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Comfort Domains
Comfort is both a good thing, and perhaps one of our greatest evils also. We tend to neglect our instincts with comfort. We mistake comfort for ease, and we can be totally at ease but not comfortable. In that case, people tend to just suffer the stress to keep the ease. Comfort has two domains: the…
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Dissed Rest
I practice Vipassana meditation, and when I’m with fellow mediators they say they would like to experience how relaxed I appear. I tell them, that’s only an appearance. That I’m just observing my spasming back and legs that want to move. My body is completely not at rest. That’s a good thing to tell them,…
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Mystery of Comfort
I heard a talk by someone who has become hated in the medical industry. Through freedom of information act he uncovered that anti-depressants are as useful as placebos, and they have the tests to show it. Is there such a thing as a poison placebo, like if somebody thinks a vile of water would kill…
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Too Much Rest
We all seek comfort. Cling to it in the face of what we are told, and we often tell ourselves it is a cold cruel world. It can seem like life’s only saving grace, but comfort is both a great good, and also potentially one of the worst evils we face. It’s a natural cycle…
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Self Experience
I find that rest and growth come in cycles. As if spirit is directing all sorts of synchronicity, and then once the information has been received the rest begins to integrate what was taken in. Yes, indeed. I have called it the breath of the spirit, but our “self knowledge” often misdirects the growth cycle…
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Innocence in Awareness
You know the healing power of a baby!? It is big! Yes. Babies are examples of human nature in its pure form. Taoism says this. Buddhism says this though less bluntly. Many of the pagan faiths have the divine child symbolism which was also taken up by Christianity, and many see the “Christ child” as…
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Comfortably Numb
Where does our ego come in? Ego comes in because we attach to the supposed virtue of rest, of a narrowly defined peace, and feel we can claim spiritual success if we can say “I am this” even if it’s a very broad term produced by very vague thinking. We turn to traditions and give…
Category: Comfort
Comfort is both a great good, and one of the worst evils we face. It’s a natural cycle, and has two sides to it. The stasis threshold, which is the “rest” phase, and the growth threshold. Trying to relax is stress, but it’s “eustress” or physical change that feeds well being. Beyond the rest threshold it becomes “distress” or change that negatively impacts function. Excessive rest leads to atrophy, and distresses the body, and mind. It‘s the same with the growth threshold, but we can reclaim our awareness of our own cycle, and thus enhance our own capacity to adapt.
“As unrefined and basic as an animal’s emotional equipment may be, it is not insensitive to freedom. Somewhere in the archives of crudest instinct is recorded the truth that it is better to be endangered and free than captive and comfortable.” Tom Robbins (American Novelist. b.1936)
“In times of great stress or adversity, it’s always best to keep busy, to plow your anger and your energy into something positive.” Lee Iacocca
“Over the years your bodies become walking autobiographies, telling friends and strangers alike of the minor and major stresses of your lives.” Marilyn Ferguson