I came across this youtube video with Eric Ripert. (Don't you just love his accent? I once dated a French guy and never seemed to get over my fascination with the French accent.) In any case, what I love about this video is what Eric has to say about how he finds inspiration. He doesn't sit in a corner somewhat, fret about fret over the next big idea in fine dining. Even when he takes gastronomic trips abroad to places like India and Japan, he's not consumed by or even let down if he doesn't return home with some neat fusion dish. He seems to be so content on letting creativity and inspiration come naturally on their own.
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Meditation Video
Exercises in Awakening
- The Creek With a Human Mind
I went down to the creek behind my apartment today. I tried this exercise with the simple question, "What if the creek had a human mind, what kinds of questions would it ask?
- Where am I going?
- What is my ultimate destination?
- Is that destination better than this one?
- Why aren't I a river? A lake? An ocean?
- Why couldn't I be a famous body of water?
- Why couldn't I be a body of water where people vacation?
- Why are there so many rocks in my way? They are slowing me down, interrupting my flow.
- Why aren't I a pretty river? I'll be happy once someone comes along and prune these trees and vegetation. Maybe put up a sign?
- I would need a name. What is my name? Of course, it would need to mean something important. Maybe after the Rio Grande? Whatever it is, it would need to encapsulate who I am?
- Who am I? Energetic, though periodially morose?
- Why aren't there more people? I feel lonely.
- Why don't more people get in the water? Does this mean that I am unattrative?
- Why aren't I wider, less shallow?
- What's the point of this?
- Why do I need to exist?
Local Restaurants Help Raise Consciousness
Questions I Use to Stay Conscious During Day
- 1.What is my relationship with the present moment?
2. Who is speaking?
3. Is my pain body active right now?
4. Why am I responding to the ego/pain body in that person?
5. When was the last time I was aware of my breathing?
6. Am I identifying with the unobserved mind?
7. Is the negative emotion and energy I am feeling now suggesting that I need to reevaluate my level of awareness with I, consciousness.
8. Why am I identifying so strongly with my form-identity?
9. Why am I identifying so strongly with someone else's form-identity?
10. Am I identifying with a collective pain body?
11. Do I have spaciousness between my beingness and what is happening right now?
12. Is what I am doing as a means to an end?
13. Is what I am doing to be showy? To get attention for something that I have done? That I have said? That I have written?
14. Am I engaging with this person not as a role, but with consciousness of the present moment?
15. Am I cherishing and relating to the timeless, Essence in this person?
16. Why do I feel the need to associate good or bad with this person? This neutral action or situation?
17. Am I being less shallow, less negative, content with what is or isn't?
18. Do I have spaciousness between the television and my beingness?
19. Do I have spaciousness between music and my beingness?
20. Have I taken the time to hear the birds chirping?
21. Have I taken the time to feel the warmth of the sun on my face?
22. Have I taken the time to smell Nature's bouquet?
23. Have I taken time to have a moment of silence?
24. Did I take my lunch today?
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