It’s Cold Out!
Happy new year! Welcome to my new mindfulness website and my first blog post. I’m practicing doing it all imperfectly - but doing it.
It’s cold out here this morning in Toronto 0°F/-18°C and Environment Canada has issued an extreme cold warning for the city. It was cold out yesterday too. I couldn’t keep my feet warm in the studio, even with a fresh change of socks. And, I was wearing my scarf - not that there’s not sufficient heat - but this kind of cold permeates. Uncharacteristically, I stayed inside all day. I didn’t want to venture out unless it was absolutely necessary.
Last night in my M & M class (Maintaining Mindfulness on Monday ) one of the students noticed aloud that she was often trying to distract herself when doing hard things. When she made the resolution to go to the gym for example, she went through these elaborate routines (podcasts in her ears in front of the TV on mute, etc.) to distract herself from the fact that she was indeed at the gym! "Why can’t I just be in my body and allow myself to feel that it’s difficult to work out?” Great question.
Why - I wondered this morning, bundling up - can’t I just experience this moment as it is, this weather as it is, rather than hide from it until it passes. Why don’t I surrender to this cold snap? Then, when it’s over I won’t have missed it and I’ll know exactly what -18°C actually feels like, having opened myself up to it. How incredible that I (have warm clothes and) get to live in this place of extremes - where even my hair can freeze!
I walked out the door and immediately noticed the tiny, exposed sliver of skin between my mitten and sleeve.
I ran across the unusually quiet College St. and noticed the dry frigid air coming into my nose. Breathing in, I know that I’m breathing in (because my nostrils are sticking together). Breathing out, I know that I’m breathing out (it’s fogging up my glasses).
I turned the corner, bracing myself against the wind. “Drop your shoulders”, I thought. Oh, that felt good.
It’s winter. It’s cold. Here I am.
Why is it called pie mindfulness, you ask?
Presence is everything.. These three words encompass the most powerful teaching for me – stop obsessively thinking and tune into the present moment.
(And also, for sentimental reasons. My mindfulness teaching began with leading with a small group of friends through Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth back in 2013. It was berry picking season and loving having peeps to enjoy dessert with, I used our meetings as an opportunity to overcome my ‘crust angst’. When one of their teenagers overheard us discussing possible names for our group, he poked his head in and said “How about you call it “Middle-aged Ladies Endlessly Talking About Spir-it-u-al-i-ty?” Aghast, outraged and definitely not wanting this name to stick, we immediately settled on “Pie Club.”