If this can't make you smile, what can?

I'm watching this over and over again, and I find myself with this silly, giant smile on my face every time! I'm going to kill myself with this cuteness!!!



At the same time I'm worried and sad for sweet Annabella and her Scout... I'm sending hugs and warm, happy thoughts their way, hoping everything turns out well. And since I can't give Anna a real orchid for her new office, here is a virtual one. Love to you both...

Of Bumblebees and Owls

Who would've thought?

I just lived through a wonderful weekend, so delightful in many ways and I also got a lot of stuff done that I've been putting off for far too long. I guess therapy is kicking in? Seriously, even if I still have a long way to go, it's really nice to see some progress, be able to feel a difference from just a couple of months ago.

On Friday I had the day off and after I'd dragged my sorry ass through practice, it was so nice to go back home, have breakfast and then take a nap before my dad came over to help out with a few things. In the evening I met up with Grace and a few of her colleagues for dinner before we went to see Vicky Christina Barcelona. How wonderful it is to have a good laugh in the company of friends!

And then, on Saturday night, Game Boy and LeapYear had a cocktail party to celebrate their 80th birthday! Muzzy and The Ed also came and there were a lot of other couples that I've met before but don't get see very often (everyone has kids!). It was a lovely evening and I had quite a few glasses of champagne :) Still, aiming to get up to practice the next morning...

Strange enough, it wasn't too hard to get out of bed, even though my head felt a bit heavy. Went to the shala with absolutely no expectations at all. Well, maybe just a little... that it would be a somewhat dense practice and that I wouldn't do it all... To my great surprise, my breath found the flow almost immediately, and for the first time in a very, very long time I noticed small, but distinct changes in almost every asana. Overall, I seemed more aware than usual which made it the most delightful practice. And if that wasn't enough, my shoulder and arm almost didn't give me any trouble at all :) Afterwards we went for the usual Sunday coffee at the nearby coffee place. What a joy!

For the first time in such a long time, I'm going to bed, on a Sunday night, feeling happy and content with my weekend, and even slightly positive about the upcoming week. I can't tell you how good that feels...

xxxx

"I'm out of my mind, but feel free to leave a message"

Who put chewing gum in my brain?

I'm so fcuking tired I can hardly keep my eyes open, and thinking a thought through is nearly impossible. I almost didn't get up to go to practice this morning because my head didn't want to leave the pillow and later I fell asleep on the bus to work...

Besides that I just need to brag a little, although, most of you will probably think I'm even more insane than you ever could imagine ;-)

We've been away with work for two days on some kind of development conference for my unit. We went to a charming place outside Stockholm, in the archipelago. In the evening of the first day there was some time for recreation and a few of us decided to take a sauna. The facilities were excellent! A wooden fired sauna on a pier and only a couple of meters to get in the water. And so I did. For your information (Carl!) it was 52 degrees and just marvelous :-D

Silly Chitta?

Is it alright for someone how's supposed to be kind of depressed to make silly stuff like these? Well, I couldn't resist :) Make your own at www.yearbookyourself.com

The Fortune Cookie Bacio

"Friends are those rare people who ask how you are and then wait to hear the answer."

Chitta needs to post...

To tell you the truth, life hit me, so HARD, after I got back from yoga camp. I don't like to whine, but I have to tell you straight up, I'm a total wreck... My self-confidence has gone right out the window, I don't know who I am anymore or what I'm good at in this world. I suck! There have been days when I wished I'd get a deadly disease so that I could just vanish from the face of the earth...

Of course nothing of this is true, I know that, but it's how I feel and right now I can't see a way out of it, don't know where to begin to sort out this mess and get back on track. The chittas are vritting a bit too much. Or as a very dear friend defined it: my mind is stuck in self amplifying deviation loops.

Most of this, I'm sure, emanates from the fcuking situation at work. Partly due to lots of stress that's been going on for far to long, and partly because of issues of leadership and value systems in the work environment (which of course also is stressful). All of these things can be dealt with, but they are really not my responsibility to sort out. I'm just the one getting squeezed in the middle.

I know, I know, time to find another job! Only problem is that promoting myself with a non existent self-confidence will probably not render me a new job...

I've had several talks with my boss, who is very understanding and considerate, and he SAYS he will do all in his power to help me get back on track. I'm not so sure though... he's also very anxious and unclear in his leadership. But I'm prepared to stick around a little more and at least take some advantage of the situation, let him do what he can do. Hopefully that will get me in a better state so that I can get the hell out of here.

For now, it seems that the only things that are joyful and make me a little happy is Bumblebee and my practice. I need to hold on to that and not let anything interfere or disturb it.

Practice has been good ever since yoga camp, great in fact. I've been able to keep at least 4 day weeks so far and seeing Mercury this regularly is getting my practice into a fantastic groove. Not so much in a touching-the-universe-kind-of-way, more like a I-could-do-this-every-day-for-the-rest-of-my-life-kind-of-way.

So, there you have it...

...and here is Bumblebee!

Me(me) needs...

LI Ashtangini tagged me for this meme where you go to Google, put in ‘[your given name] needs’ in the text window, hit 'search' and see what comes out. Hilarious! These were mine:

Chitta needs a boyfriend (doh!)

Chitta needs daylight (SAD, right?)

Chitta needs to put away things or otherwise clean apartment (well, who ever made this up knew what they were doing...)

Chitta needs to turn 22 more or gain 540 more Werewolf points to reach the next level: Cyber Werewolf! Chitta should get out there and bite some people! (yes please ;-)

Chitta needs mom and dad to be around a lot (ok, so not every one of these have to be true, do they?)

Chitta needs to start learning to do this stuff (what's *this*????)

Chitta needs to come home again (physically or mentally?)

Chitta needs one too (he he... ;-)

Hmmm, it doesn't say how many to tag, so I'll just tag as many as I like :) Liz, Susananda, Eeyore, and Arturo, consider yourselves tagged!

I'm The Empress?

Beauty, happiness, pleasure, success, luxury, dissipation.

The Empress is associated with Venus, the feminine planet, so it represents, beauty, charm, pleasure, luxury, and delight. You may be good at home decorating, art or anything to do with making things beautiful.

The Empress is a creator, be it creation of life, of romance, of art or business. While the Magician is the primal spark, the idea made real, and the High Priestess is the one who gives the idea a form, the Empress is the womb where it gestates and grows till it is ready to be born. This is why her symbol is Venus, goddess of beautiful things as well as love. Even so, the Empress is more Demeter, goddess of abundance, then sensual Venus. She is the giver of Earthly gifts, yet at the same time, she can, in anger withhold, as Demeter did when her daughter, Persephone, was kidnapped. In fury and grief, she kept the Earth barren till her child was returned to her.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

A day in the life of a happy yogi

06.30 wake up, take a long, warm shower and get dressed

06.56 go to the shala


07.00 get on the mat




~08.30 savasana


08.45 have breakfast: grape fruit, buckwheat porridge filled with nuts, fruit, flaxseeds and topped with cinnamon, tea and/or coffee



11.00 technique class, philosophy and chanting with Morning Star
(~12.30 short brake for fruit and drinks)




14.00 lunch

afternoon - depending on the weather - hang out with other yogis, read, take a trip to local sights, sleep




18.30 dinner

sauna

20.30 meditation


22.00 go to bed

Preview

On my way to practice

The view from my mat


(to be continued...)

I <3 radio

Oh. My. Gosh. I just listened to an amazing program on the radio. So thought provoking, so inspiring, such a punch to the stomach.


We have a marvelous tradition on Swedish radio called Sommar. It's a radio show broadcast daily during the summer and every day is hosted by different people how get to talk about whatever they like and play music of their own choice. Mostly it's celebrities ranging from scientists, musicians, athletes, politicians, authors, artists and others with a reputation in their profession. Nowadays you can listen to the program on the web or as podcast, so you don't need to put on the radio any specific hour of the day. I usually listen to the web version while doing stuff around the house. Sometimes the host is no one I know of, but I tend to listen anyway and mostly I don't regret it. The shows are often interesting, funny, inspiring and thought provoking. And you get to listen to a lot of really good music from many different genres.

Anyway, today I got to Raymond Ahlgren (who is the son of one of Salvador Allende's closest men, Paredes). In a very creative way, he told the story of his own transformation for the past few years, the things he'd learned and new perspectives he had gained on his life and living in general.

Among other things, he spoke about how procrastination creates a kind of loss of time and energy. He described how thoughts that are not carried through are littering our brains. All of those things undone are still in our thoughts and filling up mental space with anguish to get them done. He compared the human brain to a hard drive, that when becoming fragmented will be slowed down and working poorly. In the same way we become tiered and slowed down, loosing power to get on with our lives. A tool to overcome this that he'd used was to try decreasing the distance, in terms of time, between thought and action. I find that a very useful way of looking at it.

Another subject he spoke about was how many of us search to find a partner that will make us whole. He argued that if we're not whole ourselves we are likely to attract a partner that isn't either. Say that we are both half and thinking that together we will be one. Though, simple math shows that 0.5 x 0.5 equals 0.25. Even if one of us is whole it would be 1 x 0.5 = 0.5. So, his point being that instead of creating wholeness and energy, we will instead drain ourselves and become less than we were before. In other words, we can not expect anyone else to heal us or make us a whole person. We need to do that ourselves.

Now you're all wondering what's new about this? Well, nothing really. These are all things I believe most of us are well aware of. Still, it doesn't hurt to be reminded once in a while, and it's really inspiring to hear it put in an eloquent and concrete way. We all need inspiration and some new perspectives, no?

To end this post on a lighter note, I give you a picture of Bumblebee in her endearing little dragon jacket!

I ran away with the circus!

Have been visiting with my friends the Circus Family for a couple of days. We've had lovely days at their summer house, a fantastic place where one can really relax and just be together. And they are a fantastic family to be a part of for a while :)

Circus Dad and I studied at the university together more than ten years ago. Since then he got married to Juggler Princess and moved back to his hometown a bit south of Stockholm. They had their second son, Smootchie, four months ago. He's a very content baby and so easy to have around, although, a baby is always a baby. It's cool to see another baby at the same developmental stage as Bumblebee was just a couple of months ago.

Smootchie's older brother, Calvin, is Prince Charming and a real cutie, but he is also a handful! I think I'll have make him a t-shirt that says 'I want!'. He's very determined ;-)

And everywhere you go, the Circus dog, Hobbes, follows you around. I think he might be the sweetest dog I ever met! We've gone for long walks in the woods. Every morning, before getting up, he came and snuzzled with me in my bed. And when you sit on a chair he comes and puts his little head in your lap or between your knees and looks at you with his big, cute eyes.

Calvin and Hobbes chasing bubbles




The Circus tent
Juggler Princess, Calvin and his best friend takes a swim in the pool
More animals at the Circus (bats! click image to enlarge)
Smootchie!


The observant reader probably noticed I haven't mentioned yoga for a while. That's simply because I decided my practice is also on vacation :) Instead of feeling guilty for not practicing, I just took a few weeks off. Next week I'm going to yoga camp and I will use this week to slowly get back into my practice. Will be sore, that's for sure.

Happy Birthday Bella Anna!

Vi e' så glada ida'
att du har födelseda'
att du e' född just ida'
Hurra hurra! HURRA HURRA!!! *)


Sweet darling Anna, I wish you an amazing, fabulous birthday, filled with snuzzles, shibas and cupcakes! Today is the beginning of a wonderful year in your life. Remember, you're the hero in your own story :-D

ROAR! MEOWTH!

Sunshine-y hugs, lots of love and glittering pazzels over the miles!

xxxxxxxx


/Chitta

*) This is Grodan Boll's birthday song, not the most commonly sung on birthdays. Though, among my friends it is tradition to sing this one :) Basically, it says we're happy today that it's your birthday and that this is the day you were born!

Fucking neighbors

I live in an apartment building, facing the back yard and another similar building. Almost every sound of what's going on reverberates and is heard if you have a window open or sit on the balcony. For instance, if the guy opposite to me is on the phone, I can hear it.

It's a beautiful serene and quite night and I could hear the blackbird singing at twilight. Maybe people are exhibitionists and like the fact that others can take part of what they're doing, but this, I don't think I've ever experienced. A couple on the top floor in the opposite building just fucked. With their balcony doors wide open.

Deduction

Did I mention I'm on vacation?

Obviously, time off from work means blog slacking? I've been visiting with my family in Skåne. Seriously, I thought the internet connection would be better and that I would have all the time in the world. Ha! It's been very intense days and surfing the internet has been a bit nostalgic, like in the good old days on a 56.6 kb modem.



I've had some issues with parts of my family in the past. Actually, I still have, but it's easier these days to ignore it and be thankful for what I do have with them. It's quite special to be together this much for several days. Somehow, these people are the ones I can always be myself around, and most importantly, they are the people I care most about in the whole wide world. They will always be there, no matter what. Cousins and second cousins may seem a bit far away. But really, when we are all together like this, three generations, you realize how important family is.

It's also at times like this I miss my grandmother the most. On the other hand, it's fantastic to see that life has moved on even though she's no longer among us. We're doing good, we take care of each other, we enjoy each others company and all the kids love to get together. They fool around and play all the time. The older ones take care of the younger ones, no matter who's sister or brother it is. Just the same way as when I was a kid, growing up with my cousins.




Centre of attention, though, was of course Bumblebee. She's charming everyone and seems to be safe and snug in the arms of almost anyone. It's been such a delight to spend so much time with her.



Another center of attention, as always in my family, is good food. How can one family end up with so many good cooks and bakers? Everyone seem to have their specialty. At lunches and dinners, we all bring something to the table. Like this dessert. Yum!




WTF, I might as well turn this into a photo blog instead ;-)