Gary Green's Blog, page 12

The Mindful Lifestyle–Available now

Having posted about my first book, “In Pursuit of Joy”, I thought maybe I should post about my newly released book, “The Mindful Lifestyle”.

Mindfulness is a very hot topic lately and as usually happens when a lot of people are talking about something, there is a lot of confusing, contradictory and just plain wrong information out there. “The Mindful Lifestyle” cuts through the clutter and provides a concise explanation of mindfulness practices and why everyone should adopt mindfulness as a lifestyle choice.

In “In Pursuit of Joy” I discuss how important mindfulness practice was in my recovery from depression and alcoholism. However, the more I thought about it, the more I realized there was a lot more to say about mindfulness. So, The Mindful Lifestyle” is sort of a supplement to “In Pursuit of Joy”.

What will you find in “The Mindful Lifestyle”? First, there is a listing of the benefits of mindfulness practice. I go on to discuss the types of mindfulness practice and the qualities of mindfulness. I give practical exercises and discuss how mindfulness can be a lifestyle choice.

“The Mindful lifestyle” is now available here:

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-mindful-lifestyle-gary-green/1121216393?ean=9781631357008

and here: http://sbprabooks.com/garygreen/

Feel free to contact me if you are interested in receiving a free review copy.

 

 

In Pursuit of Joy

People tell me I should blog about my book. I had hoped when I wrote it that the publisher would do all the marketing. Sadly, this is apparently so longer the case. So this is me bragging about my first book “In Pursuit of Joy”.

It is the story of my recovery from depression and alcohol. However, I think it is a book everyone should read–and I’ll tell you why. I was not miraculously cured by Jesus; though my recovery (read “all recovery”) was certainly a spiritual process.

I had to learn that all people grow and develop throughout their entire lifespan. As a depressed person I had become stuck in this process and did not know how to get my needs met. I came to understand that as a human being I am a social animal and that if my social needs were not met I would be sick.

I learned to get my love and acceptance needs met by giving love and acceptance.

I learned the importance of mindfulness in the growth process

I learned that by becoming more connected with people I also became more connected to the Universe-at-large (my Higher Power).

I learned that the things I had to do to beat depression and alcoholism continued to increase my joy even when those things were no longer a problem. I had become a more compassionate, effective and grateful person.

My spiritual quest to reduce my pain became a “Pursuit of Joy”.

Learn how I did it and how you can do it too. Read “In Pursuit of Joy”. It is short, cheap, easy to read and inspirational.

In Pursuit of Joy

Great Expectations

It happened again. It never fails. I’m sure it has happened to you as well. I went to a movie that I was really excited to see. The previews were really funny. The critics loved it. Everyone I talked to who had seen it said it was the funniest movie they had ever seen. Then I saw the movie and I was disappointed. Sure, it was funny, but the funniest ever? I don’t think so.

How weird is that? I saw a very funny movie and came out disappointed. It did not meet my expectations. That was the problem really. I was living in the future and when I got there I was disappointed, rather than being in the present and enjoying that. When I thought about it I realized that no movie could be as great as I expected this one to be.

That is the problem with expectations. We live in an unknown future and are disappointed when we get there. And yet, we do it all the time. Admittedly, sometimes the future meets or exceeds our expectations. Then we feel happy. The problem with this scenario is that we are setting ourselves up for a kind of emotional roller coaster that is completely unnecessary.

How can we avoid this disappointment? What if we looked at this in the context of the mindful lifestyle? We may know of future events but are grateful for the joy we find in each present moment. When the future events arrive we are not burdened by the judgmental thinking that expectations are, and find the joy that those future events hold. And we are grateful for it.

What if the present is not pleasant? We accept it without judgmental thoughts and move on. The moment passes and the pain along with it.

There is a difference between planning for the future and having expectations. Having expectations is having judgmental thoughts about future events—always a mistake.

My Last Two Weeks

I haven’t posted for a couple of weeks. I think it started when I attended the funeral of one of my high school friends. He was one of the good people who populated my youth. He was a successful accountant, had a wife and seven children. I hadn’t seen much of him in the last few years but it gave me pleasure thinking of him living his life. I was shocked to learn he shot himself.

I have been somewhat outspoken on the topic of suicide still firmly believe that where there is life there is hope. He was always such a positive person—and clearly loved by his family. This is why it was such a shock to me. I have accepted I will never understand it. All I can do at this point is grieve his loss and wish him and his family well.

I found myself thinking about this a lot. So I decided to find something to take my mind of it. I decided to go to a popular genealogical website and research my ancestors. I was pleasantly surprised. I found many lines in America that placed my ancestors right on the frontier. I traced my ancestors back to colonial America and further back to England. I found an ancestor that came on the Mayflower. In England I found some lines that had members of the nobility. I traced those lines back to the Plantagenet kings of England. There were Scottish kings and kings of France and Sweden. I even found Charlemagne and through him ancestors going back to Roman times. It was fun.

However, then I started to wonder “What does this all mean?” I thought about this a bit. Took some pride in the fact that some of my ancestors built Western Europe. But then I thought “What have they done for me lately?” I suspect that Charlemagne has thousands of descendants. After all, he had eight wives. None of the wealth or power has found its way to me. Also, it seems that most of those powerful people were ruthless, greedy and power-hungry.

Additionally, Charlemagne lived over 1200 years ago. He is my 35th great grandfather. That means there were living at that time millions of other people who were my ancestors. I also carry their genes. The conclusion I came to is that my ancestors going back to the dawn of humanity have given me life. What I do with this precious gift is up to me. I do feel gratitude for this gift. Furthermore, I read a while back that all living humans descended from one woman who lived many thousands of years ago. We are truly one family. We are all truly connected to each other. Maybe we should be nicer to each other.

Trouble in Paris

Well, here we go again. It is one thing if narrow minded people want to establish a state where they can control everything people say and do. It is a completely different thing when they try to impose their will on the rest of us. I am of course referring to the recent attack in Paris.

Certainly we all condemn the actions of the Muslim extremists. Certainly we must do whatever is necessary to bring these murderers to justice. What we don’t want to do is to give in to the temptation to let judgmental thinking run rampant. Clearly these perpetrators are promoting some very wrong thinking. What I mean by wrong thinking is the idea held by many people that God condones killing people who say or do something you don’t like.

I do not believe God condones killing anyone. When it was written in the Bible “An eye for an eye” it was actually toning things down in a time when slight offenses escalated into long-standing blood feuds. Later in the Bible Jesus tells us to pray for our enemies—to forgive them.

In a practical sense we cannot pardon every terrorist. There penalties for people who commit crimes– as a deterrent. We, as a society have a right to protect ourselves. However, I think it is reasonable to ask what makes people living among us to decide to travel to the mid-east to learn how to kill us more effectively. What does this say about us?

We all want a free and open society. But this comes with responsibility. We have a responsibility to respect people and societies that are different than we are. If you lived next door to a Jew it would be impolite, to say the least, to tell him jokes about the Holocaust. We tolerate the Holocaust deniers even though most of us disagree with and dislike what they say. Just because we have the right to say something it doesn’t mean we should or have to say it. A little compassion or empathy would go a long way here.

Perhaps both sides can back off a bit. We quit saying derogatory things about Mohammed and they quit trying to kill us. It is something to think about anyway.