30 Day Blogging Detritus, March Edition

day 30- it's been fun!

What was your favorite prompt from the last month? What was the most rewarding aspect of participating in the competition?

I think my favorite prompts were those about leap year and daylight savings, I had never really taken the time (ha! see what I did there?) to stop and think about how much time really does permeate every little crevice of my day-to-day thoughts, often in odd ways. Looking back, thinking ahead, all of that is mechanical for how most of us think (I think?), and now the concept of practicing mindfulness and "living in the moment" is becoming ubiquitous.

When mindfulness classes, podcasts, seminars, articles, all that stuff began cropping up everywhere, my first thought was "awesome! that's really gonna be beneficial for so many people!" Especially when I heard that police organizations, the military, and prisons were teaching mindfulness, that's amazingly useful for people mired in situations full of adrenaline.

But here's the thing that taught me about myself, which brings me partially to why all this reflection on time has been informative. I've been practicing vipassana meditation for so long that I'm more than a little ashamed to say that after the whole "oh, cool!" there was the "everyone's copying me, ohmygod that's so lame..."

No, I am not in middle school in case you were wondering. I'm just a stupid human who for a split second thought she had the right to lay claim to an ancient tradition because her sense of self is so wrapped up in it.

So yeah, time. My grandma always said, "You'll never have enough money or time, so there's no point in being stingy with either."

The most rewarding part of this past month has been getting to know all of you. You've made me think, laugh, and feel good. All month, I looked forward to (time again?) sitting down to blog and reading yours. Even though being real can make people uncomfortable, I'm proud of those of you who were brave enough to speak their truths. It's made this surreal time a little less surreal- thank you guys.

-TPB