Day 10 (of Juice Fasting & Meditation)

Day 10

 

Well, here we are.    We did it!    And we got a 30-second-long earthquake as the celebratory party favor and noisemaker!   Whoooo-hooo!  (Those of you in the L.A. area know what I’m talking about)

In all seriousness, when I first started this, I asked a friend if he’d do the fast with me so that I could have a support system.   He came on board enthusiastically, and so I want to thank Ross Wright for being so willing.  He actually started a few days after me, so he’s still going at it.   When I called him to check in on my last day, I told him he was free to stop if he wanted.  And he said “no, I’m gonna see this through,”  which made me smile.   What I never realized, by blogging about this adventure, was just how much of an extended support system I would end up having.   My running joke has always been that I wonder if Bindi Girl Chronicles even exists, if no one tunes in.   You know, that whole bear in the woods things?   Because I’ve tended to feel the presence of the wasteland here.   Cyberspace can be a cruel mistress.  So, imagine my surprise to discover a genuine rooting section, as I’ve peeled away each layer and each day.  Some even feeling the inspiration to try something like this themselves.    My heart is incredibly warmed and humbled by your presence on my quest.   Which is why I shout “WE did it!”   So, not only do I thank my friend Ross, I thank YOU.

Today has been a good day.   Contemplative, as you might imagine.   Wondering about all the shifts and changes, both internally and externally, physiologically and spiritually, overt and covert, instantaneous and yet-to-be-discovered, that may have taken place during this time of privation, fortifying, prostration, and inward-turning.   It hasn’t necessarily been a quiet time.   Especially emotionally.   But it has been an astonishing time.

When I looked back today over all the blog entries of this journey, I wondered if the shorter entries were because I just couldn’t get inspired, perhaps was downtrodden that day.   And then I realized that the size and length did not necessarily correlate with a good or bad day.   Quite the contrary, some of my longest entries were about very taxing days.   In fact, my shortest entry had been a peaceful day.   All systems were go.   The engine was running smoothly.   And therefore, there simply wasn’t much to report.   Then again, my most buoyant day beget the longest of the entries.   No rhyme or reason, kind of like life itself, in all of its magnificent abstract and bebop free form.

Today’s juice was beets, beet greens, spinach, and cucumber.   It tasted so lovely that I could almost picture it as a warm beverage for a cozy evening.

My meditation happened later in the day today, and the theme seemed to be compassion and equanimity.   When I’ve referred in past entries to the “themes” of my meditation, I haven’t been referring to anything I’ve deliberately set out to ponder before I close my eyes.   I close my eyes, and these issues, themes, lessons, whatever you want to call them, show up.   Sometimes, no theme at all shows up, and I’m merely meant to quiet my head.   But today, compassion and equanimity were definitely floating like a haze over me, and I know that I have been challenged in that area of late, so there’s no mystery as to why it would make itself present.

What have I been hoping for this observance of Lent to do for me?    I think, slow me down a bit in certain areas of my life.  Areas where beauties are missed, where stress and hyperactivity rule, where over there is more meaningful than right here.   And in other areas I’ve been hoping to speed up, show up, get into action.  Areas where complacency or fear have clinched my ankles and caused me great frustration and despair.  Wanting to appreciate impermanence.  Wanting to be made weightless by non-attachment to outcome, and to recognize the beauty and wisdom in creating for its own sake.   Wanting to love exactly who I am, without judgment and chastening.  Embracing imperfection, and finding that a little perfect.  A tempering of  narcissism.  Having the ability to listen to and honor every voice and every story, and to really get that someone else’s isn’t rendered valid ONLY if I can claim the same experience.   Center.   Ground.   Clarity.   And letting go.   And letting go.   And letting so.

So, have I achieved any of that?   Have the plate tectonics shifted at all?   I guess I’ll see, as my life goes on and I operate in it.

But what I do know for sure, today, is that I’ve set a groundwork for ongoing self-tending and soul-tending.   Let there be no doubt about it, I am on the precipice of profound self-awakening.  I am completely geared for an embarrassment of riches.  I find beauty in everything.  And I express my gratitude to the Source everyday.  The tools are in place.  So bring it on.  Whatever it is.   The blessing and the challenge.   I am ready for the responsibility of my Buddha mantle.

 

Ring the bells that still can ring.
Forget your perfect offering.
There is a crack in everything.
That’s how the light comes in.
― Leonard Cohen

Here’s wishing us all vigilant healing and constant transformation.

 

 

 

 

Angela Carole Brown is the author of three published books, The Assassination of Gabriel Champion, The Kidney Journals: Memoirs of a Desperate Lifesaver, and Trading Fours, and has produced several albums of music and a yoga/mindfulness CD.   Bindi Girl Chronicles is her writing blog.   Follow her on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram & YouTube.

Day 9 (of Juice Fasting & Meditation)

Day 9

 

Why didn’t I think to post pics this entire time!   Today is quite possibly the most energetic day I’ve had in some long time, so I’ve just been bopping around my house juicing and taking pics like a madwoman.   But I’ll only inflict this one on you.

WatermelonGinger

My yummy watermelon and ginger from yesterday just HAD to have a revisit today.

 

Especially after the disappointing green batch I made this morning.   Here I am on Day 9, when all experiments should’ve been perfected by this point, and today’s was the least palatable batch yet.   AND, I was stuck with it, because today I worked my office job, took my jug o’ juice with me, and my sippy cup, and hadn’t bothered to do a taste test before I left home.   I wouldn’t exactly say it was vile; it was just really pungent and bitter.    It was more of the dandelion and chard from yesterday, which are pretty bitter greens anyway, but I’d already successfully used that combo, so it must’ve been just an unfortunate ratio of the greens with my apples and lemon.    In any case, each sip was met with a grimace, but it’s all I had to fuel me for the day.

Thankfully my boss came to the rescue with some pineapple slices she had, and a blender, and I got the chance to rescue the rest of the batch.  Thanks, Karla!

So you can see my need to come home to a wine glass filled with… (any other time in my life, that sentence would be finished with “a nice cab”)….my watermelon elixir.

Meditating Angel

Okay, I lied, here’s one more pic.   Man, I have a lot of energy right now.  Hyper, party of one!    My little Zen girl certainly has a thing or two to teach me about meditation, doesn’t she?   Look at that focus.  Yeah, I’m pretty hyper.

 

 

 

In all seriousness, my meditation this morning was a doozy!  It seemed to ring with themes of forgiveness.   But I was a good long way into it, as I wondered whom I needed to be forgiving in my life, or whom I’m needed to be asking forgiveness from, before I was suddenly hit with the dawning that the answer to both was ME.   Forgiving myself the difficult realities about myself.   We all have them, don’t we?    Those pesky little “difficult realities.”   We try to buff them up, better them, put a little spit shine on them.  Or we try to tuck them away and pretend they aren’t there.   We rationalize them, justify them, or we self-berate.   But it really all comes down to this:   We can transform, evolve, improve who we are, learn something new every day, open our hearts, practice compassion, and yet at the end of the day we are not perfect specimens.   We aren’t designed to be.   And so all of those rough edges, the warts, the fears and defenses that still insist on lingering there, even with all the soul work we may do….that’s where forgiveness comes in.  That’s where we’re tested to see if we can love and embrace the shadow as well as the benevolent characters in our personal army.  Because they all have a role to play in shaping who we are, and how we walk in the world.  They all have a lesson to offer.

And by no means am I saying don’t do the work.   We should always be working toward transformation.  Just don’t forget the self-forgiveness.  It’s a pretty powerful ingredient in the recipe.  Without it, it’s kind of like my bitter green juice today …. something vital missing.

And finally to recognize that we’re always evolving, and so wherever we are on the path is the right place to be for that moment.  That’s a HUGE one for me.   A mountain.   And not just any mountain.  Everest.

So the work continues.

 

 

 

Angela Carole Brown is the author of three published books, The Assassination of Gabriel Champion, The Kidney Journals: Memoirs of a Desperate Lifesaver, and Trading Fours, and has produced several albums of music and a yoga/mindfulness CD.   Bindi Girl Chronicles is her writing blog.   Follow her on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram & YouTube.

Day 8 (of Juice Fasting & Meditation)

Day 8

 

Day 8 finished as uneventfully as it began, though I have to give a great big “thank you” to Kelly Phillips of Kona for the incredible suggestion of watermelon juice with ginger.   That was my dessert, and it was easily the best taste sensation I’ve had on this fast.

The green concoction was back to some interesting dandelion greens and chard.   That’s a pretty bitter-tasting combination, so copious amounts of carrots and lemon helped to make it palatable.

My meditation got the short shrift today, for the first time.   There were just things to do around the house, commitments on the computer that needed my attention, and by the time I could fit it in, the distractions were prevalent.  It was the briefest, and most uncommitted, of the efforts so far.   I have to wonder if there wasn’t something in the back of my mind that thought, “well, I meditated TWICE yesterday.   Can’t I get a day off?”   It’s silly to think, but that may well have been in the back of my subconscious.

But as far as emotional lows, or upheavals, no, Day 8 has been normal and even-keeled.  Thankful for that.

I can’t believe I’ve made it this far.  Day 9 approaches, and a sense of something important has definitely been felt in my bones.

 

 

 

Angela Carole Brown is the author of three published books, The Assassination of Gabriel Champion, The Kidney Journals: Memoirs of a Desperate Lifesaver, and Trading Fours, and has produced several albums of music and a yoga/mindfulness CD.   Bindi Girl Chronicles is her writing blog.   Follow her on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram & YouTube.

Day 6 (of Juice Fasting & Meditation)

Day 6

 

This will be brief. A down day. Still resolved, but so paralyzed by some personal issues that it’s been difficult to get up and do, today. My meditation didn’t happen until later in the afternoon, but was so welcomed and warm. It is definitely my haven and sanctuary when I’m feeling helpless. I just really tried to open my heart and listen.

Spinach, apples, and ginger. A simpler meal than some of the recipes in the past few days, because, like I said, I just couldn’t get up and do.

There was a moment as evening approached when I seriously wanted to bail on this. But I didn’t. And I haven’t. It’s the genuine first of those in these six days, so I’m trying not to beat myself up. Hey, this is what goes with the territory, the open wounds and emotional ups and downs of any kind of prayer and fasting. I’ve isolated a bit today, as I’ve feared being short with anyone who might speak to me.

Except for a lovely phone call from my sister, who had just finished reading the first installment of this journey, and was calling to tell me how inspired she was by it. How it resonated close to home with her. And it had me thinking about how there seems to just be this environment all around us right now of people feeling discord with their lives, a general sense of disconnection, and the fierce, restless desire to call upon solutions. I’ve believed for some time that a paradigm shift globally, spiritually, has been in place, a crack in the door, where just the tiniest sliver of light comes through, to assure the planet that there is better possible, but in order for the light to be more than just a sliver, we have to open that door by awakening and expanding our consciousness. So, it really struck me in a profound way to have my sister confirm similar feelings.

Look, a fasting & meditation isn’t going to be everyone’s answer to addressing issues and seeking clarity; it’s just the one I’m trying right now. But to be able to create a dialogue with others about the need for…something, whatever that might be for each person, to up the ante on our lives, to opt for peace of spirit …. is kind of extraordinary.

 

 

Angela Carole Brown is the author of three published books, The Assassination of Gabriel Champion, The Kidney Journals: Memoirs of a Desperate Lifesaver, and Trading Fours, and has produced several albums of music and a yoga/mindfulness CD.   Bindi Girl Chronicles is her writing blog.   Follow her on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram & YouTube.