Articles and Essays – Page 22

Of Vipassana, The Trauma of Birth, and Swords of Healing…

4 Comments / Articles and Essays, Relationships / Anjuelle Floyd

Buddhist teacher and vipassana meditation teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh, once said, “To bring about peace we [human individuals] must learn to live with peace.”

Agamemnon, brother of Menelaus and wife of Clytemnestra, declares in Homer’s Iliad, “Peace is for the women, and the weak. Empires are forged by war.”

While Clytemnestra’s role is unclear in Homer’s Odyssey, according to the Iliad, Agamemnon dies at the hands of wife when,

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Of Apologies, Sincerity and Saying What We Actually Mean…

Leave a Comment / Articles and Essays, Relationships / Anjuelle Floyd

What did you mean to say?

Apologies over what we said usually indicate that what we said, the words we used did not gain favor with those to whom we were speaking.

Rarely does it mean, at least in America, that we are truly sorry.

But what do we mean when we say, “That’s not what I mean to say?” if we are truly sincere?

What words would we choose if we gained the opportunity to turn the clock back and speak again,

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Of Mark Halperin, Narcissism and The Words We Use…

Leave a Comment / Articles and Essays, Relationships / Anjuelle Floyd

What happens when what you say or how you say your words takes listeners’ attentions away from the point you are trying to make?

Recently on Morning Joe of MSNBC when asked of his opinion concerning President Obama’s response to the GOP not backing down on opposition to higher taxes , Time Magazine’s Editor-at-Large, Mark Halperin stated to the co-host Joe Scarborough, “I thought he [President Obama] was being kind of a d***.”

Immediately from Joe Scarborough’s response of shock and overwhelm, all done with a smile, to various Tweets and ultimately

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Of Books, Tension, and The Mind on the Page…

2 Comments / Articles and Essays, Relationships / Anjuelle Floyd

Presently I am reading Anuradha Roy’s novel, An Atlas of Impossible Longing .

As with any good novel, interactions between the main characters are strained.

Tension abounds, but not in a melodramatic way.

The story moves with a nice speed for an opening.

I look forward each evening–a hallmark that I have found a jewel of a novel–to settling into bed,

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Of Arrows, Psyche, and Moments of Empathy, Grace and Redemption…

2 Comments / Articles and Essays, Relationships / Anjuelle Floyd

The outset of the Greek myth of Eros and Psyche, shows Eros leaning over the sleeping mortal, Psyche, and fervently prepared to strike Psyche with one of his arrows and create a wound that will command her to fall in love with a beast.

Eros’s mother, Aphrodite sent him on this mission out of her jealousy of the beautiful, young Psyche.

And yet something about Psyche and/or her beauty evoked sorrow in Eros.

A silent knowing moved between them even with Psyche asleep and her eyes closed.

Perhaps he saw himself, weak and driven at the merciless hand of his mother, Aphrodite’s less than virtuous and ethical desires.

Though Eros is careful and quiet,

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Of Knots, Persephone and Releasing the Seeds of Our Pomegranate…

Leave a Comment / Articles and Essays, Relationships / Anjuelle Floyd

“When peeling the pomegranate the goal is to release the seeds and discard the membrane surrounding the seeds”. How Do I Peel A Pomegranate by Ann Johnson

Human relationships present a challenge much like peeling a pomegranate, or perhaps at time, like unraveling a knot that has formed in the chain of a necklace, a ball of yarn or a length of thread.

In each case involving either the pomegranate and or the necklace, thread or yarn, efforts to release or dispel the knot require that we sit down and untie or as we like to say, unravel the knot.

We must bring our fingers or a sharp object into the center of the tension and pull apart the threads separate them from around each other.

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Of Conundrums, Pockets of Time, and Water to Down Our Bread…

Leave a Comment / Articles and Essays, Relationships / Anjuelle Floyd

I once had a client who said, “We [humans] consist of but pockets of time. Spend time on things that don’t matter-waste time–and you throw away yourself.”

As with life and pockets of time, humans also consist of a conglomeration of relationships, none so important as the one we hold with ourselves.

Despite all, we recognize and best come to know ourselves, who we are, our likes and dislikes, pet peeves and joys through interaction with others.

We can never truly come to understand some aspects of ourselves except by way of interaction with those outside ourselves.

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