The Quest for Mindfulness

 My self-talk vs mindfulness.

I’ll blame my decades of sales, but I got into this obsessive, impossible to turn-off dialogue of what I’d say to them, based on any myriad of responses to my intro. I’d spend an in ordinate amount of time on my introductions.

That spread to family at the holidays, days of rehearsing what to say to my psychiatrist, (15 minutes to analyze my past three months), friends, weekly National call-in shows, etc.) and I couldn’t turn it off.

For example, after that couple the first night warned me about the bear, I spent an inordinate amount of my head space rehearsing what to say if they stopped by or I dropped by to say good night, or good morning.

Thus, the lack of mindfulness, unless you rationalize that rehearsing what to say, with a short list of things they’d say to reply to my introduction, and my subsequent capsulared, (unless it’s family, and then I’m verbose),  is definitely mindful in and of itself, to which I’d say, huh?

And what is running through my head when I’m mindful whilst glamping?

Fishing with the combination of white-caps, my new anchoring system with my new 3 lb. anchor to replace that old 1.5 lb. anchor, my depth finder that found the walleyes, and trying to smoke and toke, so putting the anchor down so I can have my back to the wind...

That’s mindful, until I think about how mindful that is, but that’s a middle step of self-awareness.

And the other, much more desirable target of my mindfulness? Lists; what to do next, what to do after that, and then I would check my heart rate, (currently 82) and try to calm down and take a breather, and smoke a whole Marlboro 100, without getting up, and try to remember anything other than the #1 priority on the list when I first lit up the fag, (British cigarette joke).

When I went to bed last night, my second night, safely ensconced in my tent, hearing the sounds of the forest, then nothing, (dead ear) at my beckoning, I found it a good time to pray. I’m not one for prayer, per say, but that’s because maybe my mind isn’t ever mindful. And I thought of lost  family, good things to think about those few still in my life, and working out the second verse to the ear worms that really stick.

🎼 ... she was just 17, 

If you know what I mean [jail bait?],

And before too long, 

I fell in love with her.

How can I dance (what the young kids now call fucking) with another?  

When I saw her standing there ... [once a pedophile, alwaysa pedophile?...] 🎵 

Second verse, (and countless more thereafter) same as the first!

Or I make up lyrics I’ll forget moments later:

🎼 Well she looked at me,

But I, I had to pee,

And the way she looked,

I hoped she didn’t stare,

Cuz I had a hard-on for jail-bait,

Oooh

When I saw her standing there... 🎵 

Written on my iPhone. 

On Jun 7, 2021, at 8:47 AM, Stephen Wigg <stephenwigg@hotmail.com> wrote: