By the end of 2019, my contemplations around rupa that had begun during the retreat, had grown increasingly more refined. While at times those contemplations seemed stunted or fragmented, I had moments where they really began to gel into a cohesive understanding. Though self and self belonging –grounded in rupa — are a prevalent theme of the time,  I also began to  expand my considerations and explore the role of nama,…

This a continuation of the last blog. If you haven’t read previously then please go back and read ‘Part 16’. My Dear Reader, I thank you for bearing with me on this looooonnnggg recap of my early 2020 “interruption in our regularly scheduled program (an orderlyish, linearish blog tracing my meandering dhamma path)”, this here was the final recap post of that  Post-Retreat Interruption Series. It is simply a brief…

This a continuation of the last blog. If you haven’t read previously then please go back and read  ‘Part 15’. In this blog, I will begin just after the last blog left off and end with a much more recent contemplation, from 6 months later, when I circled back to the topic of meaning in rupa and found a new depth and clarity. If you recall, in the last blog…

In the wake of my cake baking contemplation and seeing the extreme limits on my control/tendency to use rupa arrangements to define who I am, I had gone to get my nails done. About a week later, looking down at them, I caught myself feeling surprised that the polish had started chipping so soon. At lightning speed, I caught myself thinking, “I have been being so careful with them.” Then…

After all of my contemplations I was beginning to see that there was nothing innately special in my objects or my body. Just varying, shifting arrangements of 4 elements. I knew I was not my arrangements, and yet, I couldn’t shake the belief that those arrangements, and my ability to bring them about, must prove something about ME. Alana the great arranger!  I knew I had a huge wrong view remaining – that…

This blog is a direct continuation on the previous blog, “Interruption Part 11: A Major Breakthrough Part 1”. If you have not read that blog yet please go ahead and read it first before you continue on with this one. Does rupa do what I think/ want/imagine in an absolute sense or in relation to myself?  Is a quality fixed/innate in myself — Again I started thinking about beauty. I realized that…

I walked into Starbucks today and there was a homeless man making a mess at his table near the door, I felt myself move to give him wide berth, going to stand as far from his table as I possibly could while still holding my place in line. The truth is, the man, his rupa (physical form), disgusted me — the smell of filth mixed with urine, the look of…

Counting down days to an upcoming vacation to Seattle and Napa, and suddenly I start wondering to myself,  “what the hell am I going to wear on this trip?”  I would rather wear pants than skirts, in case we are hiking a lot, but then I feel like I don’t have a jacket to match most of my pants. Plus, what if we want to go to a fancy meal…

This blog is a direct continuation of the previous entry — Its about me and me. If you have not already done so, please go back and read that entry before you proceed here. On the tail of realizing that my own standards/impossible desires –and my inability to uphold them — lay at the heart of my negative feelings about my Mom, I started considering a few other troubled relationships in…

Today I was at Whole Foods and a call came over the loudspeaker, ” Can the owner of the silver BMW with plate number XYZ please come to the front”.  That was me, “that is my car” I said, as I rushed to the front desk. It turns out I had parked crooked over the line and the person in the space next to me couldn’t get out. I hadn’t…