Countdown to losing my mind... Don't worry, it's a good thing!

In ten days I will be leaving for my Vipassanna mediation retreat in North Fork, CA.   While I'm there I will experience ten, ten hour days of insight meditation, which in a nutshell means I will be letting go of all unnecessary thoughts and quieting my mind, and 24hr a day noble silence.  This will teach me to truly observe my actions and experiences without dwelling on the past and worrying about the future.   My hope is that this retreat will be a jump-start to a regular meditation practice and will help me to learn to control my emotions and see them for what they are.  I am working toward to eliminating negative impulses and increasing my capacity to react in a calm and positive way.  I am learning that my habitual busy-ness has wired an unwanted addiction to stress and though I have recently been attempting to find ways in my life to escape the things that cause the most stress, I have only made myself busier and more stressed.  I need to create healthy calm habits to reduce stress and increase by ability to see things clearly and calmly in the moment.

I'm really excited about this whole endeavor and the potential positive effects it will have on my life.  In preparation for my retreat I purchased some meditation supplies.  Possibly a little overkill, but I think I'll be really comfy.  Follow these links to check out my new meditation cushion, zabuton sitting mat, and fleece, hooded robe.  At some point later I'll have Omar take some photos of me for the blog so you can see them in action!

I've been practicing with my new cushions and really enjoying them.  The hooded robe is helpful to eliminate distractions.  Earplugs also help ;-)  My biggest challenge is the upper back and neck pain I've been experiencing the last few weeks.  I'm going to visit my chiropractor, Ty, on Wednesday, so hopefully that will help.  I'm also hoping he can suggest a new pillow situation.  I've tried a whole bunch of different ones including a memory foam pillow and haven't found a good solution.  Pretty soon I may break down and try the $100 tempur-pedic pillow.  But I'm going to wait to see what Ty say.  You can't put a  price on being pain free and having a good nights sleep.