Health and Medicine

HIYA!

I will write about touristy things. I swear. Just not quite yet. Haven't gone anywhere yet. Tomorrow we'll arrive at a border crossing with Cambodia so I'll write about that.

Yesterday while walking I saw a dog in the road. Lying down. Had obviously been hit. As we got closer I could see that it was breathing. I'd never seen a dog dying on the road before. It was really hard to look at. It had difficulty breathing and I could see blood under it's head. I heard it yelp a couple of times. I saw it get up once or twice then fall back down. It was hot when we walked by. Cars and pickup trucks whizzed by, container trucks whizzed by. What a hard way to die.

I felt so sorry for the dog. I don't know that I could have been of any real help.

I thought so of many things. I remembered seeing a kitten in Japan that had had its eyes burned. One of my co-teachers had thought about jumping on it with his boots to put it out of its misery. I remembered when I was living at the temple in Chiang Mai and smashing little moths that flew into the dish-washing water. I killed them thinking that it's better to die a quick deatht than a slow one. I remembered an Asoke monk telling me that we shouldn't interfere with the lives of other things. We shouldn't kill them. They should be able to live out there lives to it's natural end. Without intentional killing. It's a karma thing. But of course, if a person or an animal is dying, and we help, then what does that say about that person or that animal's karma? I remembered how when I was a small kid I'd cry when saw I a dead dog on the road.

I know that I've always been very sentimental about animals. I know that many people say that such people anthropomorphise animals. Animals don't have any feelings, they say. I don't know. I remember years ago a young woman telling me that she once looked into the eyes of a cow and she knew right away that that cow had a soul. It's in their eyes. She was so passionate when she told me. She was drunk too. It's easy to be passionate when we're drunk! I don't know if I anthropomorphise or not, but I don't care to wait until I am fully enlightened. I believe that I did the right thing yesterday in not helping this dog. This is so common. It's an everyday thing here.

Want something touristy? Well, there you go. Something about a "dog's life" here in Thailand. Soon, I'll write about the Thai - Cambodian border town. We're going to Aranyaprathet, in the eastern part of Thailand. Pretty directly east of Bangkok.

Oh, and durian. Soon, I'll write some things about this amazing piece of food.

I'd really like to write about honesty, but, I'll leave that until another time. I like to keep these entries short. This is long enough.

Troy.

HIYA!

Yeah, I said a crummy thing about Pranom. There is no good reason to have said that he wouldn't last on a mostly raw food diet. So what? He hasn't lasted but, still, so what?

There's this word in Buddhism, UPATHAN. Or at least, this is sort of how it sounds in Thai language. I really like this. It means to cling to misunderstandings. So when we, for example, believe that we have to eat rice, or bread, or meat, or whatever in order to stay healthy, well, there it is, that UPATHAN. Sleeping 8 hours a day. Not letting your hair get wet when it rains or you'll get a headache! The list goes on and on.

Troy.

HIYA!

I'm categorizing this under Health and Medicine, and maybe you'll see why towards the end.

Today was the first day. My friend Pranom and I left BKK yesterday by bus and arrived in a city called Sa Kaeo. It's 50 kms (100 miles is 60 kms, so, you figure out the distance!) or so from the border with Cambodia. My visa expires on the 14th so I want to be at the border on the evening of the 13th so that we can go across the border on the morning of the 14th. If we want to stay all day in Cambodia, then we can.

Seeings as we can walk 20 kms in one day, easily, we are taking this slowly. It takes 10 to 15 minutes to walk one km so 50 kms can be done pretty easily in 2 days.

We arrived in Sa Kaeo yesterday about 4pm and found a temple pretty quickly. We stayed the night at this temple. Very nice. Wow. We stayed in the visitor's room. Call it a room, why not. Pretty big and nice for a temple room. No beds or anything, but very clean and plenty comfortable. Don't have to mess with mosquito nets as they have screens on the windows. The bathroom and shower are outside but that's to be expected. They are cleaner than most temples here in Thailand, but I still wouldn't call them "clean".

Slept fine last night. Woke up this morning about 4 to go to the morning chanting and meditation. Pranom didn't want to go. He enjoys reading the newspaper in the morning.

I sat in meditation for almost an hour while the monks chanted and did their own meditation for 15 minutes. Then back to the room to read the newspaper myself.

We headed to a nearby fresh market for some breakfast about 6:30 then back to the temple to eat it. We finished about 8 then left about 8:30.

Eating mostly fresh fruits and vegetables. Plenty filling and gives lots of energy. I'm surprised a little that even Pranom is eating this way. At least he did today. I'm sure he won't last very long. I know him. We biked several days a couple of years ago and didn't last very long then either. He says he can but doesn't. Ah ... okay ... never mind.

I'm amazed that eating so little heavy food, and really not an awful lot of food in any way, for that matter, yet I don't get hungry easily. I don't know if it's the quality of the food or the fact that I'm walking so much and for some reason just don't feel hungry. Though I ate enough to get plenty full, it still surprises me that that's all I ate, and it was almost all raw. It's 7pm now and I haven't had dinner yet. I'm not hungry either. I know that I've got to be careful not to undereat. I'll give myself plenty of food but I'm really surprised that I eat so little yet have so much energy.

Not only today. A few weeks ago another friend and I were in Chiang Mai and walked lots and lots. Same thing then. Same way when I lived in the South. I could work and work all day on little food. But when I'm sedentary I just want to eat. If I feel weak then I'll know that I haven't been eating enough. But I intend to not feel weak. I'm pretty careful and don't like feeling weak and listless. I realize that I can get myself into a dangerous position too if I spend lots of energy but don't repelenish it with enough sleep and quality food.

Lastly I want to mention some things that happened today when Pranom and I relaxed and spoke. This is really the most important reason that I'm walking. The emotional stuff. The feelings that come up. Noticing them, really feeling them, then watching them fade away. And then see what replaces that feeling.

I forget what we talked about that brought this subject up, but he asked if he could talk directly. I told him that I prefered this and didn't really like indirect talk very much. He said that when I was living at Pathom Asoke (temple here in Thailand)some members of the community told him to stay away from me because I'm a selfish person. Right away that feeling of defensiveness came up. I always feel it in my chest. Whaddy mean selfish? But I listened to him speak about it. I asked him in what ways I was considered selfish. He mentioned a couple of things and I refuted them saying that this wasn't true. I was honest with him and I'm honest with you too. (I feel that the deepest, most important reason for the fourth precept of Buddhism - honesty, among other things - is to be honest with oneself. If we lie to ourselves how in hell are we ever going to get to the truth of existence? I've never discussed this idea with any monk or anyone who may have some insight into this but I feel confident in my understanding.)

It took a bit of talk and a bit of time before I let go of this defensiveness but I sure felt better when I did let it fade away. Maybe the talk actually prolonged the feeling! But I feel it's important to not just cover it up and "let it go". It won't really go away that way. It just gets beat down for a while. Supposedly, this way of looking at oneself will, over time, really clean this feeling away for good. This feeling of defensiveness regarding what people supposedly think of me.

He said that Pathom members'd told him that I get angry too easily. I know that I'm an irritable person but I've calmed down ALOT. I used to be an angry person. So to have calmed down to just irritable, to me, that's pretty good.

The other inside stuff that I want to mention regards Pranom. He's Thai so his English isn't like native speakers. Of course. He's 61 years old so his brain doesn't work like it once did. Yet just the same, communicating with him is sometimes so frustrating. I realize that I have hangups or, in Buddhist language, spiritual defilements / spiritual impurities regarding communicating with people. I get out of balance fairly easily. Upset when things don't go smoothly. But I've been working on this for years now. I've whittled it down to a more managable "thickness" but I've still got quite a stick left, I realize this. One of the reasons I've agreed to walk with Pranom is just for this reason. So I can be in the midst of this often. And in sometimes easily "unbalancing" situations. When you're tired, thirsty, hot, hungry, and whatever else, yet communication isn't going to my heart's content, well, this is the time to really bear down and get to work. Already, I've put in a pretty hard day's work. Yet we've had a pretty good time. I am honest with Pranom about my difficulty in dealing with our communication difficulties and he understands. I like openness and honesty.

They're shutting off the lights in this internet shop. I'm finished anyway. I'll write more of the same sort of thing I am sure. Also I expect to write about the more touristy / traveller sorts of things too, but I don't care to emphasize them.

Love to all of you and to everyone else while I'm at it, Troy.

HIYA!
So, I did a breathing course called Art of Living. It is best to maintain awareness while doing the breathing exercises. I've always had such a hard time maintaing awareness. Actually, I don't even know the difference between concentration and awareness. Never mind, I'll just say awareness.

Anyway, I did the six day course and liked it. Really did. About three hours a day. It's a version of Hinduism, I'd say. And we had a bit of theory. I liked that part too. I like all this stuff about the reality of existence. Lots of the theory seems to me consistent with Buddhism, which makes sense that it would be.

They say you should do the exercises for at least 40 days after the course. Solid. Don't miss a day. Well, I did miss one day last week. But even today, when I thought about chucking it, I told myself that it's not a good idea to chuck it. Like the teacher said, she used to tell people, if you have to miss a day, well, then you have to miss a day. But then people'd miss a day here, and miss a day there. No, tell yourself that you'll not miss a single day. So, I have been really good about it. I've made time for myself in the morning. They say that if you do it straight for 40 days it'll become a part of you and if you miss a day you'll not feel right.

It takes about 25 or 30 minutes I guess. First I do some yoga-like exercises called the Five Tibetans, then I do the breathing exercises, then I do the sitting meditation. It all takes about an hour and 15 minutes.

This morning I felt really really good after doing the exercises. Really good. I sat there in meditation aware of the really good feeling in my chest area especially. Really nice. Better yet it lasted for quite a while. Though for sure the good feeling faded somewhat even before I finished sitting meditation, never mind, I still felt good a while after finishing. This is the very motivation I probably need to keep me going. There's been nothing that I can think of in my life that has made me feel like I want to continue doing it. Oh, jogging once made me feel really good afterwards. But I like this better.

I can join other people doing this once a week for a longer version of the breathing exercises. I went once.

Can't say that my awareness is any more solid for doing these breathing exercises but I do feel more relaxed when I realize that I've been daydreaming during meditation. That's a positive thing.

I actually feel a little uneasy about having learned this, about practicing it regularly, and especially about telling people I know - like you all - that I do these breathing exercises. It's because I've read where people criticise all these health fads, help-yourself this and that. I realize that I'm really sensitive to other people's opinions of me and what I do. I identify myself as someone who's doing one of these "health fads" then feel defensive because of the criticism. But when I'm aware, I tell myself that I'm being defensive, allow myself to feel this way, then let it go. Someday I suppose I won't feel defensive in the least.

I'm glad to do these breathing exercises as I believe breathing to my lungs' full capactiy is probably more useful to my health than even healthful eating.

Enough.

Troy.

HIYA!

I'm finally getting around to starting this blog. But not the walk. I am in BKK now doing a breathing course. This is promising. The only thing that seems to be holding me back is my restless mind. I'm not focusing on things as I feel I ought to be. I am so much in my thoughts. So I'm really not "here". As the teacher says, you "mess up the moment" when you're not present, not aware and mindful. I've messed up more moments over the past 42 years than I've attended to. That's for sure. So after this course, maybe I'll be more attentive. I did the meditation course, in part for this purpose. Being more attentive to each moment. Someday I will either find something that will click for me, I'll quick looking, or I'll understand deeply that it takes constant, consitent intention without letup.

So, I'm not going to say much here because this is mostly just to get this blog off the ground. And, I want to say to the person who coined this word that he or she chose a doosy.

Troy.