Balance is about weight distribution. However we tend to forget that balance may be a form of equilibrium that does not rely on an "equal" distribution of weight. There may be symmetrical balancing acts but there are also assymetrical ones. Indeed, as a corrective to the idea of balance, I prefer to speak of balancing…Read more Balancing Act
self care
Seasonal Stress
Back to school. Often a mess. A tangle of things to do. With the difficulty of trying to find the beginning or the end. A long thread of "to dos". And in France, "to don't s". Why not take a moment to just look at the tangles. Admire the complexity. Admire even how this banal…Read more Seasonal Stress
Summertime
And the living is easy. So what is this ease. How might I locate an expression of ease and stay with it, observing it. In high summer when the grass is dried and the ground firm, the sun calls us to doze off in a quiet spot. Back against a tree or laying down. Resting.…Read more Summertime
Equanimity
The vestibular system contributes to sensory information processes allowing for our sense of balance and spatial orientation to coordinate movement. Motion, equilibrium and orientation are largely an affair of the inner ear in complex functional-organic terms. But what about metaphorically? How do we tend towards balance in our daily life choices. Must we listen for…Read more Equanimity
Faces
Lunchtime, a moment to come back to one's senses. Locked away indoors all day till the walls begin to grow on us, it would serve us well to look up and out. Why not take a brisk walk in the winter cold? Feel the frozen breath of the season on our cheeks? Why not investigate…Read more Faces
Solstitium, the Sun stills
"those of us who hold no religious or supernatural beliefs still require regular, ritualised encounters with concepts such as friendship, community, gratitude and transcendence" Alain de Botton, Religion for Atheists Winter Solstice. The great Sun sits still a moment and then turns. The long night giving ease to incrementally longer days. This ceasing to move,…Read more Solstitium, the Sun stills
Simple Wastelands
Waiting near a terrain vague in "the zone" (the liminal space between Paris and the suburbs); submerged by the noise of the the cars on the nearby Peripherique, the city's circular highway. Vague terrain? An empty lot. A temporary wasteland. Filled with overgrown things and castaway seeds. I wait, and so I sketch.
Forest Bath anyone?
Nature based ecotherapies such as horticultural therapy or forest bathing are perceived increasingly as good platforms for mindfulness interventions and attentional flexibility training. Restoration theory and evidence based research support the claims of various mood improvement benefits.
Radical Self Care?
Extreme caregivers and emotional labourers --professionals in the human and social services industries, but also wives, mothers, adult daughters, that's to say nearly always women-- should take better care of themselves. It's a platitude all too regularly ignored. In a society striated by leylines of power where certain tasks are deemed subaltern, and as corollary certain…Read more Radical Self Care?
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