It’s day 40 and I can hardly believe how quickly time has flown by. Has it really been since day 7 that I wrote?
My trip to the ER revealed ovarian cysts and having that on top of Lyme’s Disease has made this Sadhana particularly challenging. I have found that the lesson of the last 40 days has been one of acceptance and openness to change and doing that with grace.
I began this Sadhana with three goals in mind. The first was to eliminate refined sugar from my diet, the second was to do a Venus Kriya mediation with my husband everyday and the third was to do some form of arts or crafts each day as well.
Each of these goals experienced some form of change that at first made me experience anger. Having to push though that I came to a place of acceptance.
Refined sugar is in so many, many things to eat. It lies hidden in items you wouldn’t have even dreamed it would be in. I found out all too late one evening after eating something that there had been sugar hidden in it. My Sadhana had been blown!!!!!!!!!!!!! NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Well, that’s how I felt at first. The I took a deep breath and thought about my original goal. I knew I would begin again at day 1 the next day and decided to tweak my goal to this, “I allow myself to be more mindful and aware of refined sugar in my diet and will try my best to avoid it as much as possible.”
The key change here was to use the words ALLOW and AWARE. They opened myself up to be in a more comfortable space that worked for me in that moment without giving up on the pursuit of keeping refined sugar out of my diet. The change allowed me to be able to make a mistake if it was unintentional and opened me up to be more conscious of all the places sugar can be hiding. I have found that as I continue this particular Sadhana that my craving for sugary foods are way down and I read the labels of absolutely everything and have found many new ways to replace sugar with honey in recipes which has been exciting in the kitchen.
The second goal of practicing a meditation with my husband failed after only a week or so. We were really enjoying our Venus Kriya each night but even after my husband setting an alarm on his phone we still managed to forget about it. Instead of holding onto the anger of the situation every time we forgot I just let go. I can to a place where I realized that we just weren’t ready for this. What we needed at this point in our lives was to just be with each other at night with nothing that we HAD TO DO.
Allowing myself to accept the situation with grace and know that it didn’t mean that we would never do a Sadhana together but meant that it just wasn’t our time RIGHT NOW made all the difference.
My arts and crafts goal opened me up to making art anywhere and everywhere big or little, fast or slow and in every kind of form. I learned to be creative in a myriad of ways that best suited my physical well being.
I spent the last 40 days baking, crocheting, cooking using new recipes, making jewelry, drawing, helping my children with art projects, trying art projects on my computer, writing, singing, acting, taking photographs and even researching possible new projects to do in the future.
Some of my creative endeavors only took seconds to do, like you saw with my chalk heart in my last post. And for that day, that is what I was capable of. Other projects took hours and that was fine too. What the change was with this Sadhana was to find creativity in everyday life and everyday situations and make the best of it.
At first when the day came that I wasn’t feeling well enough to sit down and do a full fledged art project I once again felt angry about it. But once I did what I had to do and instead made a small quick project instead I felt much better. I saw that the adaptation better suited what I needed in that moment and I was still able to stay on track with my Sadhana. It has opened me up to viewing life as art and how nearly all the things we do can have a creative element to it.
My favorite creative project throughout the 40 days was working with my daughter to make cupcakes for her forth birthday. I found an excellent recipe using honey to make the cakes and honey to sweeten the frosting. It was all homemade and absolutely delicious! To decorate our “Thank You Honey Bees!” cakes I printed out ballerina bears and taped them on toothpicks to stick on top of each cupcake for her nursery school party and printed butterflies and the letter E with flowers and butterflies and taped them to toothpicks for her family and friends birthday party. It was such fun to bake with her and watch her and her brother looking through the oven window while the cupcakes baked and having her help me stick the toothpicks in. It’s moments like that that makes bonds even stronger and make lasting memories.
These 40 days taught me to open my eyes to the world and see the art and creativity in everything. It taught me to become more aware of what I need in the now and adjust accordingly. It taught me to become mindful and aware of what I eat and to be kind to myself if I make a mistake. It taught me that grace is more powerful then anger.
What will my next Sadhana focus on?
I am thinking of continuing to be aware of refined sugar and adding being aware of anything genetically modified and attempting to avoid consuming either. I am also thinking of continuing to work on my anger issues and doing what I can each day to take a moment before I react and breathe and think things through. Is it really necessary to get angry? Is what is going on really that important to expel so much energy by becoming angry? Can I say yes instead of no or no instead of yes? Will that help? Can I just remember to breathe? Will that help? The goal is to create more of an inner dialogue with myself and think and breathe before I react. I would also like to continue to be creative in some form each day.
These goals may be the basis of my next Sadhana, they might not. That’s what is so great about this process, you can do just about anything!
Many Moons Yoga 