M.E.A.L.S. - Mindful Eating And Living Sangha

In 2010 I started this blog to capture my process of learning about Mindful Eating and Mindful Living (from the book Savor - Mindful Eating, Mindful Living by Dr. Lilian Cheung and Thich Nhat Hanh).  I lost over a hundred pounds, and became a vegetarian, and a Buddhist.  All of which have dramatically enhanced my life and, hopefully, some of the lives I touch.

Once the weight came off, and stayed that way, I kind of drifted away from this blog.  That’s mainly because I had written primarily about my weight loss and not so much about Buddhism.  When my life focus turned from weight loss to maintaining weight and exploring buddhism, I didn’t feel I had as much to write about.  Or, more accurately, I didn’t feel qualified to write about the things I was deeply experiencing at the time.  I was in a deep period of learning and exploration (and I still am) but over these past few years I’ve started a couple of Buddhist Sangha’s and participated or helped run several other groups of various kinds and I’m sort of feeling like I’ve come a bit full circle in a way.  I feel like if I re-read Savor (this will be something like my 4th time) I’ll get a whole different perspective on it now that I’ve been a Buddhist practitioner for a handful of years and because I learn best when I'm explaining or teaching others.

This time, I’m not only practicing the teachings from the book, but I’m helping others do the same.  I’m starting a group, local to me, that will study the book.  Sort of like a book club, but deeper than that.

I'm calling it M.E.A.L.S. - Mindful Eating And Living Sangha.  And I’m extremely pleased to have the support of Dr. Cheung as I launch this effort.  She’s always been supportive of my efforts personally, and when she heard that I was thinking of this, she offered some guidance and some incredibly kind words of support.

The year-long group will meet every other week and will:

• Recite the Five Contemplations
• Share a Mindful Eating Experience
• Read and discuss the book Savor
• Practice Mindful Movement

My hope is that this year-long grassroots-group exploration will deepen my own practice further, help others establish mindfulness as a way of healthy living, and - hopefully - encourage them to go out and spread the practice through starting similar groups the following year, and so on.  If successful, it could see a viral growth since those who complete the year, may hopefully create groups of their own and repeat the process, again and again.

I’ll try to get back to posting here along the way to track the progress of this endeavor.  When it’s done, I hope that this blog can serve as a blueprint for those who wish to replicate this process.

Best wishes!
_/|\_

2012 State of the Samu Address

Previously on MondoSamu.com:

2010: I weighed 349 pounds.  I read "Savor" by Thich Nhat Hanh and Dr. Lilian Cheung.  I surprisingly, and rather effortlessly,  lost 110 pounds in 11 months by applying it's Mindful Eating, Mindful Living principles. Through "Savor" I was introduced to Buddhism.

2011: Having lost 110 pounds, I plateaued at around 240 and have stayed right around there.  I've continued my healthier lifestyle, as well as my Buddhist practice.  I had hoped to get some health matters handled such as getting a full physical, but I have found many excuses to postpone that one.

2012: And now, the rest of the story....

So, while I failed to do a couple of medical/health things I wanted to this year (so far) I'm extremely pleased with how my year has gone regarding my health and practice.  I am disappointed that I didn't blog more, and I apologize for that to those who enjoy reading here.  I'll try to do better this year.

First, in terms of my health - which is kind of the main focus of why I started this blog - let me update you there, as it's the short part of the story.  As I mentioned, I've leveled off and unless I reduce my food, or increase my exercise, I guess I'm done losing weight.  I still have a goal to lost about 20-30 more pounds, and I will definitely be focusing on that this year. (See the end of this article for my intentions for the coming Samu year)  As for me, I feel GREAT, and I'm happier than ever!  So health is doing well, and I WILL get the doctor stuff handled this year.

Now...the biggest thing that happened in the last year, and the reason for me not blogging as much, is the incredible deepening of my practice.  I said I was going to do it, but I had no idea how deep I would get with it!

First off, I used to post book reviews of various Dharma Books here.  I intended to continue that, and I still hope to do so.  The problem is that I got so deep in to reading them that I have read DOZENS, and before I knew it I was so far behind writing about them that I felt I didn't even really know where to begin.  I'll try to rectify that this year too!  They're one of the most helpful things on the blog I think.  So there was that.

Next, there was the plethora of Sangha's I visited in my travels.  I had the great and distinct pleasure of spending many sits in the presence of numerous loving and welcoming Buddhist Sangha's all over the country.  It was humbling, gratifying and helpful.  So helpful, in fact, that I finally launched one in my area!

After nearly a year of effort, I finally got enough people and resources together with a like mind to launch the Two Hands Sangha.  As a part of that Sangha, we have a steady Mindfulness Meditation Group that meets once per week.  It's hosted in the lovely home and garden of one of our members, and has been a great benefit to all involved, I think.  That progresses well.  I still want to have a secondary group, with a more Buddhist focus (as opposed to the more general Mindfulness group) but it will come.

Aside from the Sangha effort, I've also decided to start attending retreats.  I started getting serious about it, and all of a sudden, a couple of options for a 4 day Memorial Day Weekend retreat popped up.  One in the Thich Nhat Hanh tradition and one in the Against The Stream/Theravadan tradition.  I struggled over both as I love the teachings in each, but ultimately my wife prompted me to do the ATS retreat in Joshua Tree, CA when I shared my thoughts with her.

Joshua Tree, CA - ATS Memorial Day Silent Retreat

I was concerned about the extra time a California retreat involves (an extra day on each end for travel) and a few other things, but I explained to her that I wanted to do whichever one would challenge me the most.  After telling her all about it, she wisely (and lovingly) suggested I do the ATS one.  She was right! I'll do a separate post all about that retreat, but it was definitely the right choice.  While I love the Thich Nhat Hanh tradition, I think the effort I had to put in definitely made the ATS retreat more rewarding.  Anyhow, now that I got my feet wet with a 4 day, I've cleared the way to attend a week or so each year.  I'm really looking forward to that.

As a direct result of the retreat, I also FINALLY went full Vegetarian!!  I was lingering in the meat eater world because I couldn't get rid of chicken, but the exquisite vegetarian food and mindful eating on retreat finally gave me the strength and clarity I needed to push the rest of the way over.  I've been veg-only since May 24th!

Last, but certainly not least, I've had the incredible fortune this year to meet some of my Online Dharma friends in the real world and grow closer to that online Sangha.  I hope, in the near future, to write a post all about that Sangha (or #Twangha as I hashtag it on Twitter), but suffice it to say that I deepened my connections to that Sangha and it has had many, varied rewards for me.  This year I was fortunate enough to hang out in the "real world" with the likes of @DharmaApple (who attended the retreat I was on and has turned out to be a great friend), @Jacklope (One of the nicest guys ever, whom I consider a dear brother and friend, and even teacher at times), @MindOnly (a wonderful human being, if ever I've met one) and many, many more.....too many to mention them all here.  But that's been one of the greatest things for me. I've developed these deep, wonderful friendships thoroughly through the Dharma and it's SO rewarding in so many ways.  I'll explore some of that more in my future post on the matter.  In a couple of weeks, I'll be meeting an online Twitter friend who has already become like a sister to me, @KittyDew, and I can't WAIT for that!

I'm sure, after such a lengthy absence, I'm leaving something out, but I think that's enough for now.  SO...

My intentions for the next 12 months or so are:

• Remain vegetarian. 
• Attend a 7-10 day retreat!
• Continue to deepen my practice.
• Establish better personal health care (routine Doctor and Dentist visits)
• Re-Read Savor AGAIN and see if bringing a little focus back on to it will shed that last 20!
• Cultivate two personal, long-range, Dharma-work-related projects in the right livelihood area that I've in mind! (Ooooh, secret-y!)

So that's it.  I hope you'll hang with me in the coming year, as I explore even more!

_/\_

#RealHappiness 28 Day #MeditationChallenge 2012 - Review

Late in January, I decided that I would participate in the 2012 Real Happiness 28 Day Meditation Challenge after telling a host of friends that the Real Happiness book by Sharon Salzberg was a great way to help them start a daily practice but watching them struggle to do so. I figured it would help motivate them if they had a little company from someone they knew who was directly participating.

Having been practicing for almost two years now, and having read the Real Happiness book previously, I didn't think it was going to do much for me to participate in this thing. What I found was that just reading the book and actually participating in the challenge are two very different things!

From what I observed, this is for two reasons:

1) Doing is better than reading! I had read the entire book and had even practiced many of the methods or - more accurately - something close to them. The difference, this time, was doing them in a daily, planned fashion with guidance. This structure, I feel, translated to a lot of insight and benefit that I didn't expect. The challenge aspect and this structure compelled me to want to track my effort by writing about it.

The second reason I think the results of the month of dedicated practice was such a surprising help was...

2) Responsibility. The commitment to participate in the challenge and, more importantly, to write about it publicly gave me a sense of responsibility that helped me stay at it. While I already practice daily and don't require any additional motivation to practice, I think that writing about it daily made me stick strictly to the books practices rather than settle for ones I might prefer normally.

These two things provided a sort of motivation loop that kept running on its own steam, one step feeding the other, perpetually. So much so, that I'm a little sad to see it stop! But, then, that's a good reason to remember the most important lesson the month had to offer:

Start over!

#RealHappiness - Day 15 - The Benefits Of Practice

Wednesday I practiced walking and sitting meditation.  For my sitting meditation I simply practiced my core meditation and it was as mundane and wonderful as usual.  But, I'd rather tell you about my walking meditation from that day.

It was unseasonably beautiful out on Wednesday in Atlanta.  I took full advantage and made sure I carved out the time for extra walking outside.  I got home, changed and hit the streets of my neighborhood.  I was filled with gratitude for the great weather and neighborhood walk, but I was also extremely happy to be getting back to my routine which has been sporadic lately due to travel and weather.

The subject of enlightenment is one of those strange topics that make people uncomfortable.  Some people brag about having "gotten" it, which tends to make me think they haven't.  Some demur when the subject comes up, which makes me wonder if they have.  And most describe enlightenment as the present moment.  Thich Nhat Hanh has said that enlightenment is simply being present.  He says that "Small enlightenment lead to large enlightenment."  Other teachers I've read and learned from say that enlightenment, or "enlightenment experiences", are when you gain true understanding of something you previously understood only as logic.  That it's all a gradual process of deeper understanding.  Specifically, for this post, I thought of Brad Warner when he talked of what might be considered his own enlightenment experience in "Hardcore Zen".  He said:

"I was walking to work along the Sen-gawa River, just like I did every day, when in an instant everything changed... ...But I can't really recall anything unusual, I was just walking to work."

Well, it was this deeper understanding that hit me like a bolt on Wednesday!  I was walking along, practicing my favorite walking meditation.  I was in the middle of some gratitude sayings, or prayers if you will, about my family when I got to my Dad.  I have this habit of listening to the sounds around me when I think of my Dad.  I listen for the "jazz" in the sounds around me.  The solo, I guess you'd say.  I listen for the part my Dad would be playing if the sounds around me were his band.  There's always something that rises out of it.  It's the lead sounds I'm listening for, never the rhythm.  Not the sirens, or cars, or cicadas.  It's usually the barking dogs, or kids playing or birds singing.  The things that aren't redundant. 

Anyhow, I guess my mind wandered for a second while I was listening for the jazz, when I slowed to a complete stop and stood there with my mouth agape.  Then - and this is where I won't be able to do a very solid job of explaining it - I suddenly gained an insight.  A clear, deep(er?) understanding of Shunyata.  And it came from relating it to music.  I realized that Music is not found in the notes, nor the space between them.  It's both.  Notes are spaces, spaces are notes.  Form is Emptiness, Emptiness if Form.

Now, this doesn't sound like any sort of great revelation and I've logically understood Shunyata (Emptiness) for some time now, but there is a difference between logical understanding and a true, deep understanding.  Most teachers I've read tend to describe "enlightenment moments" as achieving a deeper understanding than a "common logical" understanding on a subject.  They also caution, almost universally, not to get caught up in them and that they are no big deal.  But, as this happened to me, I suddenly gained a true deep understanding of emptiness and interbeing that spiraled through my mind starting with jazz. 

I simply can not explain it better than that, but I guess the shortest way I can try is to say that it was like I had a little idea about how music is a great analogy for Shunyata.  And then from that thought, it was like a doorway cracked open.  I peeked through, and got an even better look at the idea and how it related to Shunyata.  And that was when the door swung wide and I really grasped it all.

Then, as Brad Warner described so well in his book, I walked through the door, and kept going on about my business.  There's really nothing else you can do.

I feel I've done a really terrible job of explaining this.  Almost to the point that I don't feel this was even a worthwhile post.  But, hopefully, someone out there will understand it.  Maybe, with any luck, someone might even benefit from this sub-par explanation.  But most of all, the point of this post is not about Shunyata at all.  It's about Meditation and why a daily meditation practice is so important.  I've been doing this 28 Day Meditation Challenge to help some friends of mine kickstart a daily meditation practice.  When I try to explain to them the benefits of practice, they are so numerous, varied and wide-ranging that it gets hard to explain concisely.  This sort of stair-step deepening of understanding of the Dharma is one of the greatest benefits of meditation.

If anyone out there has any similar experiences, I would really love to hear about them publicly or privately.  Anyone?  Anyone?

#RealHappiness - Day 14 - Walking Meditation; Airport Style!

On Day 14 of the #RealHappiness #MeditationChallenge I hit the cushion after a LONG day of travel home from Ohio. But I decided that instead of writing another day of my Core Meditation, I would tell you about an alternate practice I did that also fit in with Sharon Salzberg's Week Two practices.

In Week Two, Sharon talks about Walking Meditation and gives us a nice guided meditation to use. She even gives some illustrated instruction if needed. I've been practicing walking meditation since the early days of my practice so this is old and comfortable territory for me, but I've not used Sharon's guided meditation until now. Also, my day of travel on Valentine's Day provided me with the perfect opportunity for it!

I've talked often of how much I enjoy walking in the Airport. Coming back to ATL I took the opportunity to listen to the walking meditation from Sharon as I walked the mile and a half or so from my gate to baggage claim. First off, the ATL airport is basically one big straight line. There's a train, but you can walk instead. If you choose to walk, you're treated to all sorts of interesting stuff. There's a segment that is filled with giant photos and artifacts and information about the history of Atlanta. There's a section of statues that are just amazing. It's really nice!

Most travelers never see these beautiful statues in the
Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport

Also, it's a great way to enjoy your travel rather than race through it. It kind of nudges you in to being more mindful and getting exercise all at once! Lastly, listening to the guided meditation added a nice component to it as well.

Give it a try…next time you visit the airport, try skipping the escalators, elevators and moving sidewalks. The trains and trams. Try walking from the entrance to your gate. Make sure you have the time to do it, and then just relax and enjoy. There's something almost perversely enjoyable about walking slowly and calmly through such a hectic and frenzied environment. And best of all, you'll be sitting for a flight anyhow…this helps you get your muscles stretched and warmed before all that sitting!

Let me know if you've done this and what your experience was!

Be well!

_/\_

#RealHappiness - Day 7 - Letting-Go-Of-Thought Meditation

I decided to utilize the "Letting Go Of Thought" practice described by Sharon in "Real Happiness".  This is something I already do, pretty much since I started, but it's always good to approach it like it's new. Plus it never hurts to get different guidance on these things.

As meditations go, there's not much to tell.  I sat, I settled and I waited.  In the book, Sharon says to return to the breath any time you do get distracted, and that is exactly what I did.  For this kind of meditation, you will often hear people use some variation on the "Mountain and Clouds" or the "Sky and Clouds".  One that I have used often, and to great effect for me personally, is:

"Breathing In, my mind is the great blue sky.
Breathing Out, my thoughts are the clouds that pass by."

I am pleased to say that I wasn't too often distracted (probably because I've practiced this considerably) but I still found myself pursuing a random thought now and then.  This is perfectly normal, and happens less with time. When I did, I simply took a moment and re-focused on the feeling of the breath entering my nose and exiting.  Sharon gives really good, very simple and clear instruction on this in the book.

"We release a thought or a feeling not because we are afraid of it or because we can't bear to acknowledge it as a part of our experience, but because in this context, it is unnecessary.  Right now we are practicing concentration, sustaining our attention on the breath." ~ Sharon Salzberg "Real Happiness"

I did this for 20 minutes and it was, as it usually is, very calming and peaceful.  The last 10 minutes of my 30 minute sit, I was more distracted.  Or, not distracted so much by stray thoughts I followed, but more deliberately I started pondering specific thoughts.  Intentionally, I guess.  For me, sometimes, this happens in meditation where I will suddenly start pondering some thing, usually a problem I've not solved, and my mind will decide that the time is right to solve it.

So, for the last 10 minutes of my sit, I pondered a couple of issues on my mind.  Rather than letting go of these, I decided to sort of let my mind do it's thing and work on these problems.  Not really letting go of the thoughts, but rather sort of observing the solution taking place without interfering. It's rather hard to describe, but there ya go. 

The bell rang, and I was somewhat energized from my sit.  I ended up staying up later than planned as a result.  Not a bad thing, just a thing.

How was your first week of the challenge?

#RealHappiness - Day 5 - Gratitude!

Sunday afternoon is when the Two Hands Sangha meets for it's weekly meditation group. Day 5 of the challenge happened to be our Sangha meet day, so I rolled them all in to one.

In the week leading up to our gathering, I had picked up on a few loose ends of conversation and such. The theme that seemed to rise out of it all was Gratitude. I had heard each of our members expressing gratitude in various ways and for various things as well as missing opportunities to be grateful, including myself.

So, on Sunday morning, I found myself with a little free time and used it to try to sew those loose threads together for a talk on Gratitude. I was looking for some poetry about Gratitude and I stumbled across a fantastic article that not only included various quotes and poems on the subject, but a TON of other great insight on incorporating Gratitude in to our daily lives.

The article, by a gentleman I was not familiar with (Phillip Moffitt), was PERFECT for my needs. I ended up highlighting sections of it to discuss and had so much material that I really had to prune it down to fit it in the time frame we had.

Anyhow, once I found that incredible selection from DharmaWisdom, all I needed to round out the group meet was a nice guided meditation on Gratitude. I reached out to my #Twangha (all my Twitter Sangha from all over the world, including the #OMCru - Online Meditation Crew) and asked if anyone had a suggestion. Kayla Hewitt, a great young aspiring Dharma teacher, immediately reminded me of Gary Sanders recorded meditation on the topic. It was PERFECT!

So, we had our 20 minute guided meditation, followed by a beautiful 10 minute walking meditation in the gardens (Which was so lovely one member didn't even hear the bell and ran a little long enjoying the trees) and finally another 15 minute silent sit. We wrapped up with the reading from the article, and some discussion. It was truly a beautiful way to wrap up the weekend and I was FULL of gratitude for our wonderful little Sangha and my amazing #Twangha. 

If you don't belong to a Sangha yet - and perhaps if you're participating in the RealHappiness challenge, you might not - I would definitely encourage you to seek out one in your area. If you have good ones, that's a great thing to be grateful for! If you don't, start one and be grateful for that! ;) Best of luck with this practice, and may we all be at ease!

#RealHappiness - Day 4 - It was a good day!

In the words of the infamous sage Ice Cube, "I got to say it was a good day."

Yesterday my little Sangha had a field trip to a local spiritual book store, followed by a wonderful lunch at the World Peace Cafe run by a local Kadampa Buddhist Sangha.  My little girl got to know my Sangha mates and really connected with one of them deeply.  Following that, my wife took her to a hockey game giving me some free time which I used wisely.

A part of that wise use of time was to meditate for my fourth day of the 2012 Real Happiness 28 Day Meditation Challenge.  With the house, uncharacteristically, all to myself I prepped for my meditation (having added my new candle holder to my alter) and got started.  Or got stopped, I suppose, depending on how you look at it. ;)

Anyhow, it was very interesting.  First off the house was so unnaturally quiet that I could hear my body (sorry if this sounds gross) digesting my dinner.  So I sat with that.  For some indeterminate amount of time, I followed the sounds and sensations of my body turning my dinner in to fuel, and I observed the feelings and thoughts that came with it.  I offered gratitude for the process.  I've never done anything like this before and it was very interesting.

Eventually, I sort of fell away from that and stopped meditating long enough to launch a recent guided meditation and talk by Gary Sanders on Karuna.  Thus, I ended my fourth day of the challenge, having gained insights on compassion from Gary.  If you're not familiar with Gary, check out his blog, or follow him on twitter.  He's recently started recording his talks and meditations and has a handful of very nice ones to listen to.

See you tomorrow!
_/\_

#RealHappiness Meditation Challenge 2012 - Day 3

After a busy Friday at work, and a hectic evening, my wife reminded me at nine that I was normally sitting by then.  I hurried off to the bedroom, to the cushion, tweeting my check-in with the #OMCru on the way.  By the time I got settled on the cushion it was 9:03pm and I was really glad to be meditating.

I listened to a short guided meditation from the Real Happiness book, and when it ended I just sat following the breath.

It was a peaceful, uneventful sit with my attention drifting from one are of my body to another and observing.

Before I knew it, my timer bell went off and I was done.  Some days it goes by quickly like that.  It's almost hard to believe that 30 minutes has passed.

How's your Real Happiness Meditation Challenge going?  I'm interested to hear.  I hope you're finding the challenge beneficial so far.  Please remember the meaning of the name for this blog: 

Mondō: "questions and answers"; a recorded collection of dialogues between a pupil and teacher (I consider us all to be both)

Samu: Work service (in the sense of sutra service); meditation in work.

 

 

SavorTheBook.com Interview with MondoSamu.com Part 1

I am extremely pleased and honored to have been interviewed by the great folks over at SavorTheBook.com for a series on my process of losing weight through Mindful Eating, and Mindful Living. 

Please head over there and check it out.  If you like what you see, share it with others.

Thank you for your interest!!

Five Spare Tires

(I apologize in advance for the crazy length of this post.  I've written and re-written it many times.  I've been struggling to write it and to express what I have to say.  Ultimately, I made the decision tonight to just put it up and be done with it.  I'm sorry it's so much, but it's my great hope that someone out there will find it motivational and that it will encourage them to find their way.  If you're that person, looking for a way, then read on!)

You ever try to visualize what weighs the amount of weight you have lost, or want to lose?  For most folks it would be a small hand weight.  Maybe a good sized bag of dog food.  Here's a short list of items that weigh the same as how much I have lost.  Try to visualize these things, and carrying them around with you, in your head.

~ ONE WHOLE FRIEND OF MINE!
~ THREE of my four year old daughter.
~ FIVE 20 pound bags of Dog Food.
~ FIVE SPARE CAR TIRES!!!
~ TWENTY average bags of potatoes!

 You get the idea.  It's a LOT!  I don't point this out to pat myself on the back, but to illustrate how CRAZY it is that I was walking around with all that extra weight!  It's easy to look in the mirror and just see your "self".  But I promise you that if you look in the mirror while standing next to a stack of five car tires, it really drives it home what you are doing to your body!!!

On July 3rd, 2010, I stepped on the scale as I left the house for a vacation.  I was dismayed by the digits it reported.  THREE HUNDRED FORTY NINE POUNDS!  You can read all about that day by clicking here.  I'm not sure exactly when during this day I vowed to do something about my weight, but I did.  I swore I would never hit 350 pounds.  That's when I discovered "Savor" by Dr. Lilian Cheung and Thich Nhat Hanh.

By the time I finished reading "Savor" I had stopped the train, and thrown it in to reverse.  That train had been gathering momentum for over four decades, so it didn't happen instantly.  It slowed.  It stopped.  It switched gears.  And then, with a shudder, it lurched ahead, back the way it came.  The weight started coming off that first day.
My initial goal, to lose 100 pounds, was randomly chosen just based on one simple thing.  I asked myself what it would take to make me feel like I had a fighting chance of living a healthy life.  At 349 pounds, 249 sounded like a dream, but it also sounded like the most I could weigh if I wanted to live long enough to enjoy my family, watch my daughter grow up, and all the other things I would like to do.  Anything more felt like failure to me, and felt like not being serious about it.  ALL I was really after was survival, which at the time I was seriously starting to question my chances of.

I've blogged before, often, about the various tools I have used to lose weight and assist me on this journey.  The primary app I have used is LoseIt!  When I started using it, it asks if you want to lose 1 pound a week, or 2.  I chose 2 and it calculated that I would hit my goal in one year. Unfortunately, I didn't make a note of what day that would be.  I've always assumed my "start" date as July 3rd, when I saw my 349 pound weight.  In reality it was around July 23 from what I can tell in LoseIt!'s web site.

At first, the weight was coming off incredibly fast at several pounds per week.  Then, once I lost about 60 pounds or so, it slowed to a few pounds, and then a couple of pounds per week.  Ultimately, toward the end, there were some weeks where I didn't lose any at all, and I started wondering if I would hit the goal on time.  What was happening is that my goal was nearing the end, so the calories were pretty
well balanced out with what I was burning.  Ultimately, it took me about 11 months - almost precisely - to lose 100 pounds!  I can't even pretend not to be pleased with myself here, so forgive me that little self indulgent pat on the back now.

So here I am, at about 248 as I write this, and I am definitely still very much over weight for my size.  Don't get me wrong, I look and feel GREAT compared to where I started but I still need to shed a little more.  When considering future goals, I decided not to have any.  What I have found is that throughout this process, I have lost weight without much effort (more on that later).  Since I'm not on a diet, and I'm not doing anything specifically special to lose weight, I decided that I might as well just keep going with what I am doing.  The weight has already leveled off considerably, and I figure if I just keep up the efforts I am making, the weight will come off - or it won't.  Either way, I win.  At some point my body will be at a naturally comfortable weight, and meanwhile I can focus on starting to exercise a little more than my current walking and Tai Chi Routine.

People seem divided in to two camps immediately upon hearing that I have lost so much weight. One faction immediately assumes I'm on some crazy diet.  They can't believe when I tell them I eat whatever I feel like eating, that I finish every night off with a big bowl of frozen yogurt and that I'm NOT on any sort of diet, per se.  The other faction is of the mind that I have super-human strength and will-power, neither of which could be further from the truth.  When they say "yeah, but you're the most strong-willed person I know" or "you have such tremendous dedication" I always have weird reactions emotionally.  I get simultaneously insulted and proud.  Proud, because it feels good to hear this and I like to think it's a little true, although it's really not very true.  Insulted because it's so NOT true that I get a little offended I guess because I'm not getting credit for the proper thing.  They are crediting me with having the will-power to resist eating poorly, but they should be giving the credit to Mindfulness.

When I tell them "Mindfulness", in answer to their inevitable "How are you doing it?" question, they always look at me a little funny and immediately dismiss me as a crackpot, or so it seems to me.  They almost look like they think I'm about to sell them something.  In fact, that's EXACTLY what they think.  Bottom line though, I lost this weight by doing many things, but especially by being mindful as taught to me by Dr. Lilian Cheung and Thich Nhat Hanh in "Savor".

The secondary thing I credit my success to is watching my calories closely which can be done in any number of ways.  The way that worked best for me (and I tried MANY) was the LoseIt! app.  It's worth noting that the app improved massively over time, and especially improved it's web site over time.  The web site can be used FULLY without a phone, so it's really great now for anyone (not just us iOS users). I fully believe that if you use mindfulness, the rest will fall in to place naturally and organically with little to no effort.  The effort will come from trying to implement mindfulness which, to the degree that I have so far been mindful, was fairly easy for me.  When asked, I tell people (to their absolute and utter disbelief) that it was no effort at all.  My standard answer to "How did you do it?" is always the same - "Mindfulness".

While I am not a doctor, and have no authority with which to offer anyone advice on weight loss, I CAN speak to how it worked for me, and that is it.  One of the things I love about Buddhism is that it discourages you from believing what someone else tells you is true, and encourages you to experience it for yourself and then decide if it is true.  "Be a lamp unto yourselves", the Buddha allegedly said in his final moments, directing us to seek the knowledge from within, rather than from external sources.  Or, for you Christian readers, perhaps another way to say it is "The Kingdom of God is within".  Either way...try mindfulness out, and see if it works for you.

It's obvious (and if not I've written numerous blog posts about it that will explain) why I decided to lose this weight.  But what I would rather talk about is the not so obvious reasons why.  I'm grateful that I have lost this weight because:

~ I might live longer
~ I have already become a significantly better father.
~ I like to think I am a better husband.
~ I have confronted the one thing in life I've always felt powerless to defeat.
~ I have gained control over my eating habits.
~ Countless other reasons I can't begin to list.
~ I am more aware of life, and each moment it offers.
~ Perhaps most of all, I'm extremely grateful to have discovered Buddhism through this most unexpected of paths.

So, in summary, Please - If you want or need to lose weight, but think you can't do it - go get a copy of "Savor" and, well, SAVOR IT!  Read it, absorb the information, read it again.  Then just DO IT!  Start with the Apple Meditation and then repeat that type of mindful eating each time you sit down to eat.  You will not succeed every single time at being completely in the moment, but when you are not, just re-focus the next time.  And repeat.  And repeat.  And repeat!  Before you know it, you will be well on your way.

Savor every moment of life that you are fortunate enough to have.  If you do this, I am walking evidence that you WILL lose the weight, and it's NOT some impossible goal that only that other guy over there has figured out how to do because he's some super strong willed guy.  And it's not something that only that other girl over there can do because she's on some crazy fad diet.

But don't take my word for it.  YOU already know exactly what to do, you just have to be mindful so that you know when to get out of your own way, and let your brain and body take care of themselves properly!  You'll likely find that they will.

Best wishes and warm regards to you in your efforts!  And special thanks to all the folks who rooted for me!  It was a big help, and you know who you are!

MS

Lose 100 Pounds In One Year - CHECK!

I'll write at length about this, very shortly, but wanted to announce it right away.  About a week ago I saw the numbers "249" on my scale for the first time in many years.  This is different from 349 when I started!  Anyhow, I gave it a week to make sure and I'm happy to say I haven't gone up and I'm not dreaming.  I really have lost ONE HUNDRED POUNDS!

Again, I'll write about my thoughts and experiences with this, but just wanted to say it here!

Have a GREAT day!

MS

MondoSAMU, Now With More Samu & 26% Less Fat!

I have not been writing as much as I would like lately. There are a number of reasons for this, but primarily it has been my deeper exploration of the Buddhist path.  Since starting this weight loss process, when I read "Savor", I have taken quite an interest in the Buddhist aspect of it, and I have grown in that area steadily.  In fact, I would say that the weight loss has taken a back seat to the exploration of Buddhism in the  last several months as I slowly realized that the weight loss was a simple and natural by-product of my mindfulness and Buddhist efforts.  At the time of my post, some months ago, about my visit to the Dallas meditation center, I saw that I was at a critical juncture in the Buddhist aspect of my journey. 

That experience solidified a number of thoughts I'd been pondering such as my feelings about meditation and how beneficial I thought that it might be for me and my thoughts on Buddhism as it fits in to my life.  Most of all, I now had to decide what tradition of Buddhism I was interested in pursuing, if any. 

With those things solidified, new questions unfolded before me.  To assist with these, I really dove in to reading a lot of books, listening to a lot of audio books and podcasts, and talking with as many other Buddhists as I have been able to.  I also continued trying to find Buddhist groups that I could visit with to see which appealed to me.  When I was last at the Dallas meditation center, brother ChiSing suggested that I do this, and it has been excellent advice.  Specifically, he said that I wouldn't find anything exactly like the DMC but that there would be numerous similar groups and that I should try them all until one felt comfortable.

I'm still in the process of doing so, but it's becoming clear to me that I will ultimately need to try and get a Sangha started in my area if I want a group close to home.  But that's another story.  And a story I am working on!

So, I guess the reason I am writing today is that I feel like I have an overwhelming amount of things to share, and I am hoping to get back to writing here more often.  Due to my submersion in reading, I have tons of experiences and books to review.  Appropriately, I am writing this post as I am 38,000 feet in the air, heading to Dallas, where I expect to visit the DMC again and sit with them.  I'm sure I will write about that experience again as well.

One of the reasons I started this blog was to share my experiences, but at least equal to that was the goal of any readers sharing their thoughts and experiences with me as well.  So it is my hope that anyone reading this will chime in and share their stories, questions and advice as well.  Here's just a few of the things I am exploring at the moment.  Any feedback or suggestion is most welcome.

- What has been your experience finding a Sangha near you?
- If you didn't have one close to home, how have you dealt with that?
- What tradition do you follow, if any, and why?
- How do you use technology and the Internet in your practice?

Lastly, I'd like to share two more things.  Today, I stepped on the scale before leaving for the airport (exactly as I did 10 months ago) and found that I have officially lost 90 pounds of my 100 pound goal so far!  Also, Happy Mothers day to all of the Moms out there!

Be well,
MS

Savor: Mindul Eating, Mindful Living is Now In Paperback!

I saw a post on the SavorTheBook blog that they have released the paperback version of the book and they are celebrating by giving it away for *FREE*!

Anyone who reads here regularly probably knows that, while I use a variety of technology (iPhone, iPad, various apps, books and more) to assist with my weight loss and lifestyle changes, "Savor" is the foundation of my entire plan.  I aslo credit "Savor" as being the root of my success.  All the other tools are great and incredibly useful in their own ways, but without the day-to-day mindfulness techniques I learned in "Savor" I would not have been able to lose the weight.  I am thoroughly convinced of this.

Anyhow, if you want to check it out and give it a try for yourself click on the links in this post to go to their page and enter to win your *FREE* copy!  They are entering everyone who joins the Savor Community today, to win a free copy.  You can also "like" their post on FaceBook for a chance to win.

You can find them on FaceBook (SavorTheBook) or Twitter ( @SAVOR_the_book ).

I hope you'll check them out.  It's great stuff!
Regards,
MS

I'm Positive That Negativity Sucks!

Man, I had a great weekend!  It sped by, as they tend to do, but it was great.  There wasn't anything special about it.  No big exciting fun.  Just lots and lots of little moments that were great.  Friday night, I had an excellent walk.  Saturday morning I spent time with a friend and my daughter, then more time with another friend and both our kids.  Had a nice lazy day around the house the middle part of Saturday.  Home alone for a few hours to read and relax.  Nice evening.  Sunday I hung out with my brother for a few hours, then more home alone time.  Sunday evening I took a great walk in the park at dusk.  The whole thing was just nice.  Here's a pic from the park.

Now, by this time you might be wondering what the title of this post has to do with the great weekend I had.  Well, here it is.

Friday night, I also had a lengthy phone conversation with a friend who was being extremely negative and complaining about everything, and they actually irritated me which is rare.  Saturday, another friend made a couple of sideways stabs at me online with some holier than thou attitude and crap.  I had a few minor disagreements with a couple of family members.  One of my favorite authors posted some blog stuff that was real negative.  As I said, he's a favorite of mine, and he's a cool guy, but his books and posts can sometimes come across as really negative.  And a bunch of other little minor annoying stuff happened that was a drag as well.

But come Monday morning, when I got to work and people asked me how my weekend was, I told everyone how GREAT my weekend was, and none of those crappy things came to mind at all.  This is generally how I live life.  I'm USUALLY a happy person with low stress.  I simply don't care about, or am not bothered by, most of lifes little annoying bitches and moans.  I'm not perfect, and I do my own share of negative business, but the majority of the time, my outlook is pretty happy and positive.

I was reading some stuff about Buddhism and negativity, and found a great quote by the Dalai Lama saying "...is an action influenced by anger not very likely to cause more negativity?"

That makes a lot of sense, right?  I mean, if I let all those little things get to me, and lashed out (more angrily than the polite lashing out that I did) at my friend who was being so negative, or if I pointed out to my "holier than thou" friend that his negative attack was worse for his Karma than the thing he perceives me to be guilty of, or if I just hauled off and pimp-slapped some of the people who pissed me off...no good would come of it.

Instead, I am happy to say that - with the exception of being slightly annoyed or perhaps even tickled by these things - most of this stuff doesn't even come up on my radar.  The more annoying things do, but even they are quickly forgotten.  As always, it is mindfulness that helps me with this.  Having a mindful hang-out with my brother or friends, some mindful walking in the park or my favorite of all - mindful breakfast with my daughter, just makes those negative things so unimportant that I mostly forget about them.  It's a great thing.

So, why write about them?  Am I being negative by just talking about these things at all?  Probably.  But I decided to write this post in the hopes that someone, ANYone, out there might read this and take a pause to think about whether they are sniping at their friends, or snapping at their loved ones or just taking pot shots at their acquaintances.  We all do it at some point or another.  And if they find that they are, maybe take a minute to reflect on why we feel we need to do this, then take a few more moments to be mindful.

Not only will this mindfulness possibly prevent them from being hateful or hurtful to others, but more than likely it will probably make them happier in their own lives which is probably the source of the trouble to start with.

Just a few thoughts for you on this fine Monday Tuesday (I didn't have time to post this yesterday)!  Have a good one!
MondoSamu

E=mc2

I don't have a lot to write about this, but I wanted to take a moment to recognize a milestone.  This blog is about learning from one another, and about my self-work, and to that end I wanted to let everyone know where this path I started down seven months ago this week has led.

Seven months ago, I stepped on a scale and saw - to my utter astonishment - the numbers that FINALLY snapped me awake and made me take action.  Those numbers were 3-4-9.  I've written about this before, so I won't repeat the story, but the short version is I weighed myself before a vacation and was positively stunned to see that I essentially weighed 350 pounds!

That moment came after a number of other factors which, I guess, started with a visit to an old friend's place during which the torture he had put himself through in life culminated, during my visit, with him being rushed to the hospital in congestive heart failure.  That same weekend, one of my other dear friends showed up after no contact for 15 years and was significantly heavier than when I last saw him.  He was always rail thin, so this new obese version of him, was unsettling.  Anyhow, point is, that I decided that weekend that I needed to do something drastic about my weight, but it wasn't until a couple of months later when I stepped on that scale that things clicked in to place and I knew I needed to act fast.

On the second day of that vacation I discovered "Savor: Mindful Eating, Mindful Living" by Thich Nhat Hanh and Dr. Lilian Cheung.  This book, as I have written here many times and in many ways, illuminated the path that I had started walking down.  It didn't actually make the decision for me, but it showed me the way, once I had decided, to where I wanted to be.

Today, seven months later, I have lost three fourths of the weight I set out to lose in one year.  With five months still to go on my goal time frame, I have already lost SEVENTY FIVE POUNDS!  I won't go on about that much here as, around the 70 pound mark just recently, I was humbly honored to be featured on the Savor The Book Blog if you want to read about that.

I feel better, I live better, I eat better, I'm happier, my life is changed in countless ways.  My goal is 100 pounds, and then re-evaluation, and I WILL get there.  The truly interesting thing is, however, that I no longer care about that goal.  Sure, I want to achieve it.  Sure I want to be as healthy as possible, but I have already achieved the thing that matters.  I have truly, meaningfully, changed my life!  I make great choices now with regard to food, relationships, health and just my very moment to moment existence!

I do this, every moment of NOW, through MINDFULNESS.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I'm perfect or my life is perfect, but I've definitely discovered that mindfulness is the key to being truly happy.  I've written many times that if you insert mindfulness in to your life, you will do the single most important thing you can to achieve your goals, because this one act will help all the other things you want to fall in to place.  It's as though your body already knows what to do, and right from wrong, you just have to make your brain get out of the way and mindfulness will do that for you!

At any rate, I am very pleased and proud to be where I am with my journey of weight loss and life improvement and I just wanted to share these thoughts with you.  Please, PLEASE, if you are reading this and have any thoughts, doubts or fears, that you can't lose weight, know that you CAN!  My best recommendation is to start with "Savor", and implement mindfulness. The rest will take care of itself in time.  It reminds me of the ant in that classic Johnny Hart "B.C." Comic Strip, when he kicks a snowflake off a hilltop and it rolls down, picking up mass, and obliterates all the caves and he just says "E=mc2".  Your good choices are the snowflake, and mindfulness is the hill.  You are the ant making the decision to kick the snowflake.

E=mc2!

MondoSamu

MondoSamu Featured On "Savor The Book Blog"!

I am so very proud to say that Dr. Lilian Cheung, Co-Author of the book "Savor: Mindful Eating, Mindful Living", and her team recently gave me the wonderful opportunity to write a post as a "Guest Blogger" on their SavorTheBook.Com Blog!

It was posted a couple of days ago, and is live on their blog right now.  It's about how I discovered Savor, applied mindfulness and have lost over 70 pounds now.  It also talks about some of the things I have done to get here. My hope is that something there will help you in your own weight loss journey!

If you have a moment, please visit the Savor The Book Blog and give it a read.  I hope you enjoy it, and thank you all for reading here!

My greatest pleasure is to hear from some of you that this site has helped you in your own journey some how.  I had one person tell me that it was "what she needed to hear right now", which meant a lot to me, because it was what I needed to hear when I heard it.

My warmest regards,
Geo

BOOK REVIEW: Buddha's Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love and Wisdom

Being a tech-head, and professional problem solver, I tend to enjoy knowing how and why things work the way they do.  A friend of mine, who has a blog called Dharma Loss, is also in a similar line of work and has written a two part post on the very subject (Check his posts out here: Hacking The Brain & Hacking The Brain Part 2).  He has specifically mentioned that he has an interest in "re-wiring" his brain, and that Buddhism is helping him with that.  He enjoys knowing how his brain is wired.  Here's a quote from his posts on the topic that I liked: 

"I don’t know about you, but the thought of rewiring my own brain to change the way it operates is exciting. This may be because my brain has some great things going for it that I’d love to improve and its got some patterns that really aren’t healthy and need to be changed for the better. Either way, those are some pretty good motivators to want to rewire myself."
        ~ The Dharma Loser

So when I saw "Buddha's Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love and Wisdom" on the shelf, and read the back cover, it appealed to my thirst for knowing how things work, but also because it sounded very similar to some of the things I've read on his blog.  My thought was "I know at least two guys with these issues, so chances are "Buddha's Brain" will not only be helpful to us, but others might find it helpful as well!"

I snagged it on audio, and began listening.  The only nice thing I can say about the audio version of this book is that it piqued my interest enough that I rushed out to buy the print version.  I try always to be positive and I try, really hard, to only blog about items I LIKE.  I try never to blog about my dislikes because my goal is positivity.  So...suffice it to say that I very much LOVED the print version of this book, and will not be discussing the audio any further in this review! ;-)

The authors, Rick Hanson (also a Ph.D., Neuropsychologist, and Teacher) teams up with Richard Mendius (board certified Neurologist with a subspecialty in the neurobiology and practice of meditation) and produced "Buddha's Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love and Wisdom" to show us that the path of the Buddha can actually reveal ways that understanding the science of happiness can help us re-wire our brains to make us happier!

I won't kid you..."Buddha's Brain" is not light reading for the average person, but if you are at all interested in how the human brain works, and how you can re-wire your thoughts to reach a happier state, then it's definitely some interesting stuff.

The author explains how our brains have evolved toward keeping us safe from external threats.  Due to this evolution. our inherent negativity leads to suffering. They postulate that by using meditation and the ways of the Buddha, you can cause the reactions in the brain that create neural pathways to actually become more positive.  Essentially saying that if we act positive, we will become positive.

The constant mindfulness and attention to "Right Action" and Right Thinking" and other precepts of Buddhism naturally and organically lend themselves to this pursuit. 

I'm no neuroscientist, but I can tell you from experience that mindfulness and positive thinking vastly improve ones' disposition, so it all makes perfect sense to me. 

While "Buddha's Brain" didn't reveal any major mysteries to me, I did find it to be very interesting.  Perhaps the most interesting thing about it, for me, was that it puts Buddhism in a scientific perspective.  It shows that you can use the ways of Buddhism to achieve quantifiable scientific mental health benefits, whether you subscribe to the tenets of Buddhism or not.

Because of this, I would feel this book is best for those who might not yet be terribly familiar with Buddhism, but are looking for help with happiness, or for those who are considering Buddhism but find it all a little mystical for their tastes.  I say this because I think a lot of people hear "Buddha" and think "esoteric".  If you were one of those people, or more likely if you KNOW someone like that, then this book might remove that veil of mysticism some people can't see past and put things in much more concrete scientific terms.  Telling someone to recite a meditation such as "Breathing in, I am grateful to my body.  Breathing out, I smile at my body" might sound a little strange to those unfamiliar with Mindful Meditation.  Explaining to them that if they do, it will scientifically increase their happiness and how…well, some might find that very helpful.

While "Buddha's Brain" probably isn't for everyone, I would say that it's extremely valuable for those who want to understand the science of happiness a little better.

Mondo Samu

Mondo Samu Site Maintenance - COMPLETE!

OK, my changes have all been implemented, and as far as I can tell there are no issues with any of it.

Aside from my own permissions changes on the back end, the blog should now post to my Twitter (@mondosamu) and Facebook (Mondo Samu) accounts automatically.

I'll be testing it out of the next few days/weeks.

Let me know if anyone has any questions or issues with any of it.

Thanks!!
MS