerful. During our day, we face a myriad of different obstacles and challenges as we tackle the tide. By jumping head first into a cold shower, we are training our instant-response to 'get shit done', acting with presence instead of letting the mind mull things over. It improves our discipline to step into scenarios we are innately uncomfortable with. I'd say this is quite a powerful thing, especially if we can follow through on such a gruelling practice when we are most off guard.
Meditation
Meditation is the most powerful way to calm the mind and body. We are beings passing through a world of happenings. Our mind is a very efficient station, but oftentimes all the thoughts and emotions that emerge leave us fried and fizzled out. Stimuli clouds our world, attacking us like bull-frog darts. Our day to day regime always seems so busy; we are zipping around the place like firecrackers, showing up to things, maintaining our stature, trying our best to not peel in the face of our duties and responsibilities. Where are we amidst all of this clamour?
Meditation is like blowing a bubble around our precious being, and taking a moment to really and truly be with ourselves. I'd say that nothing is more beautiful than our own divine presence. Sitting in silence gives us a chance to become our own best friend, and find immense self love from within. Meditation is like laying down on a waka, and letting our minds' underlying current carry us back to our core. That's where our true home is, away from the dazzling bright lights of our modern world, with its tantalising promises of satisfaction that are so short lived. Turning inward is where life's true reward lies, but it requires the discipline and diligence to be still.
In my own experience, meditation is the practice that allowed me to explore my own nature and heart. I noticed how noisy it was outside, and how all the sparkly things were distracting me from my true callings in life. When I introduced the practice of meditating for 20 minutes every day, I started to notice the whispers of my heart, but I couldn't quite make out what it was trying to communicate. After an entire year of meditating every morning for 20 minutes, it became blindingly obvious to me how important spiritual practice is for the cultivation of one's being, so I took my practice to the next level by meditating for one hour every day. That's when I really started to cradle my life, and hear my hearts whispers. From then on, I let my heart be my compass, guiding me down the road. The heart is infinitely wise, and I simply cannot refuse it's callings. That's why I am here writing about all of this.
Journalling
Journalling is my golden habit! It is most powerful for transmuting our life experience into treasure that we can stash away and always flick back to. As we continue on our life journey, the journal is tracing our footsteps, containing within its pages the story of our life, however epic we decide to make it. But journalling is so much more than just telling our life story as it happens. It is a way to work through the details of our life and process things in a mindful and focussed way, as opposed letting the mind off its leash to handle matters, which will likely leave things unresolved.
It is a grand surfacing of all the debris that builds up during our life experience - it takes all that floating gunk, washes it ashore for us to sort through; removing it from the crystal ocean.
Life is complicated. So much shit happens! And our mind likes to chatter to itself about that shit, munching on it as if it tastes good! Instead of being tormented by things that happened in the past, we can sift through matters in a journal, thus approaching things from a higher perspective, learning the lessons that we need to learn, and freeing ourself from the burden. Likewise, there's so much joy and beauty in our lives, but it oftentimes gets moved to the side and unappreciated. Journalling to count our blessings is a marvellous way to reimburse ourselves with deep gratitude for life, and love for the things we have.
In my own experience, my journal is my greatest companion. It comes with me everywhere. It knows absolutely everything about me. It listens! And it will never judge. I'd say that's a brilliant friend to have. When I started to journal every day, I found so much more peace, because I had a moment to really flesh things out, to contemplate ideas, to calm stresses and worries, and to re-live the best moments of my life with imagination and renewed enthusiasm. Journalling allows me see things from a brand new, untainted perspective, where I can understand things properly without the concoction of emotions spinning things in complicated directions. As far as my Warrior spirit was concerned, Journalling was strengthening the connection to my heart, and bringing more peace to my soul.
You may have noticed that the main theme throughout these practices is the cultivation of the heart. It is because this is what I believe the True Warrior to be about. He follows his heart! He doesn't listen to anybody else, because he doesn't need to. He is his own councillor. His own emperor. Because he has harnessed his heart and its grandeur, and is actively cultivating its majesty.
The Warrior is righteous. He is noble. And he will fight for Truth, Love and Peace until his last breath sweeps across the land.
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