Worshipping the Orange

This is one of my favorite exercises in mindfulness. We discussed it
in the Meditation Level 2 class this week, and it was dubbed
"worshipping the orange" by one of the students. Quite appropriately.

First, find yourself a beautiful piece of fruit. This time of year, I
prefer citrus--luscious oranges, assertive grapefruits, sprightly
tangerines--you get the idea. If citrus disagrees with you, try a
banana or anything else of tropical origin.
Look at the orange. Allow yourself to admire it. Draw it with pastels
or crayons, watch how the sunlight creeps across its skin. Realize the
miraculous nature of this orange, a product of sunlight and warmth,
existing in our currently frigid climate. Let yourself be grateful for
that. (And, just for a moment, let yourself be grateful, instead of
guilty, for the supply lines bringing us food from around the world).

Pick up the orange. Run your fingers over its surface. Map it with
your fingerpads. If you were blind, would you recognize this fruit?
Bring it to your face, and inhale its fragrance. First with the skin
intact. Then nick the skin (or open the peel, with a banana) and let
the intensity of its aroma fill your senses. Feel gratitude for this
small miracle, the potency of the scent.

Peel the orange. Continue to admire it, and to immerse yourself in
your senses. Feel the texture of the skin against your fingers, and
the stickiness of the juice. Note all these sensations with gratitude.

Finally, take a bite. Again, immerse yourself in sensation and feel
gratitude for it. Repeat with each bite you take. Finish the orange
with admiration and gratitude.

Carry this feeling with you into the day.

**Cross-posted here and to the Stellaria Meditation Group

You can dance right through your life...

My graduating class at the National College of Naturopathic Medicine named me "Most Likely to Turn Her Clinic Into a Dance Studio." I wasn't too long into the organizing of my wellness center that I realized that clinic as studio was a perfect description of what I wanted to do. Why? Because movement is at the heart of my experience of health.

I've always been a dancer. Or, more to the point, I haven't ever been able to stop dancing. I saw the movie Flashdance at the tender age of 9, and decided right then that I was going to be a dancer. I was too young to realize the silliness of the plot--that a nightclub dancer could make it into a prestigious ballet school on sheer force of will. I only knew that the main character wanted to dance, and so did I. She danced in a loft; I danced in my parents' basement. She didn't have the means to take dance classes; I had to take CCD and go to soccer practice on the two nights my hometown park district offered ballet. Still, I danced.

It would be years before I performed in public, and even longer before I took a formal dance class. Still, dancing was the thread that ran through my days. I played sports, I did aerobics, I lifted weights and jogged and swam and did yoga, and sometimes I did none of those things. But I could never stop dancing. A few days without that kind of movement--and it wasn't just movement, of course, it was self-expression--left me feeling cranky and sick. I had to dance. It wasn't about staying in shape, or honing my technique; it was about preserving my sanity.

Some people feel this way about writing, others about playing an instrument, or cooking. In a way I was lucky that it was moving that made me feel most like myself. I didn't need to force myself to go to a gym to meet the requirements for "healthy movement"--I could get my workout in any of the tiny apartment bedrooms I lived in. When I moved to New York City, I feared having to give up my dancing due to lack of space. Instead I found myself living in a loft in Brooklyn--a very raw artists' den, a sublet of a sublet--but I had room to dance.

So my blood pressure and heart rate stayed low, my muscles stayed strong, and I stayed sane.

I've been dancing now for 3/4 of my life, and there's no end in sight. If I had a wish for all of my patients, all of my students, all the people who come into my center, it would be this: I wish you find the way to move that moves you. Because moving should be a joy, not a chore. Forget about comparing the aerobic benefits of yoga to the estimated caloric expenditure in weight lifting to the predicted joint damage incurred by running. Just keep trying different things until you find yourself having so much fun moving that you don't want to stop. And then-- don't stop.

You never know. Finding the joy in movement might lead you somewhere entirely new.