Last night, my husband and I meditated on feeling our body and senses. We set the timer for 20 minutes, but 12 minutes into it, I could not continue. This is the first time that I have never been able to finish a meditation! I was lying on the sofa with my legs draped over his lap as he sat. He was holding my left foot with his right hand. We were meditating in our den, which is hot because of the wood stove, but this is where we usually meditate and it has never bothered me. Well, not last night. I became SO HOT and uncomfortable that I started shifting my right leg and moving around and then finally had to stop. When I stopped and told my husband what I was experiencing, he was not at all surprised, because he told me that he was sending energy into me from him. He said he could feel our mutual "heart beats" in my foot and his hand and how the energy was flowing between us. I could not feel that energy, but I certainly became so filled with his energy that I was BOILING HOT! So interesting!

Last night, we meditated for 20 minutes on letting go again. I think we could each spend 20 years on this one. I started writing a novel yesterday and it brought up so much current pain. I'm also meeting a friend on Monday to discuss how she hurt me, three months in the making, and that is causing me so much suffering in my daily life. I wrote a huge email to her, outlining how she has hurt me, but fortunately remembered something Jack Kornfield said. "Wait to hit the send button until after you have meditated." He was right. I took that email and turned it into 5 pages of my new novel, something I am happy about, because I can finally start to turn the tragedy and pain into something that can be useful and help other women. But how can I balance the pain of staring right into the eye of the tornado with letting the pain go? This I am struggling with. This I meditated to.

And then last night, I dreamed of my other former friend, the one who hurt me so much and caused collateral damage with other friends. I sure was letting it all out in my dream, hitting her, screaming at her, making her listen to me even though she was trying to get away, make up excuses, lie. It was so poignant. I have never gotten to tell her how I feel, what she has done to me, how hurtful she was. Here I did. Perhaps the meditation helped release some of this in my dream? Helped me to "get it out" and hopefully let go some of it. I don't know. I'm feeling the pain all over again this morning. I wish none of it had ever happened. Humph

For my husband, meditation now helps him to sleep and it did. While I woke up in the middle of the night, he snored.

Tonight, we meditated for 20 minutes on forgiveness. We had a bad day in Boston, my husband getting into a brutal fight with his mother, some of which I prompted. So much stuff came up for him and he shot it out at his mother, who couldn't hear it, didn't want to hear it. She fought back. "Why can't she just apologize?" I kept asking. My mind wandered and I teared up at one point, and I didn't have any grand epiphanies. But it helped us to do together. I am grateful that while it was I who started us on the meditation path, it's been my husband who has encouraged us to do it every night, even when I don't feel like it. I can't imagine how worse off I'd be if I weren't doing it.

Tonight, we meditated on letting go. We were in our 2nd home, a house we bought 5 years ago with my mother-in-law. It has caused much strife in our lives and a lot of suffering. It was really hard to be there. Painful memories were all around me in that house. A former friend was inappropriate and mean in that house. Twice. "How can I even be here?" I wondered. The meditation helped us both a lot. We had spent most of the day having a great time, but it seems like my own "witching" hour is early evening. My husband said something to me in the morning, about keeping $$ in the house, and now 8 hours later, I was spiraling. "How can he think that way?" I wondered again. Meditation always calms me down, puts things more in perspective, and allows me to think straight again. Especially when I don't want to do it.

"It isn't a grim training, forcing ourselves to feel something we don't, or pretending we're in a certain space when we're not." Yes, and yes again on this one. Bringing the training off the mat is challenging lately, in an immediate way. Watching close up, seeing the daily unfolding of a Navy veteran's criminal case, has opened up my eyes to the difficulty of bringing the truly "unlovable" sort (the proscecutor in this instance) into a space of observing without engaging in the passionate indignation/anger/name-calling, etc. that normally accompanies it. For a veteran to face 40 years prison time because he used the veteran's crisis hotline to prevent his suicide, only to have the information later used to by the Federal government to charge him, calls many emotions into play. There are new levels of practice on this one, bringing my attention to the fact that my feelings and my aspirations don't always line up. I try to go easy on myself here, too, knowing that it is all in process, evolving daily. On the otherhand, this situation has more fully opened my heart to a dearly loved one who is working to make a difference here, and that has been an enormous blessing. This coin flips on both sides regularly! So grateful to be in the midst of the 28-Day meditation practice in this moment. Again, many thanks, Sharon, for your guidance and for creating the opportunity for meaningful change in the world. Namaste'