Santa Clara Meditation Members Q&A – I’ve stopped taking care of myself since 2018. I’ve been eating unhealthy since then, not brushing my teeth, etc. How can I get back into taking care of myself?

If you live in my town, I’d like to go and listen to you and take a walk with you. And I want to pat you on the back saying it’s okay. I can’t do that, so I’m going to tell you this story. I don’t know if it will help. But I still give you my heart.

The picture below is an art piece which was made in class by one of my meditation students. The theme was ‘Real Me’. I asked the students what kind of life they would like to live in if they could live as ‘real me’ after throwing away the fake me they wanted to throw away. Children express themselves as they wish. There were many impressive pieces, but I remember one of them.

The child who made this work said with a small but clear voice that there are various things in her, and she respect them all and want to live by expressing them. There is no great story, but when I heard the story of that child, somehow, my heart moved. And I thought. It starts with acknowledging, loving, and expressing the various things within me. It felt like me, my life, this world, and the universe.

At this moment, I want to comfort you who are having a hard time. Don’t be too ashamed of the difficult moments or the moments when you collapse from failure. Fine. It is enough that you exist in this world. It’s okay if you don’t have a great twist story in your life. The world thank you for your very existence.

by Donna Seo

https://santaclarameditation.blogspot.com/2022/12/santa-clara-meditation-members-q-ive.html