now.this.is.happening

I woke up feeling foggy. The week has overwhelmed me. I wonder how restful my sleep can be when I sleep with my eyes open? Last night I had dreams of my family, of Olympic swimmers, of a favorite teddy bear getting stolen, of a lake... and I talked in my sleep. Over the past few days I convinced myself I was getting happy, came crashing down, fell into old habits, didn't sleep enough, didn't eat enough, felt OK again, did some performances, went through the motions, talked with friends and tried to come back into myself. Yesterday I meditated and this was satisfying. Later, I contemplated the word should with a friend. We decided not to use it anymore. Today, I spent an hour reading the New York Times in the park and started to feel depressed again. When I got to the Arts section I started to feel inspired. I saw a woman breastfeeding her baby, I bought some sheep's cheese at the market, I tried to go to the library but it was "closed for renovations". I saw people line up for an AA meeting. Last night the teacher at the meditation talked about indecision. He said that when you feel indecisive you can't force a decision, but you can sit with what you're feeling. They talk a lot about being present in Buddhism and it's something that interests me. I spend a lot of time and energy trying to avoid the truth of the moment. I like being present with physical pain and pleasure but I usually do anything I can to avoid emotional pain. This seems to create more. My mind is constantly jumping around all over the place and since I can't seem to get a hold of it I have a hard time feeling present. But today I have decided to ride the choppy waves that are my thoughts. I will spend this day being in the moment and observing all of the chaos that usually overwhelms me. I am surrounded by strangers in the "Women's Building", a man works on a desk with drill, a little kid screams, I can smell my bread and cheese in my bag and I want to eat it. Tomorrow I'll go back to work.