Look Out

If you journal once this week… It’s another list-making week in our journaling time together. It’s time to take ten minutes to list every single person you can think of in your life. EVERY SINGLE ONE. From your nearest family to the grocery store clerk — the unhoused neighbor to your family doctor — the hometown hero you admire to the politician you can’t stand. Everybody.

As you write each name or identifier (if you don’t know their name), think or write “may you be happy… may you be healthy … may you be safe… may you be free from want.” For some of the folks on your list, this will be more difficult. Do it anyway.

If you journal more than once… What do you want to change in the world? Start by picking one thing (I can imagine there are a few). What is it about that thing? Why is that what resonates for you? Try to go beyond just the things that make you feel righteous — the moral high ground you carry in this area. You could have chosen any of the inequities in the world: why this ONE?

Does it affect how you vote? How you shop? How you eat? How you get around?

I can imagine this will get you fired up — or even angry — but that’s only part of the exercise. The real goal is to understand why this one issue is so powerful for you beyond the easy, surface stuff. What does it speak to about your own deeper values and fears? Is there someone you admire in this area? What do you think inspires THEM? Where do you think THEY struggle?

If you have completed the journal prompts above, then simply let yourself write for ten minutes without any rules or restrictions. Consider the prompts, your previous journal entries this week, and just let your pen go!

This flow “peaks” with Half Moon Pose, so having a block (or two) handy might be nice. If you’re looking for modification options, check out this YouTube video by Yogi Nico.

Many thanks to The Mercedes Club, Hell’s Kitchen, NY, for letting me record these yoga flows in their gorgeous yoga studio.

If you prefer to meditate on your own, unguided: My version of the practice of "loving-kindness" meditation. Call to mind someone who is very easy to love … then someone who is "neutral," whom you don't know well … and finally someone it might be harder for you to love. For each of these folks, wish them health, happiness and safety.