{"id":781,"date":"2018-12-26T11:22:00","date_gmt":"2018-12-26T17:22:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/rglongpre.ca\/naturism\/?p=781"},"modified":"2025-11-08T12:44:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-08T18:44:07","slug":"boxing-day-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rglongpre.ca\/naturism\/boxing-day-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"Boxing Day 2018"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s almost a new year, the darkest time of the year. Even though the lights are on, there always seem to be more shadow than light. At my home, like so many other homes, Christmas lights are turned on for the evening and the early morning, when we are awake. We turn them off when going to bed, leaving the house in complete darkness, except for the blinking blue and green lights of various electronics.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s the season of post-Christmas blues when the bits of light in the darkness can\u2019t seem to cut through the shadows that slip in to our lives once the hoped for magic of the holidays has proven as elusive as trying to catch a glimpse of Santa Claus. We are left deflated in spirits and inflated with too much eaten, especially those sweet things that tempt when we are most vulnerable which then leave us even more depressed because of sugar-induced lows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the past, at those bleaker moments, I used to turn to my guitar, usually played quietly the shadows, like Joy illustrates above. The music becomes a meditative prayer that washes over the soul, as long as it is soft and gently rhythmical \u2013 no harsh volume or racing tempos. And then, with the spirit within stilled, I would breathe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This morning I opened up Pema Chodron\u2019s book, When Things Fall Apart<\/em> to find some wisdom that I felt was needed after seeing a cartoon that ridiculed pre-Christmas shoppers with the fact that all the presents they had bought were now 60% off. Such a cartoon \u2013 I can\u2019t find it now, so I chose the image above to better illustrate that post-Christmas \u201clet-down\u201d which highlights the dark side of our \u201ccrazy mixed-up minds.\u201d Chodron talks about meditation:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

\u201cit\u2019s such a help in working with our crazy mixed-up minds to remember that what we\u2019re doing is unlocking a softness that is in us and letting it spread. We\u2019re letting it blur the sharp-corners of self-criticism and complaint.\u201dPema Chodron, When Things Fall Apart, p. 140.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s almost a new year, the darkest time of the year. Even though the lights are on, there always seem to be more shadow than light. At my home, like so many other homes, Christmas lights are turned on for … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rglongpre.ca\/naturism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rglongpre.ca\/naturism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rglongpre.ca\/naturism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rglongpre.ca\/naturism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rglongpre.ca\/naturism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=781"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/rglongpre.ca\/naturism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/781\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":793,"href":"https:\/\/rglongpre.ca\/naturism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/781\/revisions\/793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rglongpre.ca\/naturism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rglongpre.ca\/naturism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rglongpre.ca\/naturism\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}