Yoga

Tonight I had a dream come true: I got to participate in an actual yoga class! I bought a 'how to' guide for practicing yoga about 5 months ago and got a mat for Christmas. I had this strong urge to learn yoga and feel comfortable with it before we got to India. I'm a 'flavor of the month' type person when it comes to exercise. Jan-Feb: running, Feb-Apr: yoga, May: biking...I like to switch it up, it keeps things interesting and my muscles always waiting in anticipation of what's around the corner. But there is something different about yoga, something lasting. I'm not sure if it's the slow, steady movements that force me to realize that I am a captive to my body, or the controlled breathing that reminds me that each breath is a gift from the Breath-giver, or maybe it's just the fact that you can soak in some amazing music and let yourself retreat for an hour while you burn a few cals... Either way, I've been able to enjoy many benefits of practicing yoga on my own, but tonight I was blessed to share it with a group of 25 that covered a wide range of abilities. I absolutely loved the entire experience and the dream was reinforced that someday I might lead others in yoga. 

Tonight, our leader said something profound in her prayer to end the session, she said, "God, in yoga we learn that we cannot force ourselves into a pose, we must release our urge to force and just allow our muscles to stop where they stop and grow from there. Help us to practice this submission in our daily lives."      Amen, sister.

yo quiero Taquito

I remember going to my friend Meghan's house when I was in junior high. We used to call her house "frozen food heaven" because her mom had a huge freezer in the garage that they kept full of all sorts of goodies that I try to make a habit of staying away from now (in order to keep my girlish figure).  My favorite item was the Taquitos. Ever had them? It's like the Mexican version of pulled pork wrapped up in a mini tortilla and fried. yumm.

Anyway, my mother-in-law pulled them out tonight for us to snack on before dinner. I felt like I was 12 again. I was torn between putting them in the microwave, which would deliver the fried goodness to me in less than 5 minutes, and putting them in the oven, which I would have to wait longer for, but they would be perfectly crisp when they got out. I voted against instant gratification and popped them in the oven.

True to form, I could wait 15 minutes to cook them, but I couldn't wait the 5 minutes required to cool them. I burnt my tongue. But every 270 calorie bite was worth it.

Live la vida loca; eat a taquito tonight.

-c

Lasik

I had Lasik done 3 weeks ago and the highlight for me was not seeing 20/15, it was the goggles I had to wear when I slept.

Bringin' sexy back.

-c

this will not inspire you

So, I've been feeling pressure to write something thoughtful/deep/inspiring whenever I post a blog.  Hence, not many blog posts.  I think I'm going to switch my approach and just type like I'd talk.  Not try and organize it so much.  Not do the whole "okay, it's prayer circle time and I need to be thinking about what I want to pray about so I'll rehearse now and then just say the prayer again when it's my turn".  Anyone else do that?  I hope so, or I've just outed myself.  Well, I quit doing that years ago in my praying, but for some reason the temptation still lingers in my blogging.

No more.

Just thought you might want to know I might be blogging more now. And they may be less interesting. :)

-c

The Moral of the Story...

I just got off the phone with a friend who went through some amazing, life-changing spiritual experience with God, and yet was afraid to share too much about it because it was so fresh.  He was scared that he would jump to the lesson too fast.  

I have been reading 1 and 2 Samuel, and it has totally captivated me.  I get so wrapped up in the story lines and how David and Saul and Jonathan and all the other characters interact.  Yet when my wife asked me to explain what it was that was pulling me in so much, I found it hard to put into words.  And when I did, it sounded nothing like what was going on in my heart.

A few months ago I went to see The Dark Knight with some friends, and one of them, as soon as we walked out of the theater, was asking us about the themes of the movie and what it said about God and how we should respond to it.  I appreciated his thoughts, but all of a sudden, the power of the movie was boxed up and packaged and no longer relevant.

There's one lecture from college about physics of all things that comes back in my mind fairly regularly.  It was about Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, which is loosely related to the "observer effect", which states that just by observing something, you change it.

These stories and several like them have been weaving through my mind recently.  I'd hate to ruin it by trying to pull out an application.  All I'll say is that I think there is something to just being a part of the story.

Justice

Much to update everyone on from our extensive travels, but first we'll share a story from last weekend. We were visiting our dear friends, Shawn and Angela and their great kids, Emma and Noah. While we were out to dinner, I (Neil) developed the most annoying case of the hiccups I've ever heard. The kind where I'll be talking normally about something halfway serious and then it's like this little 6 year old girl possesses my body and lets out a squeak. It's kind of hard to take yourself seriously in a case like that.

Anyway, this went on for a few hours despite all the usual remedies (even a friendly version of waterboarding). Five hours later, I was still hiccuping after lots of great conversation and a great prayer time along with my 6 year old alter-ego. Then, my good friend Shawn decides to tell one of those stories that everyone thinks about when someone else has the hiccups. You know, the one where the guy is like 25 and gets the hiccups and has them for the next 50 years despite surgeries and the finest medical care. (I'm convinced that we are getting all these stories from the 5th grade boys who spend all of their "library time" reading the Guinness Book of World Records and trying to make them sound even more bizarre.) Shawn relays his version of the story, starts laughing hysterically, and then, naturally, begins to hiccup for the rest of the evening. I'm usually not really a vindictive person, but it was pretty sweet to hear Shawn giggle and hiccup like a little girl all night after that.

Defragmenting

I have to be honest, I still have no idea how to defragment my computer. As a matter of fact, I don't know how to do anything on a computer that isn't required in my every day life. In college I would have to call on my friend Libby whenever my computer needed an overhaul. 

Today, my brain needs defragmenting. You know how they say you only use about 3% of your brain? (or is it 30%? either way..) I've been trying to stretch the other 97% this week and I'm tired. I've been busy solving the problems of the universe (if you want to know how we can achieve world peace, I'm your girl). This whole week seemed to be exceptionally full of thinking, philosophizing, theologizing (it's a word now), and lots of other things that I'm pretty much on the 'less than qualified' side of. 

If you know how to defragment a brain, call me.