Even more simplicity

The process of simplifying my life continues. India was the place where I sought out a wise man to reassure me that my yearnings were not selfish fantasies. Then my travels took me to Bali, Thailand, Vietnam and back to Australia then back to Bali again before my dreams started to become a reality.

Painful and long though the whole process proved to be, it was a journey that made me face the truth about my life. To examine the philosophy of Buddhism, of great thinkers, and to really step out of my comfort zone. It resulted in a book that not only looks at the process of travel in the world but also of travel in the inner world of the mind.

What has made us the way we are? What were the years that formed us like? How did our parents live and what was different? These are some of the things that I reflected on. Have you ever thought about these things?

Depression excerpt

"Many people get depressed in their later years as they look back on lives with some regrets and sadness at their lack of skill to deal with some elements of their lives. I have a friend who is depressed in Australia at the moment. I don’t know how to help him.

The teacher is saying that depression is not sadness. It is the dwelling on sadness that is depression. This simple fact is one of the best descriptions of depression I have heard. I wonder why, when we all feel sad sometimes, and choose to dwell the sadness sometimes causing brief periods of depression, some dwell on it continuously, causing major depression. It may be a choice. I know that myself. We can choose what we think about. I think back to my brief period of depression some months ago and I know I made a choice to have a pity party. It became tedious and boring, and made me feel stupid and weak. "

 This excerpt from my book is about clarifying sadness from depression. It gave me a better understanding of minor depression although clinical depression is different.

Trust excerpt

"Trusting those close to me is important. To me it’s the foundation of a good relationship of any kind. How do you trust someone close to you when they have betrayed that trust in the most brutal way? My husband betrayed me, which lead to our separation. Now I couldn’t regain the trust I had once had in him. Oh it hadn’t been an infidelity, at least not that I knew of, but another kind of trust that he had broken.

Trust is sometimes the elephant in the room, because often we don’t completely define it for our friends, our lovers, our families, or colleagues. We sometimes assume that others know what is meant by “I trust you”.

This is the second in a series of excepts from my book. What does trust mean to you?

An excerpt

"I long for a more satisfying life, a simple way of living. My life at the moment seems too complex. There’s always something on my mind about work, my marriage, looking after our many possessions at home.

There is some comfort in the way I live now – job security, a person who cares about me, the safety of Australia. There’s something missing though – peace and simplicity.

Do you ever get a niggling sense of something missing in your life? Something that makes you think, ”What is it I want?”"

This is the first copyright excerpt to be published on my blog. I will be publishing more over the next weeks. I want to provoke your curiosity about my journey from this state of mind and the places my journey took me to - inner and outer journeys