Having had to bear, without being able to defend myself, whatever judgments I triggered during that five days, I realized that the only opinion I was fearing was my own. You can’t actually “feel” someone else’s negative opinion, you can only adopt that opinion yourself, but we explain, apologize, and shy away as if we were actually saving ourselves from judgment. Ironically, the only reason we feel we need saving is because of the judgment we are passing on ourselves.

It is true. The only thought we fear is our interpretation. Maybe this is where alchohol comes in: it is an easy way of shutting up that chatter and change the voice into something else. For a brief moment. Getting rid of that chatter takes time and skill/practice.

Good writing.

I can’t deny the importance of daily meditation anymore, things got too clear for me to ignore what my mind is doing when I’m not looking.

That’s funny. :-)
.-= Suzanne´s last blog ..I Wish I Could Stop Doing This =-.

“you finally realize the obscene volume of chatter that goes on in there on a regular day”… Its almost obscene, isn’t it? No wonder we miss the present moment!!

I also like your analysis of speech and the need we feel to shape our external world with our own opinions, judgements, and explanations (or rather than “shape”, maybe I should say “impose” our own mental constructs on it…).

It’s amazing what silence can teach us, and your story and discoveries are inspirational. Regarding the football throwing… maybe underneath that need to apologize is some perceived need or desire for perfection… some judgement that if the ball isn’t thrown right every time it’s simple not a “good enough” game of catch… just a thought!

Cheers, and look forward to going through your archives and what else you have to come.
Miche :)
.-= Miche | Serenity Hacker´s last blog ..Accepting Suffering and A Call for Compassion =-.

Is it realistic to expect any of us to live life in a way that we will never need to apologize? Our knee jerk reaction is “Of course not. Mistakes are human and natural.” But there are different degrees of mistakes one can make. Some are reasonable to ourselves and our friends, and some are not.

I can be late to an important meeting because of a freak car accident that blocked off the road for an hour. That’s reasonable; I would only apologize as a formality, but would not feel bad or expect blame. I can be late because of a rare fifteen minute traffic delay. That’s less reasonable; I would apologize, feel somewhat guilty for not having left myself a fifteen minute buffer, and expect my coworkers to be low-level annoyed. I can be late because I stayed up watching the complete second season of Lost, forgot to set my alarm, and slept in. That’s even less reasonable; I would apologize, feel completely at fault and somewhat worthless, and expect my coworkers to see this as a major strike against me. In each situation, my level of culpability determines my need to apologize.

I wonder if you feel you should practice more awareness when you stand near doors, if you need to apologize there because you think you are a space cadet too often. Maybe you need to apologize to your catch buddies because you feel you see throwing as a basic skill that you’d like to have, and at some level would like to have more practice throwing and even some knowledge on throwing technique from an instructional YouTube or two.

Often, overapologizing says less about a meek personality, and more about a lack of confidence in one’s lifestyle choices. Let me know what you think.